Musical Monday: A Musical About Star Wars

Author’s note: I saw this production fairly early in its preview period. With that in mind, I respect the producers’ decisions to make changes throughout and will not be reviewing production aspects of the play. This review focuses on things more central to the themes and entirety of the play. Also, spoiler warning.

Before reviewing A Musical About Star Wars, which just opened on May 4th at Theater Row, I should be candid about one thing: I am an incredibly large Star Wars fan. I have a tattoo of Chewbacca wearing a top hat on my right bicep. I went to the show with my girlfriend—she has never seen the original trilogy nor the prequel trilogy and broadly knows very, very little about Star Wars. The things we appreciated about the show, for the most part, and the problems we had with the show were things that have nothing to do with how much one actually likes the underlying movies. A Musical About Star Wars has some decent moments when it keeps a silly tone highlighting some of the absurdity of the fandom, but by playing too easily into a lot of stereotypes, the musical ends up being a lot less fun than it should be. 

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There were definitely fun parts of the show. There was an audience participation moment where two people were taken on stage (I was actually one of them) and allowed to answer questions about the Star Wars Holiday Special, which is a television special that is perhaps best lost to time because of how terrible it was. It was different, campy, and harmless fun. There were also two songs I enjoyed—one was a parody of Hamilton that told the story of the prequel trilogies from start to finish and the other was a parody of We Didn’t Start the Fire that listed off the incredible expansive nature of Star Wars toys, comics, cartoons, and the like. Both were funny and well done. If the show kept that silly, witty tone throughout, it would’ve been a fun show. Unfortunately, this was mostly lost.

The conceit of the show is two lifelong Star Wars fans wanted to make a musical about how the movies are the greatest things ever. There is also a third character that plays the role of the actress they hired to help complete the musical who is secretly working to take down the whole thing. It’s all very meta. If the actress had been trying to take down the musical because she thought Star Trek was better, maybe it could be funny. Why is she doing it? Because she is a feminist activist and considers Star Wars to be misogynistic. She is written so grating and irritating to the point that the only thing that outpaced my frustration was my confusion at why they would make this decision. The actress is won over in the end when she learns the newest Star Wars films have better representation of women and minorities. If I give the writers the benefit of the doubt with this ending that they were trying to make it tongue in cheek and acknowledge Star Wars actual shortcomings in representation, then I still think it was a really terrible choice. It wasn’t fun, and if it were funny to someone, then I think that person would just broadly dislike women. It didn’t work as satire, and if it wasn’t an attempt at satire, that’s even worse.

The two male characters are old fashioned stereotypes of male Star Wars fans, which is probably less problematic than the portrayal of the actress but certainly didn’t add to the fun. They were both surprised they had a real girl in the show and made jokes about how bad Star Wars fans are with women—including a joke about them being virgins or one of them having to wear Princess Leia’s famous revealing costume. It just took out of the fun of the show because it felt like it was making fun of Star Wars fans for liking what they like. Star Wars is a multi-billion-dollar property that has fans that look different, come from different walks of life, and do different things. By playing into the idea that Star Wars fans are a certain way, it felt like the audience was being mocked if they liked Star Wars a lot or were being told to laugh at those people who did like it.

I don’t doubt that the writers and producers of this show do love Star Wars. It was filled with subtle lines and references to Star Wars that worked as little tip of the hats to fans. That was fine, but you can write a show that pokes fun of something you love and still treat the audience like they’re clever and they’re totally fine for loving what they love. I really enjoyed Puffs, an Off-Broadway show that I think really pokes fun at the Harry Potter universe from a place of love and keeps it witty and light without trying too hard and detracting from the audience’s enjoyment. If A Musical About Star Wars let itself be fun and witty and celebratory of Star Wars instead of diving into those weird stereotypes, it could’ve been good dumb fun. For the most part, it just wasn’t.

Clint Hannah-Lopez

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