Mrs. Doubtfire (Broadway) NYC Reviews and Tickets
About the Show
Production Covid-19 Safety ProtocolsShow-Score Member Reviews (370)
See it if This show was incredibly clever, captivating us from start to end. Hilarious content alongside more touching emotional aspects. Brilliant.
Don't see it if If you don’t have a sense of humour!
See it if You love a light hearted comedy. Awesome if you have kids who may have not seen the movie yet because they will enjoy it too.
Don't see it if You don’t like a lighthearted good time
See it if You’d like to see an earnest attempt by the performers to raise the material higher than it is, with a few toe-tapping and heartfelt scenes.
Don't see it if You are a purist of the source material or otherwise are hoping that it has been enhanced better than it is.
See it if -
Don't see it if -
See it if You want a good laugh, a heartwarming story, impressive acting, and if you are a fan of the movie
Don't see it if You want a dance-heavy show, the dance numbers weren’t that that big/often
See it if you love stage adaptations and great acting performances. A serviceable score with a few nice songs.
Don't see it if you aren't a fan of the movie. Something felt off about this production, it was simply okay.
See it if You love the movie with entertaining music mixed in it.
Don't see it if You didn't like the movie because it is basically the movie with entertaining songs added. Read more
See it if You love the original source material! It has to be understood going into this show that he is not the hero. It works hard not to be tphobic
Don't see it if You can’t put aside the outdated use of a man in woman’s close. This show is definitely more sensitive about the topic and makes it clear
Critic Reviews (21)
"But the director Jerry Zaks’s ambivalent production tries to have it both ways: The story of a playful man-child with whom we empathize but whose good intentions can’t excuse his machinations. The film pulled it off at the time, primarily thanks to Williams’s charms. McClure’s Daniel, though, is more irritating than entertaining, and his antics — which include hacking into his wife’s email account to sabotage her nanny search — are more creepy than kooky."
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"Have I seen the new Broadway musical Mrs. Doubtfire? At this point, I am fairly confident that I have; ask me in three months, and I’m not sure what I’ll tell you. This pleasant and forgettable show at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre is the epitome of what Sondheim (citing his friend Mary Rodgers) called a “Why” musical: “a perfectly respectable show, based on a perfectly respectable source, that has no reason for being.” Mrs. Doubtfire hopes to draw on audiences’ residual affection for the 1993 Robin Williams film comedy, in which a divorced dad named Daniel disguises himself as a hearty old Scottish nanny so he can spend time with his kids. We’ve already had musical versions of Tootsie and Mary Poppins; now we have the hybrid we never knew we needed and, as it turns out, we don’t."
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"What it lacks in fresh laugh-out-loud moments, honest-to-goodness heart, and sonic earworms you can’t wait to hear again, the new Broadway musical Mrs. Doubtfire tries hard to make up for with cranked-up performances and a busy, busy, busy tone. No such luck. For all of the calories burned, it’s still low-impact."
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"So the show’s pleasures ebb and flow. I will say, I assumed that I’d find Mrs. Doubtfire dated and passé. Yet there’s a central proposal in it that is still radical. If you’ve read anything about the numbers of women leaving the workforce, the uneven burden placed on mothers, the crisis of underpaid child care and unpaid domestic labor, you know that Mrs. Doubtfire is still a utopian dream."
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"The amount of talent behind the high-spirited, very sporadically fun Mrs. Doubtfire is undeniable, from the creators of the low-key brilliant Something’s Rotten!, the legendary director Jerry Zaks, and MVP star Rob McClure, whose quicksilver vocal impressions and comedic shape-shifting more than rival the same attributes that made the movie’s Robin Williams a comedy icon. Yet all of that combined know-how can only serve to shine and polish a creaky machine that probably should have been junked and sold for parts well before its arrival on Broadway."
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"A good time for all ages, despite our beloved, battered Broadway, is exactly what the audience-friendly, warm-centered, modestly scaled “Mrs. Doubtfire” delivers. In other seasons, this show might have looked like more of the same. Fair enough. It’s retro. It’s old-school musical comedy. It’s no font of formative innovation. But this year, the breadth of its target demographic stands out. Certainly, it’s the best current choice for families visiting the city and looking for a fresh show to see together.
This superbly cast musical has been given a whiz-bang farcical staging by the wily old maestro Jerry Zaks, who has installed more physical shtick, especially from the droll ensemble, in almost any show since “The Producers.”"
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"But even in the belabored tradition of screen-to-stage musical adaptations, “Mrs. Doubtfire” is doggedly risk-averse, opting for handsomely outfitted, faithful simulacrum over reinvention or surprise. “Hairspray” it is not."
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"But McClure’s gifts — robustly on display in the musical that marks its official opening Dec. 5 at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre — don’t include a radiant star element. It’s a wholly admirable, workmanlike performance: technically impressive if not charismatically embraceable. “Mrs. Doubtfire,” then, directed by Jerry Zaks — a pro with an innate sense of farcical mechanics — feels like an erratic musical-theater equivalent of a tribute band."
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