Gypsy

People will always debate if this movie was better or worse than the one with Natalie Wood. I liked both. But I think the Bob Mackie costumes in this one added to the appeal. My favorite costume is the one with the stripper that lights up. Bette is a good as Mama, but I think I liked Natalie Wood's version of Gypsy is better. I wish I could have seen the original on Broadway with Ethel Merman. I think that this movie is supposed to be closer to the Broadway one than the other movie was. If anyone has some time on their hands I would say to watch both versions of this movie back to back and compare. This version was just shown on the "Movies!" TV channel tonight (12/26/23)

I loved this production of "Gypsy" so much that when my audiocassette of the Ethel Merman production got ruined I replaced it with a CD of the Midler "Gypsy." Bette Midler has the fire to do justice to this demanding role, and her supporting cast seemed agreeable to let her shine. But the highlight of the film for me was "You Gotta Have a Gimmick." The three strip women as a group are a comic delight.

Bette Midler stars in this production of the much loved musical that starred Ethel Merman on Broadway and Rosalind Russell in the film version.

Everyone knows the plot. Mama Rose (Midler) is the ultimate stage mother who pushes her two daughters onto any stage she can find. Eventually Baby June becomes a Vaudeville star with sister Louise in the background. Years later and with Vaudeville dying, June runs off, leaving Mama and Louise to fend for themselves.

After years of being a flop, they land in Burlesque and Louise reinvents herself as Gypsy Rose Lee and becomes a star stripper. But the mother never lets go, living her dreams through her kids. Baby June, by the way, went on to become June Havoc.

Midler is terrific as Mama Rose with Cynthia Gibb as the grown Louise and Peter Riegert as Herbie. The bawdy strippers played by Christine Ebersole, Linda Hart, and Anna McNeely shine in the "You Gotta Have a Gimmick" number.

There's also Edward Asner, Tony Shalhoub, Andrea Martin, Michael Jeter, and Jeffrey Broadhurst as Tulsa.

It's a show biz world that doesn't exist anymore, and this great show with music by Jule Styne and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim immortalizes it with much love. The show is gritty and grimy and ballsy and a pleasure to behold. And brava to Bette Midler!

The '90s was such a wasteland for musicals--with Disney animation at least restoring some luster by way of BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, THE LION KING etc. But live-action? Not a prayer. Yet with GYPSY, a modestly budgeted TV-movie version of the Broadway show, with a first rate cast and crew, did an exceptional job showing how such things can still happen. Midler was the necessary powerhouse as Mama Rose, and the entire cast held their own just fine. A musical shouldn't have to be bogged down with socio-political baggage to make it relevant nowadays--a production like this shows what sheer showmanship and celebration of music and dance can still be all about, albeit derived from a forty year-old source. To see a renewal of this kind of exuberant entertainment would be a wonderful thing; at least this GYPSY shows how it can still work.

Based on the memoirs of Gypsy Rose Lee, who painted a much more affectionate picture of their mother than did her sister, actress "Baby" June Havoc, in her autobiography, "Early Havoc" on which "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" was loosely based. I saw Ethyl Merman in the original Broadway production of Gypsy, and she was great as "Mama Rose" but certainly more "Merman" than Rose. I was disappointed with Rosalind Russell's portrayal in the 1962 movie version. An otherwise excellent actress, Russell was a very wooden substitute for Merman. Bette Midler, by contrast, was better and more believable than Merman and I'd recommend her performance as the definitive one.