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Beanie Feldstein fired up her Instagram this week to share the first-ever picture of herself in costume for her revival of Funny Girl.
Funny Girl, which originally opened on Broadway in 1964, was a star vehicle for Barbra Streisand who went onto win an Oscar for the movie adaptation.
The show is now getting its first Broadway revival ever with Beanie in the title role of the legendary singer and comedienne Fanny Brice.
I’ll march my band out: Beanie Feldstein fired up her Instagram this week to share the first-ever picture of herself in costume for her revival of Funny Girl
The greatest star: Funny Girl, which originally opened on Broadway in 1964, was a star vehicle for Barbra Streisand who went onto win an Oscar for the movie adaptation (pictured)
Funny Girl was a passion project for its producer Ray Star who was married to the late Fanny Brice’s daughter Frances Arnstein.
The show presented a fictionalized account of Fanny’s rise to fame in the 1910s and her marriage to Frances’ father, the con man gambler Nicky Arnstein.
For her first Broadway show as a lead Barbra was working with composer Jule Styne, lyricist Bob Merrill, book writer Isobel Lennart and director Garson Kanin.
She had already been a showstopper in the Broadway show I Can Get It For You Wholesale and cut a few albums but it was Funny Girl that made her a superstar.
Incoming: The show is now getting its first Broadway revival ever with Beanie in the title role of the legendary singer and comedienne Fanny Brice
The score produced one of her most enduring hits – People – which became the title song of her album that dislodged the Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night from number one.
When the show opened on Broadway it became a smash hit and received a rapturous response for her performance which she also took to London.
Barbra played opposite Charlie Chaplin’s son Sydney – with whom she had an affair amid her marriage to her first husband Elliott Gould.
Her castmates at the Winter Garden Theatre for the original Broadway run also included Kay Medford who played Fanny’s mother.
Stick around for the jokes: The show presented a fictionalized account of Fanny’s rise to fame in the 1910s; Fanny is pictured in a publicity still for the Ziegfeld Follies in 1911
The New York Times said the show occasionally ‘oozes with the a thick helping of sticky sentimentality’ but raved about the leading lady: ‘Since Fanny herself cannot be brought back, the next best thing is to get Barbra Streisand to sing and strut and go through comic routines a la Brice.’
Barbra and Kay reprised their roles for the movie, which assembled Old Hollywood stalwarts like director William Wyler and cinematographer Harry Stradling.
Her leading man in the movie was Omar Sharif, with whom she also had an affair – and with whom she set off a scandal when a still of one of their staged kisses for the film went public in 1967, the year of the Six-Day War between Egypt and Israel.
The movie was top grosser of 1968, with Roger Ebert writing: ‘The trouble with Funny Girl is almost everything except Barbra Streisand. She is magnificent.’
The music that makes me dance: Barbra is pictured onstage in the original production of Funny Girl – the project that made her a superstar
Barbra won a best actress Oscar, memorably looking at her trophy onstage and repeating her iconic opening line in the film: ‘Hello, gorgeous.’
Although the movie led to a critically savaged sequel called Funny Lady in 1975 the show has never been revived on the Great White Way before.
A Broadway revival was attempted in 2011 with Lauren Ambrose as Fanny but was ultimately scrapped over problems raising money.
However in 2015 and 2016 a London production with Sheridan Smith in the title role did manage to become a runaway success.
Sadie, Sadie, married lady: Her leading man in the movie was Omar Sharif, who played Fanny’s first husband, the con man gambler Nicky Arnstein
The show went from a limited engagement at the Menier Chocolate Factory to a longer run at the Savoy Theatre that was then extended by popular demand.
Beanie’s new revival will see her play opposite Ramin Karimloo who played the lead in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s ill-fated Phantom Of The Opera sequel Love Never Dies.
Ramin, who has also played in Les Miserables and The Phantom Of The Opera itself in the West End, will be playing Nicky.
Meanwhile Jane Lynch who rose to national prominence on the musical TV show Glee will feature in the cast as Fanny’s mother.
When you’re gifted then you’re gifted: Barbra won a best actress Oscar, memorably looking at her trophy onstage and repeating her iconic opening line in the film: ‘Hello, gorgeous’
The show will open next April at the August Wilson Theatre under the direction of Michael Mayer who won a Tony for the original run of Spring Awakening.
Beanie already has Broadway experience under her belt, having played Minnie Faye in the Hello, Dolly! revival starring Bette Midler.
Incidentally it was Carol Channing in the original production of Hello, Dolly! who beat out Barbra for a Tony for Funny Girl – only for Barbra to get her revenge half a decade later by landing the role of Dolly in the movie adaptation.
I gotta try once, I gotta fly once: In 2015 and 2016 a London production with Sheridan Smith in the title role did manage to become a runaway success
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