''An Officer and a Gentleman, The Musical'' is a stage musical based on the 1982 film of the same name, written by

Douglas Day Stewart Douglas Day Stewart is an American screenwriter and film director. He graduated from Claremont McKenna College in 1962. Filmography Writer *'' Room 222'' (episodes: "KWWH", "Stay Awhile, Mr. Dream Chaser", "The Quitter" and "You Don't Know Me, ...

. It had its world premiere May 18, 2012 at the Lyric Theatre in Sydney, Australia. The musical closed six weeks later on July 1. It was co-produced by John Frost and Sharleen Cooper Cohen. The book was written by Douglas Day Stewart and Sharleen Cooper Cohen and the score was written by

Ken Hirsch Kenneth William Hirsch is an American pop songwriter, pianist and record producer, co-writer of the international 1982 hit "I've Never Been to Me" with Ron Miller. He is also co-writer of the hits "If I Could", "No One in the World" and "Two Le ...

and Robin Lerner. It was directed by Simon Phillips. It starred Ben Mingay as Zack Mayo and

Amanda Harrison Amanda Harrison is an Australian actress and singer, known for her roles in ''Wicked'' (Elphaba), ''We Will Rock You'' ("Meat" understudy in the UK, and “Oz" understudy in Australia), and for originating the role of Paula Pokrifki in the worl ...

as Paula Pokrifki. A new version of the musical made its premiere at

Curve In mathematics, a curve (also called a curved line in older texts) is an object similar to a line, but that does not have to be straight. Intuitively, a curve may be thought of as the trace left by a moving point. This is the definition that ...

Leicester, England Leicester ( ) is a city, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest settlement in the East Midlands. The city lies on the River Soar and close to the eastern end of the Nati ...

in April 2018 before touring the UK. It was directed by Nikolai Foster and used songs from the film's soundtrack such as "Up Where We Belong", "Girls Just Want to Have Fun", "Toy Soldiers", "Alone", "Don't Cry Out Loud" and "Material Girl", opposed to the musical's original score by Hirsch and Lerner.

Reception

The Sydney production received mixed reviews. In response to a highly negative review in ''

The Australian ''The Australian'', with its Saturday edition, ''The Weekend Australian'', is a broadsheet newspaper published by News Corp Australia since 14 July 1964.Bruns, Axel. "3.1. The active audience: Transforming journalism from gatekeeping to gatew ...

'', calling the show a "bloodless facsimile" of the film, author Stewart published a rebuttal defending the production and attacking the critics for their "eclectic, overly intellectual point of view". When the show's closing was announced, producer John Frost told a reporter that an American tour was still a possibility, after revisions were made to the show. The show was nominated for five Helpmann Awards including "Best Musical 2012". Bert LaBonte won for "Best Supporting Actor".

Cast and characters

* The character Taniya Seegar was changed to Casey Seegar in the US Touring production. * The character Byron Mayo was changed to Zack's Dad in the US Touring production.

Recordings

A promotional disc of five songs was released including "Up Where We Belong", performed by Ben Mingay, Amanda Harrison,

Kate Kendall Kate Kendall (born 27 July 1973) is an Australian actress and director. She played Angie Piper in the long-running Nine Network Australian drama '' Stingers'' from 1998 to 2004. Kendall has appeared in television series '' The Librarians'' (2 ...

and Alex Rathgeber, and "If You Believe In Love", sung by Amanda Harrison.

Awards and nominations

References

2012 musicals Musicals based on films {{musical-theatre-stub