Clueless, The Musical NYC Reviews and Tickets

“Affable but limp...The perverse flattening process that too often occurs when two-dimensional films are translated into the three dimensions of live theater has befallen ‘Clueless’...The whole production suffers from a heightened twinkliness...’Clueless’ cultists will find many of their favorite lines have made it to the stage intact...But the witticisms scarcely register amid the steady trickle of repurposed pop hits.”
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“The flame of originality barely flickers, leaving a show that feels only intermittently fresh, despite the commitment of a perky young cast...How much you get out of the show will depend on your appetite for '90s nostalgia...Some of this is genuinely witty, even if Heckerling's new lyrics are groaning with false rhymes and at times sit awkwardly on the melodies. But I found it all hit-or-miss...A roughly stitched patchwork of second-hand elements."
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“The stage version of this ‘90s teen flick remains a light delight. But a great musical? As if...This playful, upbeat show should be an easy sell...But its lightweight narrative keeps it at the enjoyable-fluff level...Whatever. The look, tone and ’tude of the show is spot-on. Its fantasy life of ultra-rich teens is here further enlivened with songs of the era, cleverly recrafted lyrically for the show by Heckerling...The cast strikes the same happy balance of satire and sincerity as the film’s.”
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“Beverly Hills teen princess Cher Horowitz and her friends sing familiar melodies with dummy lyrics that are truly dumb...Like karaoke night attended by lame improv comics...It’s a pity, because the core material of ‘Clueless’ could have made a perfectly charming musical...’Clueless’ requires a subtler, more intelligent touch. In the end, the creative team is both too faithful to the screenplay and too irreverent with the pop spirit of the period.”
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“A peppy but disappointing stage musical...Another jukebox musical, using approximately 20 ‘90s pop-rock hits...Heckerling awkwardly tinkers with the lyrics in a clunky attempt to make them more applicable to the storyline and characters...Her book closely follows her original screenplay but relies heavily on nostalgia for easy laughs...Hanggi’s production is aggressively silly and self-aware, so much so that it often resembles an affectionate parody.”
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“Cameron is just about perfect as Cher...The people behind ‘Clueless’ should be grateful to Cameron for providing it fizz, for it never reaches a comic detonation point and it suffers from a lack of urgency...‘Clueless’ comes across as a series of disconnected episodes...The narrative line wanders, the laughs are only occasional and fall well short and the songs, with their familiar melodies and new lyrics, fail at the all-important task of making us fall in love with the characters.”
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“Heckerling revels unabashedly in nostalgia, even forgoing an original score to insert winkingly reworked versions of ’90s pop hits made temporarily ubiquitous...Where Silverstone brought a sort of knowing dizziness to the spoiled teenager’s mix of narcissism and genuine good intentions, Cameron is more conventionally ingenuous...Heckerling and Hanggi milk the material...for laughs and general merriment, abetted by Devine’s kinetic, jubilant choreography.”
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“The verdict is: Whatever...The project certainly seemed like a good idea...What’s on stage...Is a pretty good argument for why not. Heckerling seems far too close to her original material, and far too unfamiliar with what makes a ’90s spoof work in 2018...That’s not to say it’s all bad...Cameron’s dynamite...The script...never achieves any lift...Worse are the songs...The lyrics are awful...Ultimately, 'Clueless'...can’t help feeling like a let’s-put-on-a-show college pageant."
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"While 'Clueless, The Musical' is never less than slick and professional in the best possible way, for those who know the iconic film it offers no surprises so slavishly does it follow the original storyline. What was charming in the 1995 movie about Cher's sense of superiority and wishing to help others less fortunate is no longer as acceptable. What was amusing in the era of excess now seems selfish, elitist, and an example of extravagant wastefulness."
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"Daffy but doggedly entertaining stage adaptation...And it’s actually a lot of fun...Much of ‘Clueless, the Musical’ is ‘Clueless, the Movie’, but...Heckerling hasn’t been afraid to replace and refresh much of the dialogue...And Heckerling’s lyrics, which ought to feel tacky...tend to work as silly satire...This musical gets the satire exactly right...The musical pulls 90s teens’ music under that wide net and it’s just enough new bite to make the enterprise worthwhile.”
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"While Heckerling has rejiggered some of the lyrics to make them fit in better with what's happening on stage, her add-ons are awkwardly rhymed and tend to be more witless than witty. But enough complaining. The show does have enough assets to entertainingly distract us from these worst of times that nowadays affect teens everywhere...This is what it is— a fiuffy entertainment with a clever literary link."
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“’Clueless’ includes a nod to today’s activist sentiments, without political overtones...The element that hasn’t strayed too much, if at all, from the movie is the dialog. A lot of it is identical...What saves, and makes, ‘Clueless’ the musical from being a rehash of a who cares teenage privilege movie, into a fun nostalgic evening, is what they’ve done with the music. It took me a couple of songs to catch on, but the music is all iconic songs from the 90’s with rewritten lyrics."
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“Directed with frenetic energy...Cher would fit better over at North Shore High hanging out with the ‘Mean girls’. She wouldn’t be as charming and funny...But as played by...Cameron, she’s basically just a spoiled brat who really isn’t all that likable or kind. She’s definitely not rad enough to drag this cringe-worthy musical out of its messy by the books wordplay of nonsense...Forcing some pretty ridiculous lyrics to be sandwiched into the classic sounds.”
