NYMF: I See London, I See France (The Underwear Musical)

Gina (Sandy Rustin) is having a crisis- it's her 35th birthday, her boyfriend just broke up with her and has run off to Bora Bora with Gina's secretary Bunny leaving her to take over his clients at the ad agency, and everyone is having more sex than Gina- the radio, her roommate (Ronica Reddick), and Gina's hallucinations of 3 lingerie models (Whitney Bashor, Juliana Hansen, and Mandi Miller) all tell her so (More Sex).

This is the opening of Vid Guerrerio and Jeremy Desmon's brilliant new musical I See London, I See France (The Underwear Musical) about a smart-girl ad exec who falls for her himbo underwear model.

Gina's new ad client is an underwear agency- their ads have ALWAYS included the nearly-naked poster boy Kenny (Nicholas Ardell), and three little words.  Her boss Cuda (Jordan Gelber) arranges a meeting at a bar with the poster boy, who, when he arrives, appears to Gina to be in his underwear (more hallucinations).  This is a genius stroke by the writers- seeing him in his underwear right away only shows how really handsome he is once he finally puts his clothes on.  Gina is at first intimidated by Kenny's unearthly studliness, but when he starts making small talk about the weather (Looks Like Rain), they warm up to each other.

Meanwhile the Temp who replaced Bunny (the wonderfully deadpan David Rossmer) has taken over the office and begun a relationship with Randi, Gina's roommate, which will, since he's a temp, only last (Two Weeks Max), which suits both of them fine.  Gina has a dream (the hilarious "Island of Desire"), which leads her to her coup de advertissment: Kenny with clothes on!  Her relationship with Kenny heats up and she tries to become more and more impulsive, freed from too much thinking, freed from being the "Smart Girl".  But Kenny can't keep up with her fervor and when he meets Bunny and they connect, Gina's out of the picture.

The book by Vid Guerrerio is clever, funny, and modern: the spiritual and theatrical descendant of Ally McBeal.  Music by Jeremy Desmon rocks.  The lyrics, by both, are witty and serve the story perfectly.  It's *ahem* the perfect package. 

I especially liked "Smart Girls", "Looks Like Rain", and the titular song (which I didn't even see coming). The cast are all flawless and attractive – Dave Foley once said (about the cast of Friends) that it was unfair that such people should be so attractive AND funny- here they sing divinely as well!  Is there no justice?  Seriously, they're great. 

Jeremy Dobrish's direction is great, serving the show never drawing attention to itself. Costumes by Brenda Abbandandolo are perfect, set by Dustin O'Neill is very impressive, made mainly of projections. Only real flaw is that it's still difficult to have someone in their underwear and hide their microphone pack. The rest of their performances in the NYMF are sold out, so hopefully this wonderful show will have a bigger life in future.

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