Gutenberg! The Musical!
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| Program Cover |
by Anthony King & Scott Brown
Review by Ernest Edwards
Gutenberg! Is one of the funniest musicals ever made.
Theater Latte Da has assembled the best cast, director/choreographer for Gutenberg! And the results are phenomenal!
You are probably wondering, what is Gutenberg! The Musical!? It is a two person musical about Doug and Bud. They work at a nursing home in New Jersey and have written a musical about Johan Gutenberg, who is the inventor of the printing press. In their research, they discovered that not much else is known about Johan Gutenberg. The internet says the information is “scant”. So they decided to use some historical fiction for their musical. To hilarious results.
The musical was written in 2005. It had productions in London and Off Broadway in 2006. Gutenberg! finally made its Broadway debut during the 2023/2024 season. I was lucky to able to see the Broadway production with Josh Gad and Andrew Rannells. I was so excited when Gutenberg! was announced as part of the 2025/2026 Theater Latte Da season.
Doug and Bud are really hoping a Broadway producer will like their show. They spent every dime they have on renting the theater for one night only to show off their show. Our two actors play all the characters with hilarious results. They use baseball caps with names on them for every single character. There’s a lot of hats that get used during this production. It’s so much fun! Credit to the props & stage management teams for making sure those hats are put in order for every performance.
Gutenberg! It’s a musical comedy with farcical moments. Gutenberg! pokes fun itself, pokes fun of the musical as an art form, and also explains what a musical is for new theater patrons.
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| Image from Theater Latte Da |
Let’s talk about the cast. Doug is played by Tom Reed, and Bud is played by Dominic Schiro. These two actors give a tour de force acting performance. They are funny, they are energetic, they can do comedy, they do drama, they can sing, they can dance. In the program I see the understudies are Noah Hynick and Carl Swanson. Whether your performance has the original two leads, or one understudy, or both of the understudies, you are in a for a treat! When the show was over, there was an instant standing ovation.
This production is directed and choreographed by Tyler Michaels King. He must have had a lot of fun working with this talented cast and this script.
I also really like the scenery by Sarah Bahr. I have attended many Theater Latte Da productions at the Ritz Theater over the years. I feel like this was the first time I have seen a show with an actual proscenium arch. The joy of the Ritz is seeing the bare walls and how Latte Da incorporates the venue into the productions and vice versa. I’m not saying we need a proscenium arch going forward, for Gutenberg! it was fun to see arch with curtains and lined with light bulbs. Doug & Bud did rent a theater for the night. It added so much to the style for this production.
In an effort not give you a spoiler. I will say there is a cameo in Gutenberg! The night I went the cameo was the director of Theater Latte Da’s production of Fun Home, Addie Gorlin-Han. With the wide array of theater artists that we have in the Twin Cities. I just wonder who will it be at each performance?
Gutenberg! The Musical! Runs through May 3, 2026. Check out www.latteda.org for tickets.
