Tootsie, with Santino Fontana, gets all dressed up for Broadway: EW review
Tootsie opens with a groan: A kitschy New York City set and far-too-happy, brightly dressed city dwellers singing about how everyone is so ambitious and everything’s so delicious in the big city. It actually seems ripped from the Skittles: The Musical Super Bowl stunt earlier this year. And that’s the point. The musical within the musical is a joke — and it really works, as many moments do throughout the production — but the cliché factor doesn’t exactly drop to zero once the twist is revealed and Michael Dorsey’s journey as Dorothy Michaels begins.
Based on the 1982 movie of the same name but set in the present day, Tootsie follows Michael (Santino Fontana), an out-of-work actor who takes himself, and his “craft,” so seriously he winds up fired from the few jobs he does earn. When his ex-girlfriend Sandy (Sarah Stiles) tells him about her plans to audition for the nurse in a Romeo and Juliet sequel musical, Michael impulsively decides to try out for the show as well — by donning drag and adopting that “Dorothy” persona. “There is so much wrong with this,” Michael’s roommate Jeff (Andy Grotelueschen) warns, but he doesn’t listen.
