SHE LOVES ME at Bucks County Playhouse

On the way out of the Playhouse my friend looked at me and said, "See?  That's a musical. Singing. Dancing. Costumes. Plot. It's a good story and it makes sense."  You can't say fairer than that about She Loves Me, a true Golden Age musical with all the touchstones that made the era great. Created by the immortal team of Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock, if the musical style feels familiar though you don't know the songs, this is the team that brought you Fiddler on the Roof and Cabaret.  It feels even bigger than it is?  Thank Hal Prince, the Prince of Directors in 1963 when it came out.

The original production was 301 performances, not shabby in the days before Cats when the mega-run was created, back in the days when musicals were intended to be followed by another fun, breezy show (think Bells are Ringing and a hundred other great shows now eclipsed by mega shows sung through with chandeliers and helicopters).  The Broadway and West End revivals were rightly award winners. 

At BCP, our unlikely lovers are Georg and Amalia, played delightfully by Broadway veteran Andrew Leeds and by BCP and Broadway vet Elena Shaddow. Romantic pen pals to their unknown "Dear Friend" with each other, they're competing sales clerks in the same shop who'd love to kill each other. Does it feel a bit Fiddler somehow?  You're in pre-war Eastern Europe, in a bespoke perfume shop. Enjoy the ride. Also enjoy Nigel Jamal Hall as Mr. Keller, the flashy lead sales clerk with too much of a way with women, and Broadway star Philip Hoffman as Mr. Maraczek, the store owner. 

Some lovers are star crossed. Amalia and Georg are more like Annie Oakley and Frank Butler without guns. Until they accidentally discover that the pen pals they adore are the real people they most want to kill. A problem?  Maybe. But nothing that angst, music, and good old fashioned Broadway magic can't reconcile. 

Look out here for songs you didn't know you know - "Vanilla Ice Cream" and "She Loves Me" among them. Enjoy the songs with clerks and customers, especially "Twelve Days to Christmas." Can't sing along?  Learn some new songs to sing along to - this is from the days when tors tapped in the audience for good reason. 

No. This is not Les Miserables. It is not Cats. It is not an Andrew Lloyd Webber production. It's a perfect, glowing gem of a musical from the days when a musical did not mean "how over the top can we go."  And it's utterly family friendly without the horror of being overtly and emphatically wholesome.  Go Tap feet. Crave ice cream. See A real BROADWAY happy ending (from the team that ruined happy endings in Fiddler).  It's directed by Broadway veteran Denis Jones, who just made Tootsie look fabulous, and he's done the same here. If only a theatre could do a perfect season of Golden Age musicals and sell it, this is one of the sure hits for that season. See it. 

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