‘Legally Blonde’ a contagious confection at Playhouse Stage
COHOES — Among the reasons for Playhouse Stage Company to produce “Legally Blonde: The Musical,” far down the list likely was to make the longest and most effective commercial possible for PSC’s youth-training programs.
But that’s among the results of the funny, smart and mildly cheeky show, which opened Friday at Cohoes Music Hall and runs through Aug. 11. In its addictive watchability, tunefulness and charm, the production will be impossible for most audiences not to enjoy, but for theater-inclined kids, it’s also an irresistible recruiting pitch. A preteen with a budding interesting in performing seems sure to leave the production thinking, “I want to be part of
that.” The impulse will be further cemented by knowledge that 18 of the 24 “Legally Blonde” cast members have past Playhouse Stage experience, including several who grew from PSC’s youth musicals into talents sufficient for leading professional roles with the company.
Based on the comedic novel “Legally Blonde” by Amanda Brown and the hit film of the same name that starred Reese Witherspoon, both from 2001, “Legally Blonde: The Musical” was adapted for the stage by Laurence O’Keefe and Nell Benjamin (music and lyrics) and Heather Hach (book), opening on Broadway in 2007. The PSC production is directed and choreographed by AshleeSimone Kirchner, its resident choreographer, associate artistic director and director of education (and probably other hats). Music direction is by Brandon Jones, who two years ago earned the distinction of being the performer who has appeared in the most Playhouse Stage productions in the company’s history.
As sweet and sunny as a lollipop lasting almost 21⁄2 hours, “Legally Blonde: The Musical” has a sucrosity that is largely redeemed by injections of humor from the script, lyrics, acting and stage business as the story unfolds about Elle Woods (Selma Fabregas), whose Malibu Barbie background doesn’t suggest the steely determination that gets her into Harvard Law School. Her initial impulse might be romantic — she’s chasing her college beau, Warner (AJ Halsey), a cad who aspires to be U.S. senator by age 30 — but resolve sets in after Elle is underestimated as a bimbo one too many times and gets a pep talk from a Boston-accented hairdresser (Molly Rose McGrath). Playhouse Stage audiences know McGrath to be a vocal powerhouse par excellence, and there’s plenty of that here, but her acting skills are now about equal to her voice, with McGrath as supremely funny in “Legally Blonde” as she was dramatic in PSC’s production of “Bright Star” in early 2022.
As played by Fabregas, the shallower Elle of the beginning becomes a savvy woman who recognizes the partner material — legal and romantic — she finds in Emmett (Jon Maltz). He’s an assistant to the stentorian Professor Callahan (Patrick Ryan Sullivan, perfectly cast and seriously credentialed), who uses his law class to recruit interns to help with a prominent murder trial. While it’s a tired trope for the popular girl to discover that the shy, unnoticed boy standing right in front of her is better for her than flashier rivals, the rapport between Fabregas and Maltz (both former PSC students) creates specific individuality that rejuvenates what could be a cliche.
In a casting decision that a churl might deem nepotistic but is utterly winning, PSC’s producing artistic director, Owen Smith, put both of his own dog companions into the show: The Chihuahua Lola is Elle’s carry-around accessory, Bruiser; French bulldog Arthur, as the hairdresser’s dog, stares at the audience with placid, panting, bug-eyed wonderment that on opening night nearly achieved the impossible — upstaging McGrath.
Theater audiences usually skew older. In my mid-50s now, I sometimes feel like, except for interns and apprentices, I’m the youngest by a decade when at Capital Repertory Theatre and companies in the Berkshires. But on opening night at “Legally Blonde,” a crowd well populated with under-25s shrieked, whooped and hollered with abandon, greeting a hunky UPS man (Hayden Chenette) as if he were Justin Bieber or members of BTS. They also seemed ecstatic at full-ensemble dance numbers and “Ohhh”-ed at verbal burns and disses. It was a delight to hear. And it’s also how you grow future theater audiences.