Kpfa - Bay Area Theater

KPFA theatre critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “Groundhog Day: The Musical” directed by Susi Damilano, at San Francisco Playhouse through January 17, 2020 SF Playhouse website Text of review (differs from the edited audio version).. The entertainment world has always used branding to sell its products. Adapting best-sellers and hit plays to the screen, and adapting films to television has been going on for decades, using the same name as the book or the film to draw audiences into the new iteration. For Broadway, it hasn’t quite worked that way. Musicals tended to take on new names. So Pygmalion became My Fair Lady, Anna and the King the King and I, Seven and a half cents the Pajama Game. But after Giuliani, Bloomberg and the Walt Disney Company turned Broadway into a corporate cash cow, branding now rules the street. Whether jukebox shows or film adaptations, the bigger the name the greater the hedging of bets by producers. But still, three quarters of all shows flop. Which brings us to the musicals Pretty Wom