Going in, I was most scared for Sean Hayes, but dammit, the boy can sing! (He does mug a bit in the middle, but not all the way through.)

Kristen is miscast. She’s neither young enough nor vulnerable enough. But she sounds great!

“A House Is Not A Home” has no place in the musical and should not have been added, but “I Say A Little Prayer” is a nice way to give Kristin a big number early on and helps even out the ballad/uptempo balance for her.

The male dancers are great! Very athletic and joyful.

But the biggest surprise was Katie Finneran! She was my favorite part of Wonderfalls on TV, but damn. She steals the show in the first scene of Act II. She should get another Tony for this performance.

Finally, I’m very glad that no one wore pink and orange together. I was worried when I saw the show logo. That color combination nearly made me ill in the Sweet Charity revival.

P.S. I was so excited by the music that I had to go home and download two Jill O’Hara albums. She was the Fran in the original show and I have always dug her voice.

Valerie ---------------------> Tallulah

I’m just ecstatic hearing that Valerie Harper (yeah, Mary’s Rhoda) is playing Tallulah Bankhead in a new play entitled Looped. Apparently, the title comes from the idea that the whole play takes place during an ADR session for Tallu’s classing Hammer horror film, Die! Die! My Darling!

I lost some respect for Valerie after she walked off the set of a show named after her. Jeesh, during the first season, even. Pretty freaking sad if you can replace her with Sandy Duncan and still manage to keep the series running for five more seasons. And that union president race against Laura Ingalls got pretty nasty. But this just may make up for all of that.

What? You haven’t seen Die! Die! My Darling!? Holy frijoles, get over here quick. I’m itching to watch it again, especially since Tallu plays a bible-thumping vegetarian who — once upon a time — was a … well, a loose, jazz-loving woman. Okay, she was a whore. And Stephanie Powers plays the mod girl Tallu kidnaps. And a very young Donald Sutherland plays the retarded groundskeeper. What’s not to love?!

And now we can even buy Spaghetti Cat apparel. Heavenly.

Krispie Kreme may have been a better choice. Or if you really needed money, you coulda called me.

There’s also a pretty funny spoof of Sex in the City.