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When I was last in New York City, something hugely unexpected happened to me. I did something I wasn't sure I was ever going to do again in my lifetime. I walked to the Ambassador Theatre and I bought tickets to go and see Chicago. And that's not the surprising part. The surprising part is that hours before a once in a decade snowstorm arrived in New York, I saw Chicago at the Ambassador Theatre and it was great in ways that I did not know Chicago could ever be again, prompting me to ask such questions as how exactly is this happening? Is this the apocalypse? What is going on? Oh my God. Hey, welcome back to my theatre themed YouTube channel. Or hello to those of you listening to this on podcast platforms. My name is Mickey Jo and I'm obsessed with all things theatre. I am a critic and content creator here on social media and earlier this month. Not earlier this month, I have no idea when you're hearing this. Back in January of this year, I travelled to New York in order to speak at BroadwayCon. I was only there for a couple of days. There weren't that many new shows which had opened. And at this point, thanks to an immense amount of theatre going privilege, I had already seen everything that I wanted to a couple of times. In New York, I had already done a victory lap of all of my favourite shows, leaving me with A slot free on a Saturday night and no idea what to fill it with. And my fiance, Aaron and I eventually came to the decision that the most compelling thing for us at that time was actually to revisit Chicago, something neither of us particularly thought we were ever going to do again. Don't get me wrong, it was the first show that we each ever saw on Broadway, the first Broadway house that we walked into. But I had sort of resolved afterwards that even though they were always going to keep bringing in interesting and unexpected stars into Chicago, I was going to do my best to resist the lure of the stunt casting. Right? Only I eventually changed my mind. And not because of a TV competition show winner or a niche reality star playing one of these iconic roles, but because on this occasion, for a limited time, every principal performer with the company came from a legit musical theatre background. And I sort of took a second glance proverbially at this cast and I thought, you know what, this could be the most, if not prestigious, then just generally capable principal cast Chicago has had in years, perhaps since it opened. And I've got to tell you, not just because third time's the charm, it is the best I have ever seen Chicago on either side of the Atlantic. And in this review that I truly did not anticipate making, I genuinely walked up to the box office and bought tickets in the penultimate row of the rear mezzanine. We're going to dig into why that is. Now as you listen along, if anyone had the chance to see this particular cast of Chicago or any other interesting casts in its multi decade history on Broadway, I would love to hear about it in the comments. And if you would like to hear more reviews from me and more of thoughts about West End and Broadway shows, then make sure you're subscribed here on YouTube or following me on podcast platforms. For now though, let's talk about the best night I have ever had at Chicago the Musical. So the quick and easy answer about why this was so great is the casting is, you know, bringing in veteran Broadway performers and people who really understand this material tonally and who can really deliver the goods, you know, as opposed to the admittedly fascinating parade of reality TV stars and personalities and singers and sports people and occasionally real life criminals who, you know, they otherwise bring into the Ambassador Theater. But I want to dig into a little more of the nuance about how it changes not just those principal performances, but also the entire show by extension, and the glimpse that it offers into what this production of Chicago initially was, what it once was and on occasion, evidently still can be, because we make fun of Chicago. You know, it's very easy to laugh at the often egregious stunt casting. And I think it gets written off a lot as this show that just exists for tourists that the Broadway community, whatever that may be, doesn't explicitly pay attention to at all times. When I told people, you know, we're thinking of seeing Chicago tomorrow, or, you know, I just got back from the box office, I bought tickets to Chicago, people were like, why? Why have you done that? How hard are times? Do you need help? Is this some sort of a crisis? And am thrilled and delighted that I did because I feel like for the first time I was able to truly appreciate what this production of Chicago was built to be. And if we glance back over the decades to the show's history, it didn't begin as the Chicago that we know today. The aesthetic wasn't quite what it has come to be. Of course, this was a different production. It was a fully staged Broadway production. Bob Fosse at the helm, this brilliant Kander and Ebb score. Fosse and Fred Ebb wrote the book. It orig starred Bob Fosse's muse and frequent collaborator and wife, Gwen Verdon, alongside the icon that was Chita Rivera. Liza Minnelli later joined the show to replace Gwen. It ran between 1975 and 1977 for 900 and something performances. And in many ways you could say that Chicago was a little ahead of its time. You know, the skewering of celebrity culture within the US perhaps was something audiences weren't necessarily ready for, or little bit subversive. According to reviews at the time, it was also arriving on Broadway at the same time as the very revolutionary and hugely successful A Chorus Line. Looking back now, I think we would regard Chicago as a dance show and for any dance show to open alongside A Chorus Line, it was always going to be eclipsed. It would lose out at the Tony Awards and in the years that would follow that production, Chicago, I can only assume, wouldn't really have been regarded as one of the great and iconic Broadway musicals in the way that it now is. It certainly wasn't a staple until. Until it was mounted as a semi staged concert production for what was always intended to be a strictly very limited small run at New York City Centre. As part of their Encores series, which continues to this day. The ethos of this series, their mission statement, if you like, is to revive celebrated and acclaimed scores from yesteryear. This has evolved a little because Encores used to Be about, you know, really bringing out hidden gems, which on occasion they still do. As of right now they are getting ready to put on High Spirits, which is certainly an under produced show, but they sometimes also do like Ragtime and bigger, much more well known things. Anyway, at the time they were getting ready to do Chicago just over 20 years since it had premiered on Broadway. Fosse had passed away about a decade before. And this production, like I said, sleek, stripped back, sparse, very strictly limited