Compared to the Broadway overblown spectacle, the show sits far more easily at Chicago’s intimate Mercury as a fun, Halloween-season entertainment.
They spent $20 million to open “Young Frankenstein” on Broadway in 2007. But all the money in Bavaria couldn’t avoid comparisons with “The Producers,” the Mel Brooks movie-to-Broadway masterpiece of a few years prior. Alas, “Young Frankenstein,” based on the 1974 movie with a book penned by Brooks and Thomas Meehan, did not translate as well.
Igor, played here by Ryan Stajmiger, turns in a knockout, Broadway-quality performance, and the Monster, essayed by Andrew MacNaughton, kills it during the show’s funniest number, “Puttin’ on the Ritz,” charmingly staged by choreographer Brenda Didier and filled with amusements. When the Mercury first started producing its own musicals, one benefit was that it allowed Chicago’s musical theater stars to work more frequently in the city limits and in a small theater.
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