The Off-Broadway Theatre Review: Romy & Michele: The Musical

By Ross

“God, I wish I had your discipline,” she says, as the movie turned musical opens with a flash of colour, a flurry of popcorn, and a repeated watch party of “Pretty Woman.” These two gals, who we know so well, are hanging out on a couch and having the time of their lives. Or so they think. They are best friends in colourful outfits and platform shoes, who are spinning their own version of grown-up life with optimism made up of a ton of glitter and glue. Romy & Michele: The Musical, now at Stage 42, knows exactly what it is, and doesn’t try to convince us otherwise. It’s a disco ball of nostalgia, a pink feather flying in the breeze with the fizzy aftertaste of 90s girl-power fantasy running wild on the streets of Los Angeles. And for a good chunk of its neon-lit runtime, that’s enough, until it isn’t.

Just like the iconic 1997 film it’s based on, the show, directed with effervescent charm by Kristin Hanggi (Broadway’s Rock of Ages) and choreographed by Karla Puno Garcia (Broadway’s Days of Wine and Roses), follows two marvelous misfits on their way to their ten-year high school reunion, “Ten Years! Ten Years!“, they sing, as they realize the goal isn’t connection but a troubled reinvention of the falsest kind. The book by Robin Schiff (“Emily in Paris“) sticks to the plot almost religiously, using so many of the same lines that it starts to feel almost lazy, like a teenager copying Wikipedia for their term paper. But we are warned, in a way, as Schiff also wrote the screenplay for the movie, stating that the premise was inspired by her relationship with her best friend, “with whom she loved watching TV indoors on a sunny day.”

Projections by Caite Hevner (Broadway’s Derren Brown: Secret) do most of the background work, swiftly whisking us from their LA apartment to the hallowed halls of high school memory via the school yearbook that comes to life behind their couch. Sometimes the visuals delight; other times, they drag the show into screensaver territory. Lit broadly by Jason Lyons (The New Group’s Clueless) on a set by Jason Sherwood (Off-Broadway’s Drag: The Musical), the audience goodwill is set to high (especially one guy behind me who was almost having that kind of loud dance floor conversation with the cast mid-show), fed by riffs on familiar scenes, inside jokes, and some occasionally clever storytelling twirls that try to find life beyond the film.

In the two iconic titular lead roles, Laura Bell Bundy (Broadway’s The Cottage) as Romy and Kara Lindsay (Broadway’s Newsies) as Michele, are the show’s most reliable wacky and wicked engine. They lean fully into the goofy electricity of their friendship, butt-kicking and squeezing every drop out of their shared delusion of success with the other, singing their hearts out and playing for every chuckle they can muster out of us. Lindsay nails it: her Michele lands somewhere between homage and invention, as she channels Lisa Kudrow’s wide-eyed comic weirdness without ever becoming a mimic. Bundy, meanwhile, is in glorious voice and energetically committed, but leans a bit too hard on Mira Sorvino’s cadence, especially in her line delivery. The result is a performance that sings beautifully but never quite finds its own unique core, especially next to Lindsay’s fresher take.

Gwendolyn Sanford and Brandon Jay’s pop-inspired score is bubbly and determined, a fizzy throwback cocktail that might give you a wee bit of a hangover. It’s tuneful and fun, but often feels as wispy as the feather trims on those candy-bright costumes designed by Tina McCartney (New World’s Empire), festive in the moment, but dissolving into thin air the second a scene changes. And this show changes scenes, and costumes, a lot.

Among the supporting cast, Jordan Kai Burnett (59E59’s Gene & Gilda) gets the closest to actually shaking things up, playing Heather Mooney with the kind of chain-smoking snarl that cuts through all the glitter. Michael Thomas Grant (NBC’s “Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist“) is solid and silly as Sandy Frink, the nerd-made-good, whose big moment is played with genuine sweetness. Pascal Pastrana (Broadway’s The Great Gatsby) as chiseled Billy is almost more prop than person, but the show wonderfully leans into that with a big wink and plenty of shirtless stage time that makes the audience go ab-solutely wild with appreciation. Even the mean girls, Lauren Zakrin, Erica Dorfler, Hanna Florence, and Ninako Donville (as the mean girl turned good, in the end), give just enough bite to make their scenes pop, even if they’re mostly playing film cutouts on repeat.

The musical is shiny and bright, and like the sign that hangs over the stage, not off enough to be clever or on purpose, but not wrong enough to be right. Romy & Michele‘s defining characteristic isn’t depth or dazzling originality; it’s commitment to a vibe. And that vibe is unabashed, air-headed fun; a glitter-drenched love letter to best friends who’ve never quite learned to grow up, and aren’t sure they need to. But you may also feel a craving for something more: more invention, more depth, and greater confidence in its own voice rather than a Post-It note carbon-copy of the film’s freshness.

At its best, Romy & Michele: The Musical is joyful, chaotic, and messily infectious. At its weakest, it’s a well-rehearsed cover band that knows the songs but little of their creation. If you’re in the mood for something feather-light, unapologetically silly, and full of friendship-fuelled sparkle, this reunion might just leave you smiling. If not, well, I hope you don’t wake up with too bad of a hangover, wondering why you had one too many Jell-O shots the night before.