Review: Beaches, an Irresistible Broadway Tearjerker

The new Broadway musical Beaches faces a tsunami of expectations. First told in Iris Rainer Dart’s 1985 novel, this tale of two friends from vastly different backgrounds is best known from the 1988 film adaptation starring Barbara Hershey and Bette Midler, the latter performing a series of memorable songs. It’s practically a movie-musical already, so any stage adaptation must contend with that history: The audience bought tickets already having a strong concept of what Beaches looks, sounds, and (most importantly) feels like, so how much do you indulge them? And how much latitude do you have to show them something even better?

It’s a nearly impossible feat that the team behind the musical, now making its Broadway debut at the Majestic Theatre, expertly navigates. Featuring a book by Dart and the late Thom Thomas that hews closer to the novel, and new songs (with one notable exception) by legendary American composer Mike Stoller (Dart pens the surprisingly excellent lyrics), Beaches is that rare new musical based on well-known intellectual property that manages to exceed our hopes, gently sailing us into an ocean of emotional storytelling until we lose sight of the shore.

The Jersey shore (specifically the Atlantic City boardwalk) is where young Roberta White (Zeya Grace) meets little Cee Cee Bloom (Samantha Schwartz), a performer in a local “kiddie show.” Bertie is the product of Pittsburgh old money, and Cee Cee comes from a Bronx family just a couple generations removed from the shtetl. From the perspective of Madison Avenue, they have nothing in common. And yet they forge an instant bond that summer, correspond through their teenage years, and keep each other honest from afar (Emma Ogea and Bailey Ryon giddily play the pair in this second iteration, paving the way for their inevitable adult forms, a trinitarian musical convention now solidified in the wake of Summer and The Cher Show).

When Bertie (Kelli Barrett) rejects the life her mother (Lael Van Keuren) has carefully planned for her as wife of steel scion Michael Barron (Ben Jacoby), she flees to Cee Cee (Jessica Vosk), who is doing summer stock in Beach Haven. Bertie really wants to be a civil rights lawyer, but she’ll settle for wardrobe assistant that summer, a time when their mutual attraction to director John Perry (Brent Thiessen) tests their friendship.

But Cee Cee and Bertie’s relationship endures through men, careers, and the birth of Bertie’s daughter Nina (an adorable Harper Burns). That’s why, when Cee Cee learns that Bertie is terminally ill, she walks out on her prime-time variety show to be with her.

Like the novel, the show opens with a taping of that television program, with Cee Cee performing “You Believe in Me,” an up-tempo theme song with a retro American pop vibe (Charlie Rosen’s brassy orchestrations sound straight out of the mid-20^th century). She sings, “You made me brave, you made me strong. / You taught me love and right from wrong. / So keep sendin’ your love, that’s the key. / I’m here ’cause you believe in me.” It’s ostensibly to her fans, but it’s really all for Bertie.

Stoller and Dart have more where that came from. The swinging duet “Wish I Could Be Like You” easily supplants any memory of “The Glory of Love,” at least for the two hours and 30 minutes we’re in the theater. The aching second act duet, “The Words I Should Have Said,” is sure to resonate with anyone who has ever felt regret. Dart’s sincere and witty lyrics float atop the bright cloud of music Stoller has conjured, his melodic powers undiminished at age 93, like an American Verdi. His addition to the creative team was a big gamble that paid off.

An earlier draft of Beaches, with music by David Austin, premiered at Arlington’s Signature Theatre in 2014 and then played Chicago’s Drury Lane Oakbrook Theatre in 2015. Thomas’s death later that year stalled production. This revamped version, with music by Stoller, debuted at Theatre Calgary in 2024, to give you an idea of the long and winding road this musical has taken to Broadway.

Of course, the efficient and nimble production staged by directors Lonny Price and Matt Cowart suggests aspirations beyond Broadway. James Noone’s essential set design facilitates Dart’s cinematic scene transitions, with David Bengali’s vibrant video design filling in the gaps. Ken Billington’s finely calibrated lighting simulates the sensation of memory, with key moments indelibly illuminated, the warmth of a perfect day at the beach radiating from the stage. Kai Harada’s sound helps us appreciate every lyric. Costume designer Tracy Christensen and wig designer J. Jared Janas brilliantly conspire to pull off the most impressive feat of this production, which is to convince us that this is a bigger musical than it actually is.

There are only 12 actors appearing in Beaches, a fact I only fully appreciated during curtain call. Chameleon-like performers (Jacoby and Zurin Villanueva are especially impressive) take on multiple roles and act as a force multiplier, solidly supported by Terri Purcell’s crack wardrobe team. This is a production that could fit as comfortably in a 500-seat theater and a 3,000-seat barn (a national tour is planned for this fall). All of it represents a necessary deescalation of the design arms race and a possible path forward for Broadway.

The two performers leading the cast are the real spectacle. Barrett puts our hearts in our throats as Bertie, her Waspy restraint breaking like a dam holding back tears late in the second act. And Vosk, finally originating a Broadway role after 15 years of reliable service as a replacement and in the ensemble, delivers the most heartfelt performance of the season. Effortlessly hilarious and vocally unassailable, she doesn’t smooth over Cee Cee’s rough edges but makes us understand exactly why Bertie finds them appealing. It’s the liberation that comes from a true friendship that has nothing to do with networking or status, but is fully grounded in genuine human affection. If you’re lucky enough to have someone like that in your life, cherish them.

Only after these two women have made us fall in love with them does Beaches trot out “Wind Beneath My Wings” as a soaring 11 o’clock number for Vosk—almost as if to say, “This is what you came for, right?” But by then there’s not a dry eye in the house.