Latest news with #Boop!TheMusical
New York Post
02-08-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Post
Broadway is in a bizarre uproar over the race of an actor playing a robot
Broadway has enjoyed a quiet, relaxing and peaceful summer. But show people can't have that! They always need, as Betty sang in the recently shuttered 'Boop! The Musical,' something to shout about. And their something has finally arrived in the form of a piping hot controversy at this year's Best Musical Tony Award winner, 'Maybe Happy Ending.' It's a doozy. Some members of the theater industry are hollerin' 'It's a scandal! It's a outrage!' over the race of an actor who's been cast to play — believe it or not — a robot. 'Maybe Happy Ending,' by the writing team of Hue Park and Will Aronson, is a sweet little science-fiction romantic-comedy that's set in Seoul, South Korea, during the year 2060. The main characters are Oliver and Claire, played by Darren Criss, who's half Filipino, and Helen J. Shen, who's Chinese. Oliver and Claire are robots. 5 There's a controversy brewing over at Broadway's 'Maybe Happy Ending.' Getty Images But the nuts-and-bolts duo have become defunct, so they embark on a quirky adventure to find Oliver's old owner. It's perhaps the nicest show to ever come to Broadway. Or it was. Until this latest fracas. The happiness dimmed when the wonderful, Tony-winning Criss's replacement was announced: actor Andrew Barth Feldman, the fantastic 'No Hard Feelings' star who's also Shen's boyfriend. He's white. Uh oh! In private, many on Broadway are largely OK with that. The most common refrain I've heard is: 'Well, they're robots.' But social media, as it does best, has poured gas on the fire. 5 Andrew Barth Feldman takes on the role of Oliver in September. WireImage Playwright and actor BD Wong, who was a strong voice in 1991 against British actor Jonathan Pryce playing the Eurasian Engineer in 'Miss Saigon' (Wong was absolutely right about that), wrote an essay slamming the choice. And the Asian American Performers Action Coalition came out against it, too. What do the creators have to say? They didn't write the roles to be culturally specific. Because they're robots! Robots don't have a culture. Well, except the Terminator, of course. He loves schnitzel and strudel. 5 'Maybe Happy Ending' won the Tony Award for Best Musical. Christopher Sadowski After the backlash, Aronson and Hue — kind and humble as it gets — explained on Instagram that they set out to create 'a modern 'Fantasticks,' able to be comfortably performed by anyone, anywhere — yet distinctly set in Korea.' Fair enough. Oliver and Claire, they said, are 'products created by a global company' who are 'ethnically undefined.' That makes a lot of sense. Because the characters are robots. The production said in a statement to the Times, 'We are proud to have created a show where every role can authentically be portrayed by an Asian actor, although the roles of the robots were not envisioned to always be cast that way.' 5 Darren Criss won a Tony for his performance. Bruce Glikas/WireImage And that openness has been true throughout the 'Maybe Happy Ending' journey. Aronson told the LA Times back in March that during an early workshop, the parts were taken on by Denée Benton, who's black, and Corey Cott, who's white. See? There's lots of flexibility when casting robots. Look, it's Hue and Aronson's show. They wrote it. Who's to tell them what they can and cannot do and what their intentions were? 5 'Maybe Happy Ending' is the rare musical about robots. CBS via Getty Images The fact is 'Maybe Happy Ending' is the only Broadway musical I am aware of in which the leads are made of metal. (Although I've seen plenty of shows where it sure seemed like they were). It's an extremely unusual circumstance, and hardly one to draw broad conclusions from. In works about Asian humans, like the Imelda Marcos musical 'Here Lies Love,' something like this would never happen anymore. Feldman, who was nothing short of sublime in last season's 'We Had A World,' starts performing at the Belasco Theatre on Sept. 2. The uproar should die down well before that. And then fall on Broadway can resume being 'Happy.'
