On Oct. 7 and 8, OPAS at Texas A&M hosted super-nanny “Mrs. Doubtfire” at Rudder Auditorium for a two-day musical tour stop in College Station. The crowd was full of laughs as they watched humorous songs alongside emotional monologues about the importance of family.
With cross-dressing, humor and a story about the lengths a father will go to be there for his family, the Mrs. Doubtfire musical reinvents the original movie for the stage. Based on the original film starring Robin Williams, “Mrs. Doubtfire – The New Musical Comedy,” follows the story of Daniel Hillard, a struggling actor who’s grappling with divorce and limited custody of his kids; he invents the Scottish nanny persona “Mrs. Doubtfire” to be more present in their lives.
OPAS Executive Director Anna Black shared her expectations for the night of entertainment.
“It’ll be very funny and very heartwarming,” Black said. “It’s a great story, and I hope everyone has a great time. It’ll be a fun evening, and I think we all need a good laugh and we all need to relax these days.”
Psychology senior and chair of the MSC OPAS Student Committee Vivian Simpson stated that the main goal of OPAS as an organization is to “enlighten, entertain and inspire” with every production they bring to Aggieland. She explained that these qualities are why Mrs. Doubtfire was chosen as one of the shows offered this season.
“Typically we are looking for something that will be interesting to both students and members of our community,” Simpson said. “…We like to have a combination of musicals on tour, as well as concerts. We found this show to be good, well-rounded and something that fits everybody’s tastes.”
In the midst of midterms, research papers and lab reports, Simpson hopes that Mrs. Doubtfire, as well as other OPAS productions, can be a much needed break from the chaos of college for students. She also said that OPAS is often the only place for community members to see professional live theater without traveling to a major city.
“It’s a great opportunity to engage with the arts,” Simpson said. “You have two hours of a break while in the depths of tests in the middle of the semester, and it gives community members a chance to be on campus and for families to come and have a fun theatrical experience.”
The ability to sell the audience on the transformation of Daniel Hillard into Mrs. Doubtfire and being able to do it frequently is one of the most impressive parts of the show, according to electrical engineering junior and OPAS member Reagan Carlton.
Multiple times on stage, the audience got to watch Daniel don a fat suit, wig, prosthetic face and old-lady clothes just to ditch it all for his regular appearance a few minutes later.
“What I was expecting was there to be one guy playing him in the beginning, and then him being gone for a while and doing the makeup and never switching back,” Carlton said. “I didn’t know that he would switch back and forth on stage, so that’s what I was most surprised by.”
The audience was filled with laughter at the witty deliveries of the actors, with some jokes and messaging from the original film being updated from its original 1990s iteration to fit a more modern audience.
Mentions of iPads, Wi-Fi and TikTok were frequent throughout the script, with a comedic music number dedicated to deceptively difficult online cooking tutorials. Carlton also noticed that certain jokes might’ve landed even bigger laughs in College Station than it would have elsewhere.
“I like when they made a joke about college students; I think that hit a lot harder here than it will in other places,” Carlton said. “It was really funny, and I liked that I felt very called out. At first it was just older people laughing, but you could hear the pause before the students were like, ‘Yeah, I’ll give you that.’”
While the show stayed faithful to the film, some changes were necessary to help fit a musical format. Biochemistry junior and OPAS member Sophia Bailey enjoyed the original movie and shared her thoughts on how the musical stacked up against the film..
“I wasn’t disappointed in any way,” Bailey said. “It was an amazing production. … It’s a very interesting take because there’s stuff in the movie that’s very different from the show. I think it’s a lot more lively and that fits, seeing as it is a musical compared to a movie in the 90s. I think it was very engaging for the audience, and keeps the spirit of the original movie intact.”
In the parting number Mrs. Doubtfire says — “as long as there is love, a family can come in all shapes and sizes.” Bailey expressed her hope for viewers to take this message with them even after they leave the theater.
“The message is about family and togetherness,” Bailey said. “It’s about knowing there are support systems and not forgetting about familial love.”
