Schmigadoon!

With a knowing wink and its tongue firmly set in its cheek, Schmigadoon! is a satirical spin on Broadway’s ‘Golden Age’ musicals. An ‘A’ list cast - Kristen Chenoweth, Aaron Tveit, Jane Krakowski, Ariana Dubose, Alan Cumming, Martin Short and Dove Cameron - do justice to this enjoyable spoof now streaming on Apple TV+.

Cecily Strong, a Saturday Night Live alumni, and Keegan-Michael Key, last seen as the schoolmaster in the filmed version of The Prom, play a couple, Melissa and Josh, who are New York City doctors in a relationship that is going nowhere. She loves musical theatre, he doesn’t, which is reason enough to ask why are they together. They decide to go on a wilderness retreat and that’s when they discover a magical small-town, USA,(population 167), in which everyone acts like they’re in a musical from the 1940s. The switch is that Josh and Melissa can’t leave until they find true love.

Cliché after cliché is on display, but there are enough bits of honest-to-goodness hokum to keep one amused. The sets are painted with an obvious theatrical look in bright primary colors, and the chorus wear gingham dresses and buckskin pants as they boisterously dance Christopher Galletti’s hoe-down inspired routines.

The opening number ‘Schmigadoon!’ is a riff on the title tune from Oklahoma! which sets up most of the townsfolk characters - Alan Cumming as Mayor Aloysius Menlove (it’s not hard to guess his secret), Ariana Dubose as the love-starved librarian Emma Tate, and Kristen Chenowith’s dour Mildred Layton, who looks like she’s escaped from the Amish enclave in Plain and Fancy.

Josh’ rival in the romantic stakes is ‘carnie bad-boy’ Danny Bailey (Aaron Tveit), an obvious take on Carousel’s Billy Bigelow, who parodies the musical’s famous ‘bench scene’ and ‘If I Loved You’ with Strong and then does an incongruous but smart dance routine with her.

Melissa’s romance rival is Betsy (Dove Cameron), a hyper-sexual teenage vamp whose phallic props enliven the duet with Kay, ‘Enjoy the Ride’.

When Josh and Melissa have a ‘lovers spat’ it’s immediately captured in song-and-dance and even includes a barbershop quartet a la The Music Man.

Best song in the first episode is ‘Corn Puddin’, a vigorous ensemble ode to home-cooking. Later eps have Jane Krakowski as The Countess from The Sound of Music singing a clone of Cole Porter’s ‘Always True To You In My Fashion’ (Kiss Me, Kate), and Chenoweth chewing the scenery with a too-close-for-comfort take of ‘Trouble’ (The Music Man).

We’ve had lots of send-ups of musical theatre of late, The Musical Of Musicals springs to mind, but this TV concept felt like it belonged Off-Off-Off Broadway with an audience of musical theatre geeks. Not all of the satire hits the bull-eye, but there’s no faulting the performances and the direction which continually upgrade this homage to something more than it is. With half the country in lockdown, it’s well worth a look!

Peter Pinne