Anne Horak as Inga and Roger Bart as Dr. Frankenstein.
- The New Mel Brooks Musical: Young Frankenstein
- Book by Mel Brooks and Thomas Meehan
- Music and lyrics by Mel Brooks
- Directed by Susan Stroman
- Starring Roger Bart, Shuler Hensley, Corey English, Brad Oscar, Beth Curry, Joanna Glushak and Anne Horak
- At the Princess of Wales Theatre
- On Thursday in Toronto
From the very first flashes of the strobe light, you know what you're going to get with Young Frankenstein: a monstrously loud, proud and rude production.
Mel Brooks scored a hit with his 1974 film version of the same Transylvanian tale and the producers (settle down, not those Producers) clearly spared no expense in moving it to the stage, where it played 484 performances on Broadway.
But the tunes are generic, if catchy, and the mishmash of burlesque-ish dance numbers and below-the-belt gags feels as hastily stitched together as the green monster himself. There are some genuinely funny moments, but it just can't keep it up. (And that line, for example, could probably pass as a joke in this show.)
Still, for the most part, it's no fault of the valiant souls giving it the old college try.
IGOR
Cory English is perhaps the one person who really pulls off the flailing, slapstick comedy of this show (his name is pronounced Eye-gor in this show). He slides easily back and forth from snarling sidekick to an occasionally witty, modern commentator on the whole affair - in which a well-intentioned scientist brings a lumbering monster to life in a plot spiced up with romantic liaisons - and he's perhaps the one person who makes the multiple accents many characters have seem wholly intentional. He makes the best of some predictable punch lines and clearly relishes the ones we can't see coming.
DR. FRANKENSTEIN
Roger Bart is one of a pair of holdovers from the Broadway production, and the face of the show. In fact, he pulls what seems like a thousand and one faces, which lead to some of the most well-earned laughs. And while this smiling, not-so-mad scientist is a touch thin on the singing side, it's an actor's role and, more than any other cast member, Bart has that touch of subtlety that carries audiences from gag to gag in Brooks's films.
THE MONSTER
The best part of this show comes exactly where we all expect it: When Shuler Hensley, who has moaned his way through a mostly thankless role up to that point, breaks into a tap routine of Irving Berlin's Puttin' On The Ritz. The tuxedos aren't the only things that make this far and away the most sophisticated and side-splitting scene, and by the time Hensley (the other Broadway returnee) pops back up "talking like Noel Coward," the show's decibel level has come down a welcome notch or two.
FRAU BLUCHER
The hidden gem here is Broadway veteran Joanna Glushak, who is delightfully stern, strict and screechy as the ghoulish matron of the Frankenstein castle. From the raunchy account of her one-time love affair with the elder Frankenstein (singing the peculiarly ribald He Vas My Boyfriend) to her deadpan delivery as the hostess of the Monster's gala performance, Glushak is mostly spot on.
The New Mel Brooks Musical: Young Frankenstein runs until April 18.