First Date: The Musical

When blind date newbie Aaron is set up with serial-dater Casey, a casual drink at a busy New York restaurant turns into a hilarious high-stakes dinner. As the date unfolds in real time, the couple quickly finds that they are not alone on this unpredictable evening. In a delightful and unexpected twist, Casey and Aaron’s inner critics take on a life of their own when other restaurant patrons transform into supportive best friends, manipulative exes and protective parents, who sing and dance them through ice-breakers, appetizers and potential conversational land mines.

The uptight, weedy guy who nervously enters this lions’ den is Aaron (William Boyd), who hasn’t been on a date since his wife left him and already regrets that he let his best friend fix him up on this blind date.  Aaron is what any woman would recognize as Mr. Nice Guy, who makes a better friend than a lover, so it’s quite an achievement in character-building when Boyd carefully draws out the more interesting and yes, sexier side of this sweet, sensitive guy.

Sophia Dimopoulos is quite the bombshell as Casey, the neo-punk, height-of-fashion cutie who drinks with both fists and goes for bad boys.  Armed with her strong voice, solid acting chops, and snazzy modern costume, Casey seems likely to make short work of awkward Aaron.

Behind the daters are best friends, sisters, ex-lovers, bartenders, gay handbags, even Aaron’s dead Jewish grandmother – they all come out in force to cheer, steer, veer and leer.

Tanake Utete, as Casey’s gay bff Reggie, has some funny moments in the three “Bailout Songs” that he calls in on his mobile. Mackenzie Kelly scores some laughs as all the waiters in all the single bars in the world, or at least, in this cold and lonely city.  Other stand-outs in this mini-ensemble include Allison Fair as the ‘ex-wife’ of Aaron with some great comedic timing. Joined by the hilarious Liam McDonnell as Aaron’s ‘thoughts’ – which brought great energy and set the pace nicely for the chaos that is a first date. The same can be said for Louella Baldwin; with several roles in the show, she did well to blend in and stand out in all the right moments.

I particularly loved the choice of venue at Reload Espresso Bar, an industrial warehouse turned coffee shop with high-ceilings and everything from couches to tables to single sofas. Of course with any venue that’s not designed to house a show, there are always some technical difficulties but the cast did an amazing job to draw the attention back on themselves with the audience forgiving that pesky sound system!

Filled with hilarious musical numbers, crazy characters and outrageous, but entirely too relatable, moments, this is a show sure to be enjoyed by anyone who has ever ventured into the most dreaded human endeavour in existence: dating.

Mel Bobbermien