PRETTY WOMAN THE MUSICAL
PRETTY WOMAN THE MUSICAL, Theatre Royal, 4 December Photography by Daniel Boud
On its 1990 release, Pretty Woman, the movie scored “mixed reviews” but was an instant hit with audiences, going on to become one of the most successful rom-coms of all time. It earned billions and launched Julia Roberts into the stratosphere.
Much the same could be said of Pretty Woman the Musical. Its Broadway premiere in 2018 scored mixed reviews, but audiences ignored them – sort of. It ran for a year. Amazing that the producers were undeterred and it opened in London in 2020, was clobbered by Covid and reopened in 2021. It also collected mixed reviews.
Now, 2025, and that same production is in Australia with an excellent all-Australian cast, touring the capitals into 2026. On opening night in Sydney, the audience – with lots of shrieking young women – was highly enthusiastic. Does it mean that Happily-Ever-After-Despite-A-Seriously-Dodgy-Premise is the acme of ambition? Apparently so.
Comparisons are odious, but in this instance, it’s impossible not to compare the fabled movie with the stage show because the book was written by the movie’s director, Garry Marshall, its screenwriter JF Lawton, and the show is deliberately the film, down to favourite scenes, dialogue, even the costumes
Where it strays from the original is where it falls over: the songs by Bryan Adams and Jim Vallance are mediocre at best, and only the talented cast makes anything of them (17 songs and three reprises, apparently). How forgettable they are was evidenced by the audience leaving the theatre happily humming “Pretty Woman” – written and sung by Roy Orbison in 1964! Orbison wrote the song about his beloved wife, not an LA streetwalker.
For the rare breed that’s not familiar with the story: Vivian (Samantha Jade) and her roomie Kit De Luca (Michelle Brasier) work a patch of Sunset Boulevard every night. In this universe, they are surrounded by a colourful community with not a pimp nor drug dealer in sight. One evening, Edward, an elegant businessman (Ben Hall), gets lost between a company takeover and the Beverly Wilshire, but doesn’t get mugged and is picked up by Vivian. After a haggle ($300 an hour) and taking over his borrowed Lotus Esprit because he can’t manage a stick shift, she is swept up to the penthouse floor, and the fairytale begins.
Vivian is variously befriended by urbane hotel manager Mr Thompson (Tim Omaji), crushed on by Giulio the bellhop (Jordan Tomljenovic), assaulted by Edward’s sleazy lawyer (Douglas Hansell) and dissed by snotty Rodeo Drive boutique assistants when Edward sends her shopping with his credit card.
The most notable thing about the latter scene is that it’s one of the most famous in the film: Julia walks in, looking like a million bucks, to the shop where she’d been shown the door the day before. “You wouldn’t wait on me,” she reminds the sleek snots. She waves her many bags at them. “Big mistake. Big. Huge.”
In the musical, it’s repeated but in such a throw-away, ill-timed manner that instead of sending the audience off to the interval bars screaming in delight, it goes by unnoticed, and the first half closes on a whimper. Big mistake. Big. Huge: there’s a lot of merch and publicity riding on the line. And although there’s a lot of energy and surface pizazz, there’s about as much depth as a puddle, and it felt like Tony-award-winning director Jerry Mitchell had phoned it in.
Nevertheless, the story must go on, and urbane Edward falls for scrappy Vivian despite her excruciating lack of couth. This doesn’t make sense because, missing from the show is Mr Thompson’s etiquette lesson, which, like any good fairy tale moment, instantly turned Vivian into a lady.
Also bowdlerised is Edward whisking Vivian to San Francisco (private jet) for La Traviata. Naturally, she’s reduced to sobs on realising who Violetta is and what’s happening. On stage, soprano Rebecca Gulinello is condescended to by the production when her aria is over-ridden by Edward and one of his silly ditties. And tenor Callum Warrender barely figures despite a fine voice. It’s breathtakingly contemptuous and also another opportunity missed to inject a bit of heart and soul.
The set and costumes are the same as in London and New York; the stars of the show are Samantha Jade, Tim Omaji, Jordan Tomljenovic, Michelle Brasier, and Ben Hall. In 1990, Julia Roberts lifted the film above tawdry; in 2025, post-#MeToo and during Grab-Em-By-The-Pussy-Trump, the show’s premise seems ugly. Dyed-in-the-wool romantics may well love it.