New York Post
26-06-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Post
‘Boop! The Musical' announces final Broadway show in latest Tony Awards casualty
Boop-Oop-a-Doop! 'Boop! The Musical,' the Broadway play that opened at the Broadhurst Theatre on April 5, has announced its final show date after failing to win big at this year's Tony Awards. The show's producers made the closing announcement on Wednesday, with Playbill confirming that the musical's final show will be July 13 after a total of 25 previews and 112 regular performances. 6 'Boop! The Musical' has announced its final show date after failing to win big at this year's Tony Awards. Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman 6 Playbill confirmed Wednesday that the musical's final show will be July 13 after a total of 25 previews and 112 regular performances. Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman Inspired by the classic Depression-era cartoon character Betty Boop, 'Boop' stars Jasmine Amy Rogers, 26, in the leading role. Directed and choreographed by Jerry Mitchell, the musical follows Rogers' character as she is thrown from her two-dimensional, black-and-white 1930s world to the colorful and vibrant real world of modern-day New York City. But the show, which includes music by David Foster and lyrics by Susan Birkenhead, faced tough competition at the 2025 Tonys. 6 Jasmine Amy Rogers, who played Betty Boop in 'Boop! The Musical,' was nominated for Best Leading Actress in a Musical at the 2025 Tony Awards. Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman Although Rogers was nominated for Best Leading Actress in a Musical and Mitchell was nominated for Best Choreography, the production failed to win either category. This marks the fourth play to take a final bow, drop the curtain and shutter its theater doors for good after losing at the Tonys earlier this month. 'Smash,' which was nominated for Best Choreography and Best Featured Actor, performed its final show on June 22 after 32 previews and only 84 regular performances. 6 'Boop! The Musical' also failed to win a Tony for Best Choreography and Best Costume Design of a Musical. Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman 'Real Women Have Curves' and 'Dead Outlaw' have also announced their final shows after losing out at the Tonys. Both plays will conclude their Broadway runs on June 29. The news that 'Boop' is closing after just three months of regular performances also comes after some behind-the-scenes drama at Broadway's biggest awards show. 6 'Smash' was the first Broadway play to announce it was closing after losing at the 2025 Tony Awards. Matthew Murphy Both 'Boop' and 'Smash' were left out in the cold when the award show's producers refused to let either musical perform during the three-hour CBS broadcast on June 8, even after both productions offered to pay the $300K appearance fee. 'It's bizarre,' one Broadway producer exclusively told the Post as the drama unfolded. Still, 'Boop' received some positive reviews despite its Tony troubles. 6 'Boop' received some positive reviews even despite its troubles at the Tonys. Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman The Post's theater critic, Johnny Oleksinski, celebrated Rogers' performance as a live-action Betty Boop – even if he did admit that the production faced certain challenges. 'The show's biggest challenge exists off-stage: Making Betty Boop a draw 95 years after she debuted,' Oleksinski wrote in his three-star review. 'At this point, the icon isn't really nostalgic to anyone or at the top of anybody's mind.' He added, 'Whatever you may feel about the big-eyed flapper, the attraction today is not the title, but Rogers.'
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Tony nominee Jasmine Amy Rogers on finding the ‘color' in 'Boop! The Musical'
One year after getting rejected for the role, Jasmine Amy Rogers is now Tony-nominated for 'Boop! The Musical.' She and co-star Ainsley Melham join Morning Joe to talk about tap dancing, time travel, and why the show's joyful message—'life isn't full of color until it's filled with love'—is resonating with Broadway crowds.
USA Today
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- USA Today
A Betty Boop musical shouldn't work. But with Jasmine Amy Rogers, it's 'phenomenal.'
