THE HANGOVER REPORT – Jimmy Buffet’s easy-going ESCAPE TO MARGARITAVILLE, an above-average jukebox musical

Paul Alexander Nolan leads Jimmy Buffet's "Escape to Margaritaville" at the Marquis Theatre.

Paul Alexander Nolan leads Jimmy Buffet’s “Escape to Margaritaville” at the Marquis Theatre.

I never thought I’d say this, but I think the bland Marquis Theatre just found its perfect tenant in Escape to Margaritaville – the new jukebox musical comprised of Jimmy Buffet songs – when the show opened on Broadway last night at its premises. What better in-hotel musical could you ask for to lure tired businessmen or guileless tourists? Indeed, despite a corny and hackneyed plot, its sanitized exotic setting, and its unrealistically carefree characters (or maybe because of of these things?), the musical succeeds on its own simplistic terms. I’m not ashamed to say it: Escape to Margaritaville is an above-average jukebox musical.

That’s because the show, much like its Grecian predecessor which ran years and years at the Winter Garden and the Broadhurst, simply wants to have fun while (seemingly) not pushing too hard in the process. Greg Garcia and Mike O’Malley have concocted an easy-going – albeit ridiculous – book that’s consistently amusing, jiving well with Mr. Buffet’s score and its laid-back world view. It’s refreshing to come across a Broadway musical without that almost demonic need to bring the house down with every number. Escape to Margaritaville is by no means great theater, but the end result is a product that’s holistically formed to effectively get to its sweet, uncomplicated end.

Christopher Ashley’s production is appropriately breezy, while still feeling like it’s giving its audience a Broadway experience and its money’s worth. He’s shrewdly cast the musical, assigning the show’s principal roles to dependable, hard-working stage actors, including the dashing and honey-voiced leading man Paul Alexander Nolan, the lovely Alison Luff as his love interest, the quietly magnetic Lisa Howard as her best friend, the hilarious Christopher Fitzgerald doppelgänger Eric Petersen as a charismatic bartender, and the gregarious Rem Webb as the hotel proprietor. These wonderful actors can simply fall back on their well-honed craft and good humor to carry the show along, confidently.

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ESCAPE FROM MARGARITAVILLE
Broadway, Musical
Marquis Theatre
2 hours, 20 minutes (with one intermission)
Open Run

Categories: Broadway, Theater

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