Mrs. Doubtfire
6 / 10
Have I seen the new Broadway musical Mrs. Doubtfire? At this point, I am fairly confident that I have; ask me in three months, and I'm not sure what I'll tell you. This pleasant and forgettable show at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre is the epitome of what Sondheim (citing his friend Mary Rodgers) called a 'Why' musical: 'a perfectly respectable show, based on a perfectly respectable source, that has no reason for being.' Mrs. Doubtfire hopes to draw on audiences' residual affection for the 1993 Robin Williams film comedy, in which a divorced dad named Daniel disguises himself as a hearty old Scottish nanny so he can spend time with his kids. We've already had musical versions of Tootsie and Mary Poppins; now we have the hybrid we never knew we needed and, as it turns out, we don't.