run at New York City Centre, was to be directed by Walter Bobby and choreographed in the style of Bob Fosse, dutifully by another of his muses, Ann Reinking, who also was one of the actresses to portray Roxy Hart in the original production. Later in the run she would reprise her performance as Roxy at New York City Centre alongside Bebe Neuwirth. And this story honestly is probably deserving of more exploration because it's really fascinating and ultimately very impactful that something quite unexpected happened when they staged this in concert because it was never built for Broadway in the same way that some encores presentations nowadays perhaps are nowadays. Accidental pun nowadays anyway, commercial theatre producers went to go and see this at New York City Centre, Fran and Barry Weissler. And they made the decision to bring that production to Broadway where it was very successful. It would win at the time more Tony Awards than any musical revival had done previously. It recouped its investment very quickly, as you would expect from the still very stripped down production. They sort of saw it at encores and I guess must have noticed that what this version that was built as a semi staged concert really worked in this format and didn't need anything else adding to it, that it was just kind of a celebration of the songs and the choreography and that was all that it needed to be successful. They went there and must have thought to themselves, you know, this really works. And also this is not going to cost that much and this could continue to really work. I dare say they didn't anticipate, you know, the next almost three decades of success. But like I said, unlike the original production of the show, awards, critical acclaim, box office success, much of which could perhaps be put down to a trio of factors. By this time, years had passed and the show was able to become a little more nostalgic. I couldn't imagine enjoying Chicago as a newly opening musical in the same way that audiences do today as something nostalgic and classic. Of course you could also say that about a lot of other shows that were very popular the first time around. But there's Another key difference, because society had also changed in a big way in the years in between the two runs. Just before Chicago was produced at city centre, the O.J. simpson trial had happened and I think the way that people felt about criminality and celebrity had evolved. The age of reality television and beyond that social media was on the horizon. And suddenly the ideas presented within Chicago and the themes that it satir just weren't so uncomfortable or inexplicable. Finally, it's entirely possible that this aesthetic is really what Chicago always needed and that it pairs very well with the material which combines this sort of dark and sexy quality that is hard to wrestle into creative submission. It works for the show though, because not only is that the aesthetic of the ongoing Broadway revival since seen around the world, often in London's West End and in many other countries, but also it's worth pointing out that this is kind of the aesthetic that the film adaptation in the early 2000s, which was brilliant by the way, retained when it brought the show to the big screen, affording Chicago even more popularity, audience recognition and a really lasting brand. It's not often that the aesthetic of a revival and its identity will eclipse the original production, but nowadays there's that song again. When people think Chicago, they think of this production. All of this to say, when this particular production first arrived on Broadway, it was hugely exciting and it was cast with performers Bebe and Anne, who really understood what it meant to be performing Bob Fosse style choreography. And the show has been so successful that in fact, thanks to this production of Chicago, the world really knows what Bob Fosse choreography looks like. Stylistically, there aren't that many even really successful Broadway choreographers in history whose style is so recognizable. And Ann Reinking and Chicago has an awful lot to do with that. So here's where everything changes a little bit. And I don't wish to sound like I criticizing Chicago for the way that their casting would evolve in the years that would follow. And after Bebe and Anne originated these roles, there were many tremendous actresses who stepped into the shoes of Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly as well as the other supporting characters alongside them. But any long running Broadway show has learned the lesson that in order to remain viable and in order to find new audiences consistently over a prolonged period of time, they need to switch up their casting every now and then, then. And they need to find ways to reignite enthusiasm at the box office. And the way that Chicago has been doing that over the past few decades has been what we affectionately refer to as Stunt casting. Yes. This show is no stranger to celebrities. Many of them making their Broadway debuts, some of them stepping foot on a stage for the very first time. Some of them are actors and actresses who haven't necessarily done theatre or musical theatre. Some of them are individuals who have never acted, who aren't even performers. But if they are capable of bringing an audience audience to the Ambassador Theatre, then there is a space for them at Chicago. And there are two immediate thoughts I have about this because I think a the show would probably not still be running if they hadn't at some point started to take this approach. I also think that it's not entirely disconnected from the show's DNA. Like I said before, this was Chicago at a time when society was beginning to change and we were thinking differently about celebrity. The show talks about celebrity. So for stars to go in who are known by the audience, audience, whether they are beloved or in some way slightly notorious, that can be ingenious. It is interesting to me that in recent years they've pulled in a lot of celebrities who are known for their dance talent, perhaps because they have appeared as celebrity contestants on TVs dancing with the Stars, in spite of the fact that specifically the role of Roxy is not actually that demanding in terms of the choreography. Famously, Bebe Neuwirth, I think, broke a hip while she was playing Velma Kelly and said like, well, I'm not going to be able to dance. That could I please do Roxy instead, having broken my hip and with so many celebrity performers having gone into Chicago and with it having become sort of regarded as something of a sideshow on Broadway because of this, you know, some have been really great, some have been unexpectedly great. Some have been not necessarily of typical Broadway caliber. You know, you win some, you lose some. But with all of that and with the reputation that Chicago has gained in the three decades since it arrived as this nostalgic, fantastic, award winning hit, one of the most unusual things for you to see is a cast of a list Broadway talent.