Review: It's Grool. It's Fetch. It's Mean Girls the Musical.

It's easy to be a bit of a mean girl when it comes to cult movies being adapted into musicals. They happen too often, and sometimes they're tragic.

Thankfully, not Mean Girls.

But how can you lose with the team? Tina Fey's adapted the book, and she teamed up with her husband Jeff Richmond for the music. And the lyrics are Nell Benjamin, who blessed us with the lyrics for Legally Blonde.

It expands a bit on the film, diving deeper into character dynamics and making even the meanest ones relatable. It sort of begs the questions...are we all just a little mean sometimes?

Cady Heron (Engish Bernhardt) moves from Africa to America for the first time with her parents, and is instantly thrust into the world of high school. There she meets Janis (Lindsay Heather Pearce) and Damian (Eric Huffman), who team up with her to help take down the school's popular girl trio The Plastics--Regina (Lily Kaufmann), Gretchen (Jasmine Rogers) and Karen (Morgan Ashley Bryant). When Cady develops a crush on Regina's ex-boyfriend, Aaron (Iain Young), the claws come out.

If you don't already know every line from the 2004 movie...who are you, really? It's probably best to make sure you catch that before seeing the musical, just so you feel like one of the cool kids.

While the book is strong, not missing any of the quotable moments and making some of them even better, the music is surprisingly impressive. The songs are catchy, and the music is made for showing off vocals. This cast is stacked.

My favorite was Pearce's Janis, who was made for that role. Her timing is sharp, and her voice is crisp. I was obsessed with everything she did. Alongside Huffman's effervescent Damian, the duo held you in the palm of their hands.

Bernhardt's Cady is just the right fit, able to effortlessly transform the character from weird homeschooled girl into a popular plastic without losing too much of her heart. Kaufman, understudying Regina that evening, gave the perfect energy of that bitch everyone worships, soaring into the rafters with her high notes. Rogers as Gretchen was the most surprisingly nuanced, expanding the movie role into a complex human who just wants to be appreciated. And of course, Bryant's Karen is just as airheaded as you'd hope, but the way the character is written, you kinda understand how her brain works.

The ending gets a little cheesy, but at least it's giving a nice message of inclusivity. For more info on what the Mean Girls tour company is doing to inspire change and positive action, check out their Instagram @changeisfetch.

Side note, to the exhausting gay men sitting directly behind me...NO, you should not say every quote before it happens, sing along, or talk loudly. You're a show ruiner, you ruin people's shows. If you're planning to go to this musical with your gaggle of friends, please don't forget your manners. You can still have fun and not ruin the show for everyone around you.

Mean Girls plays the Buell Theatre through January 1, 2023.

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