A Betty Boop musical shouldn't work. But with Jasmine Amy Rogers, it's 'phenomenal.' Show Caption Hide Caption Betty Boop, Broadway star? New musical reimagines the pop-culture icon Betty Boop trades her cartoon world for New York City in "Boop! The Musical," starring Jasmine Amy Rogers and featuring songs by David Foster. NEW YORK — In high-school choir, Jasmine Amy Rogers discovered Audra McDonald, the six-time Tony-winning Broadway legend. 'I cried the first time I heard her voice,' recalls Rogers, 26. 'I was seeing a Black woman do something I don't think I'd ever seen before and it changed my life. I was able to look at myself in a different way. Now she's right next door, which is out of this world.' The powerhouse performers are starring just steps away from each other on 44th Street: McDonald in 'Gypsy' at the Majestic Theatre, and Rogers in 'Boop! The Musical' at the Broadhurst. They are also both nominated for best leading actress in a musical at the Tony Awards, airing June 8 from Radio City Music Hall (8 ET/5 PT on CBS and streaming on Paramount+). 'I'm just the luckiest girl in the world,' says Rogers, who is making her Broadway debut as Betty Boop, the spit-curled, baby-voiced flapper whose visage has become a familiar staple of American pop culture. The unlikely musical comedy imagines if Betty traded her black-and-white, pen-and-ink world for the hustle and bustle of present-day New York, where she falls in love with a dashing trumpeter (Ainsley Melham) and brings down a corrupt mayoral candidate (Erich Bergen). Betty made her first appearance in 1930 in Fleischer Studios' 'Dizzy Dishes.' Many of her earliest cartoons centered on Betty being chased and preyed upon by creepy men, although the stage show helps bring the sexpot into the 21st century, showing how she has always been a subversive, feminist icon, with varied careers and an unwavering moral compass. 'She has such a strong sense of right and wrong, and loves other people,' Rogers says. The character's popularity peaked nearly 90 years ago, meaning many audiences seeing 'Boop!' will be introduced to her for the first time. 'It's liberating, because we've gotten to take so much ownership of her. It's really, really special to get to bring new life to Betty.' How Jasmine Amy Rogers 'completely transforms' into Betty Boop For Rogers, 'it's been a long, long road' to playing Betty on Broadway. In early workshops of the show, she was originally cast as Trisha, a teenage Boop superfan now portrayed by actress Angelica Hale. But when the youthful character was reconceived, she went back to the drawing board and auditioned to play Betty herself. Initially, "I kind of blew it,' Rogers says. 'I was so nervous to the point where I couldn't get any of the dancing down. I was just a wreck.' But after finishing her stint on the 'Mean Girls' national tour, Rogers was eager to take another crack at the role. 'I contacted my agents and was like, 'I need to get back in. I just have this feeling.'' After a half dozen rounds of auditions, Rogers was eventually cast as Betty, and led the musical's out-of-town tryout in Chicago in late 2023. To inhabit Betty, 'the physicality was very nerve-racking for me,' she admits. The newcomer enrolled in tap classes, and trained fastidiously with associate choreographer Rachelle Rak, figuring out how an animated siren might walk and stand. She also perfected Betty's high-pitched voice, which sits quite comfortably in the soft palate of her mouth. 'It's almost effortless; it just flies out,' Rogers says. 'The way I speak day-to-day is probably more harmful for me than Betty's voice.' Rogers is a 'a triple threat,' says David Foster, who composed the musical's score. 'She has charisma and that's something you just can't buy. She's so confident, and every microsecond that she's on stage, she's Betty. Her facial expressions, her body movements – she completely transforms into that character and doesn't let up for one split second. It's pretty phenomenal." Just a few years ago, the Tony nominee was a restaurant hostess Rogers was born in Boston and started doing theater in Milford, Massachusetts. Her very first show was 'Peter Pan,' where she memorably out-sang the girl playing Tiger Lily. "I had no sense of, 'This is her song and maybe don't scream over her,'" she remembers. 'I was just fully belting at 7 years old in the little chorus of tribe members. But I just fell in love with it from that moment and never stopped.' Her first professional gig was in the 2019 musical 'Becoming Nancy' in Atlanta, helmed by 'Boop!' director/choreographer Jerry Mitchell. She followed that with Dion DiMucci bio-musical 'The Wanderer' at New Jersey's Paper Mill Playhouse. 'I got to act in a way that I hadn't yet in my career," Rogers says. "That solidified for me, 'Oh, I'm in the right place and doing the thing I love. This is just meant to be.'" Between jobs, she supplemented her income as a babysitter, as well as a hostess at Jacob's Pickles on New York's Upper West Side. She worked there for two months before booking "Mean Girls" in 2022. 'That was a little side hustle I had for a while,' Rogers recalls, laughing. 'It's a good restaurant, but I hope I never have to be a hostess ever again. It was not for me!' "Boop! The Musical" is now playing at the Broadhurst Theatre (235 W. 44th Street).
Boston Globe
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
Hats in the ring? Maybe. Hats on the stage? Definitely.
