‘NEWSical the Musical’ misfires at DCPA

Old material sinks musical comedy in the Garner Galleria

Newsical the Musical won the Off-Broadway Alliance Award for Best Musical and was, according to the DCPA website, the fifth longest running musical in Off-Broadway history.

I’m not sure what happened to it between New York and Denver, but the production playing now at the Garner Galleria theatre seriously lost its funny along the way. And it’s no fault of the cast — a talented quartet of comedic actors and singers who did their best with the material.

For a show ostensibly based on the latest news, Newsical runs mostly on the fumes of gags that were exhausted months if not years ago. We may still be in the tail end of Covid, but Purell jokes? And what’s with a whole bit based on “as seen on TV” products like Shake Weights and Snuggies already thoroughly lampooned in the 1990s? Another scatological embarrassment is based on the old Jamie Lee Curtis yogurt-that-makes-you-poop ads that every standup and late-night host mined a decade ago.

Aside from an opening number that contains more topical material, much of Newsical is a lazy roundup of past-tense jokes that mostly fell flat in the show I attended (aside from the woman behind us who found every syllable hilarious). My son and I were continually exchanging glances like, “Are they really doing this?”

I’ll leave it there. If you want to go to a cabaret-style show where you can enjoy an overpriced drink and maybe eke out a couple of laughs over the mercifully short show, go check it out. Otherwise, you can find much better stuff on Colbert’s show.