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"Director Kristin Hanggi and choreographer Kelly Devine match the ‘90s pop energy with every staging trick in the book and the effect is undeniably exhilarating...Heckerling’s collaborators ultimately bring a fresher energy to the table than she does, slotting in little touches when they can...For the most part, this is the movie on stage, presented in a truly enjoyable package. That’s more than enough in the moment, but it leaves a poor aftertaste."
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"The show may turn out to be the launching pad for the next great musical theater star: Disney Channel favorite Dove Cameron (who first made an impression on me as Amber von Tussle in NBC's 'Hairspray Live!') is everything you'd want and more as spoiled yet sweet rich kid Cher Horowitz. She's got amazing pipes, superb comic chops and looks fabulous in every one of Amy Clark's dazzling designer-inspired costumes. She's definitely got the Gucci game going on."
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"Cameron's…well-honed perfection as a looker, singer, dancer, and actress lacks Silverstone's spontaneous believability…There's simply too much nonstop, high-energy going on in the music and the acrobatic…choreography…Comic subtlety is abandoned in favor of a relentlessly insistent drive for mile-a-minute entertainment. Heckerling's…filmscript structure makes it difficult to sustain interest in the…shenanigans for the full two and a quarter hours."
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“The best thing about ‘Clueless’ is that it sometimes reminds you what a fresh, flip delight the movie was and is...The road to dull is paved with Heckerling’s good intentions and her iffy follow through...Attempts to situate the action in the music are miss and hit...Most songs have nothing to do...Another show that seems diminished without its original star. Cameron is charming, but she lacks that ridiculous magnetism, which makes her smarts an open question and her stakes awfully low.”
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"The show’s big plus is the performance by Dove Cameron in the lead...The various plot threads are too thin to care much about, including the assorted relationships between Cher and friends and also with Josh,...The rest of the cast members fit neatly into the overall busy entourage. But despite all the show biz know-how and the especially entertaining Cameron, an avalanche of teenage vacuity may be more than some can take.”
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“The musical banks foremost on audience affection for the film, which withstands the test of time as most era-defining classics do. But unlike other popular teen movies recently adapted for the stage, ‘Clueless’ hasn’t undergone one of Cher’s transformative makeovers...Heckerling’s adaptation includes rewritten lyrics to a dozen-plus ‘90s hits that accommodate the story without feeling essential to it...Most unfortunately, the satire Heckerling so perfected in the movie has evaporated.”
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“Heckerling has tinkered around the edges of her screenplay...The actors themselves seem to be mimicking their on-screen counterparts. Even many of the musical numbers, come straight from the film’s soundtrack...‘Clueless’ is just as enjoyable as the film. Cameron lights up the stage as Cher...But the lack of new musical or dramatic material makes that achievement seem like an exercise in painting by numbers."
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“A youthful revel, smartly and lovingly put together with a satiric edge, one that should satisfy the film’s legion of fans...With a jukebox of tunes, the music has a bouncy pop sound...Heckerling’s tangy writing...never dissolves into saccharine...The physical production is first-rate...’Clueless, the Musical’ may indeed be helpless when it comes to avoiding that sight feeling of redundancy. Still, it infatuates as a bright, expansive bubble of a musical.”
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“Though the familiar characters and central romance remain in Amy Heckerling’s musical adaptation of her hit 1995 film, ‘Clueless’, the nostalgia factor is undermined by contrived lyrics, heavy-handed direction, and some very odd design choices. It feels more like a parody rather than a homage. The production has a winking self-awareness that eats away at the original’s warm heart...A capable cast can’t save a tonally mismatched and awkwardly staged musical production."
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“'A Star is Born' is hitting cineplexes everywhere, but it’s really happening in the totally charming lead performance by the totally charming Dove Cameron in The New Group’s totally charming musical adaptation...The cleverest innovation of pop music to create a full musical score in memory...Heckerling’s real ingenuity...is eschewing yet another, original, anonymous pop-rock-Broadway score...The songs actually inform character or move plot...Cameron is the perfect Cher.”
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“It's really good...Heckerling made a series of smart decisions in bringing her funny-yet-heartfelt movie to the stage. The first was using well-known 90's songs, to which she added sharp, funny lyrics. The familiar melodies establish the time period perfectly...The second...was to be true to the original movie...Hanggi's direction is well-paced and -focused. She balances the silliness and meaning perfectly. Hanggi's choreography is energetic, playful, and great fun...Cameron is perfect as Cher.”
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“This musical version of...’Clueless’ is mostly just whack...Heckerling goes the jukebox musical route...While some of the tunes are played pretty much straight, most have had their lyrics radically reworked to fit into Heckerling’s storyline...The best of the new songs are cute, if random...But others come off as embarrassingly amateurish...All the elements that made Heckerling’s movie groundbreaking...here is watered down into the most generic of musical theater adaptations.”
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“Heckerling manages to perfectly capture the spirit, camp, humor, and vibe of the original. In an age of jukeboxes and adaptations, ‘Clueless’ stands out as expertly written, performed, designed, and executed...‘Clueless’ thrives on its camp, cult status, and nostalgia...Heckerling adapted the songs and wrote new lyrics...so they actually advance the plot and make sense for the characters...The musical is consistently hilarious in ways that both mimic the film and somehow feel fresh.”
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"A musical adaptation so insipid it makes one long for the good old days of 1642, when the Puritans shut down all the theaters...Heckerling’s film is capital-g Great, if not particularly good. Yet the musical adaptation wants to be something more; it wants to be topical and, even worse, important, climaxing in an environmental protest that feels neither earned nor particularly genuine."
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