Or turn your eyes to Broadway, where 'Wicked' is still playing to full houses more than two decades after it premiered (and five months after an But as the hat-wearing Elphaba defiantly begins to dance by herself, making the hat her own, Galinda's mean-spiritedness transforms into something like empathy. She begins to dance with Elphaba. It's the beginning of an unlikely friendship that will ultimately take 'Wicked' to a deeper place — and that friendship became a key part of the reason the musical continues to resonate so profoundly with girls and women. Advertisement The history of the American theater abounds with memorable hats that have been used to swiftly establish character, time, and place. And, sometimes, authorial voice, as with Stephen Adly Guirgis's mordant comedy-drama 'The Mother------ with the Hat.' Advertisement Zero Mostel as Tevye sings to Golde, his wife, played by Thelma Lee in a scene from the musical "Fiddler on the Roof." New York Times Hats can also serve as a signifier of social status. Consider Tevye's cap in 'Fiddler on the Roof.' As careworn as he is, that hat embodies the countless mornings Tevye has spent delivering milk to the villagers of Anatevka. And the headscarves worn by the Jewish women in 'Fiddler,' including Tevye's wife, Golde, signal their attachment to custom and tradition — the very things that are under siege. Or look at the faded, flat-brimmed straw hat that 20-year-old Julie Andrews wore as Cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle in the opening scene at Covent Garden in 'My Fair Lady,' which premiered on Broadway in 1956. And, later, the staggering array of wide-brimmed hats worn by the women, including Eliza, in the Ascot racetrack scene. A hat can also punctuate key moments in a musical or play. Because we learn so much about the individual dancers in 'A Chorus Line,' we know what landing a role in a Broadway show will mean to them, professionally and personally. So we're moved by the big closing number, 'One,' when the dancers — those who got cast in the show and those who didn't — unite in synchronized movement, donning and doffing gold top hats to underscore what they did for love, to borrow a phrase. Jasmine Amy Rogers as Betty Boop, in 'Boop! The Musical' at the Broadhurst Theater in Manhattan, March 10, 2025. SARA KRULWICH/NYT A hat can also serve as a visual motif that forges a connection across eras. When 'Boop! The Musical' premiered on Broadway earlier this month, featuring Jasmine Amy Rogers as Betty Boop, Rogers wore a '30s-style top hat in one scene — the decade in which the animated cartoon flapper made her first appearance. Advertisement In September, Keanu Reeves will make his Broadway debut in Samuel Beckett's 'Waiting for Godot.' He's slated to play Estragon, one of the bowler hat-wearing tramps trying to puzzle out the riddle of existence. (All four principal characters in 'Godot' wear hats.) The cast for this fall's revival will also include Alex Winter, Reeves's costar in the film 'Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure,' as Vladimir. A revival of Kander and Ebb's 'Cabaret' opened a year ago on Broadway and is still running, with Eva Noblezada (Eurydice in 'Hadestown') playing Sally Bowles. Liza Minnelli in "Cabaret." Warner Brothers But no stage performer can hope to displace the memory of 'Cabaret,' the movie, was directed by Bob Fosse. As he began losing his hair at a relatively young age, Fosse had taken to wearing hats. Soon, fedoras and derbies — not just on the head but in the hands — became a core part of his signature style, as vital as hip rolls and jazz hands. When Arthur Miller's 'Death of a Salesman' was revived three years ago, the production simultaneously made history as the first 'Salesman' where all four Lomans were portrayed by Black actors, and connected with history. As in the 1949 premiere, starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, the revival opened with the sight of Wendell Pierce, as Willy, the picture of weariness beneath his hat, a pair of valises on the floor before him after another unsuccessful sales trip. Advertisement At the end of the play, standing by Willy's grave after he died by suicide, his friend Charley says of a traveling salesman: ''He's a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back — that's an earthquake. And then you get yourself a couple of spots on your hat, and you're finished.' Of course, sometimes a hat is just a hat, a way to heighten a scene and/or make a big stage personality even bigger. Consider the gigantic red feathered headdress — roughly the size of an aircraft carrier — that was worn by Bette Midler as Dolly Levi Gallagher when Dolly descended the stairs at the Harmonia Gardens in the 2017 revival of 'Hello, Dolly!' (Equally sizable were the hats worn by other Dollys: Carol Channing, who originated the role; Pearl Bailey; Bernadette Peters.) Jonathan Groff as King George III in "Hamilton." Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures/Disney+/Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictu A piece of headgear can help an actor get a firmer fix on his character or shape their approach to a role — sometimes in unexpected ways, as happened with Jonathan Groff when he stepped into the role of King George in the 2015 Broadway premiere of 'Hamilton.' As the musical obliterated one attendance record after another, Groff's characterization of the malevolently amusing monarch became associated with the measured, careful glide with which the actor materialized onstage from the wings. 'The crown was so heavy at first,' Groff explained in a Advertisement And Sondheim? Fourteen years after 'Company,' when Broadway's greatest composer-lyricist sought to capture in song the arduous process of artistic creation, he chose to do so with a hat as his vehicle. In 'Finishing the Hat,' in 'Sunday in the Park with George,' his musical about the pointillist painter Georges Seurat, Sondheim gave the painter lines that captured the apartness and obsessive labor that making art requires, as well as its occasional satisfactions. 'There's a part of you always standing by/ Mapping out the sky/ Finishing a hat/ Starting on a hat/ Finishing a hat/ Look, I made a hat/ Where there never was a hat.' But Seurat — and Sondheim — knew what most artists know: There is ultimately no way to ever truly finish the hat. Don Aucoin can be reached at
