“The new musical Bullets Over Broadway begins with a Mafia goon firing a machine gun into the theater curtain, spelling out the title of the show. He's also symbolically spelling out the glorious return of Susan Stroman.
Everything works here: The dances are inspired, the costumes rock, the sets are sharp and the use of slightly tweaked existing classic jazz and blues standards as the soundtrack is inspired.
She has teamed up with Santo Loquasto's ambitious and lovely set designs to put a snazzy looking real car onstage and yet also make a train out of dancers dressed as red caps in white gloves. When she has mobsters in three-piece suits tap dance to "'Tain't Nobody's Biz-ness If I Do," their masculine movements are a joy. When the play-within-the-musical is staged, the proscenium has real dancers posing like carved statues. It's all been so well thought out and executed, right down to its bouncy chairs and rotating houses. Stroman has the right to sing, as the title of one song goes “Gee Baby, Ain't I Good To You”.