The Drowsy Chaperone

Molina has the Spider Woman. Trevor has Diana Ross. The Man in the Chair has Janet Van de Graaff. Each glamorous muse welcomes you to forget your troubles.

What are the Man in the Chair's troubles? He never says outright though he admits he's "feeling a little blue." He's been married and divorced. He reads as gay (Well, not so much when Bob Saget played him) but denies it. ("I'm a very complicated person.") Now he's a recluse.

Why is The Drowsy Chaperone his favorite musical? He claims it's just "fun." And it is. Janet retires from the stage to marry Robert. Her former producer wants her back. Fidelity is tested and Janet's alcoholic drowsy Chaperone foils the producers schemes. One deus ex machina later we have a happy ending.

Purists have griped that the score sounds more 50's than 20's, particularly in Janet's homage to "Rose's Turn," while others have dismissed the show as mindless fluff. Those of us who like a darkness for flavor can see the Man in the Chair's fate as a sad one. But at the end of the day The Drowsy Chaperone remains fun. It also won Beth Leavel a Tony and provided Sutton Foster with one of her best numbers.

Flapper Julie Andrews

The Boy Friend. Music, Lyrics and Book by Sandy Wilson. 1953 West End. 1954 Broadway

Thoroughly Modern Millie. 1967 screenplay by Richard Morris. Original music by Elmer Bernstein.  2002 book by Richard Morris. Original music by Jeanine Tesori. Original lyrics by Dick Scanlan.

The Broadway transfer of The Boyfriend featured the New York debut of Julie Andrews! She would don her flapper dresses again for Millie and make her directing debut with a production of The Boyfriend in 2003. Both stories focus on flappers who enjoy their independence till their poor boyfriends confess they are secretly rich and propose. It's telling that the sequel to The Boyfriend was titled Divorce Me, Darling!

The Boy Friend is a fairly conventional musical that was turned into a strange film.
Millie was a weird film that got turned into a conventional musical. Carol Channing and Beatrice Lillie are doing... something... bizarre that the raise the film to new camp levels. Channing's character was toned down when the show transferred to Broadway but Harriet Harris made Lillie's villain her own crazy (and Tony winning) creation.

Trailer for The Boy Friend on film.
Trailer for Thoroughly Modern Millie on film.
Performance from Thoroughly Modern Millie at the Tony's.