I’d never heard of the show but I love live theater so I was excited. Then, MJ had a ticket to see the show before we did and she raved about it. She was so enthusiastic that Katie (my sister) and Mike got tickets for Saturday night. They loved it so much that their girls Meg and Molly bought tickets for the Sunday matinee that Katie and I were going to. We all met up in the lobby and MJ was there with Bean! Not only could she not wait to see it again, she couldn’t wait to share it with her daughter.
Something Rotten is the story of two brothers trying to make it as playwrights in the age of William Shakespeare. They’re sick of living in the shadow of The Bard so they consult a fortune teller to tell them two things: the plot of Shakespeare’s greatest play so they can steal it and write it first and what’s the future of theater.
The seer, Thomas Nostradamus, looks into the future and sees Shakespeare’s greatest play is about…a prince and…a ghost…no, a phantom …called…Omelet!
And the future of theater is…musicals!
So that’s what they write: Omelette: the Musical!
Nostradamus keeps getting glimpses of the future of theater. None of it makes any sense to the playwrights but it all makes perfect sense to the audience. For instance, when the poet says “What’s a fiddler? And why is he on the roof?” it gets a huge laugh.
The show is clever, witty, fun, raucus and the music is wonderful. I haven’t seen so much tap since Newsies came through town two years ago. Everything about the show was great!
We all loved it and were stunned that we hadn’t heard of it.
My sister Katie solved that mystery for us: the show debuted on Broadway in 2015.
The same year Hamilton sucked all the air out of room.
Something Rotten is so good that all the people involved in it must have felt like they were all going to win tonys and then Lin Manuel Miranda comes out with the greatest thing to hit entertainment since the days of George M. Cohan. No tonys for you!
Any other year, Something Rotten would have swept. I loved The Book of Mormon, which I saw on Broadway (while Katie and her girls were down the street at Hamilton) but honestly, I liked Something Rotten even more! Maybe it’s because I love Shakespeare and he’s a main character. He’s portrayed as a rock star, not so much in the style of Elvis but more like Conrad Birdie. Hmm…if there were any allusions to Bye Bye Birdie in this show, I missed them.
I think it’s because I love musicals and the show is an homage to the genre, thanks to the visions of Thomas Nostradamus. The grand finale of the show is the first (and only) performance of Omelette: the Musical!, which includes a prince, a phantom, chimney sweeps, a guitar playing nun, Nazis, orphans, a fiddler and a chorus line of dancing eggs who channel Dreamgirls. It was a riot!
The music was wonderful: I ordered the soundtrack as soon as I got home. The cast was delightful; every single performer was hilarious and great. The musical numbers were all fun and the dancing was out of this world.
I hope Something Rotten gets the love it deserves. If it comes to your town, go see it!