 THE FULL MONTY
Musical in 2 Acts. Book by Terrence McNally; Music & lyrics by
David Yazbek
Based on the motion picture The Full Monty
World Premiere - Old Globe Theater, San Diego June 1, 2000
Eugene O'Neill Theatre, New York - October 26, 2000
Prince of Wales Theatre, London - 20 March, 2002
The Place: Buffalo, New York - The Time: The Present
ACT ONE
Georgie Bukatinsky bounds onto the stage of Tony Giordano's club and
welcomes us to Girls' Night Out. "Let's hear it for gals who work!" While
her husband is at home doing the dishes, she introduces us to the featured
attraction of the evening-Buddy "Keno" Walsh - the personification of
male physical perfection in an expensive business suit, though not for
long. Soon enough, Keno is down to a G-string and accepting the cheers
and screams (and dollar bills) from the women in the club. "Who
says Buffalo doesn't rock?"
While the women are having a night out, the guys are having a different
kind of meeting. They're all out of work because the steel plant in town
has closed, and they're at their union meeting house to pick up their
weekly cheques. Their discontent is beginning to show, and Jerry Lukowski
commiserates with his best friend, the hopelessly overweight Dave Bukatinsky,
as well as the somewhat simple-minded but good-hearted Ethan Girard, and
the sweet Malcolm MacGregor, who lives alone with his infirm mother -
they all feel like so much scrap.
After the meeting, Jerry, who shares custody of his 12-year-old son
Nathan, takes him to the bus stop which is outside Tony Giordano's
club. Nathan tells Jerry not to worry, that he will get a job. Jerry
says that he knows he will, but he's "waiting for the right situation ... you don't want
to see your old man bussing tables, do you?" Nathan's response is simply
"I wouldn't mind." Nathan tells Jerry he loves him; Jerry responds in
kind and tells Nathan to get on the bus. In the meantime, Dave has been
admiring the pictures of Keno that are outside the club. Jerry dismisses
Keno's physique as a choice "real guys don't look like that." When they
overhear two women excitedly going into the club (and paying $50 to do
so), Jerry asks the women what the strippers have that he doesn't have.
"Just about everything" is their response. When Jerry finds
out that Dave's wife is in the club watching, he insists that Dave go
into the club and bring her out. Dave says he can't - he has to go home
and do dishes, and besides it's ladies only, and Georgie organised the
evening. But at Jerry's urging they sneak in through the window of
the men's room.
Once inside, the two hear the screams of the cheering women and then
the sounds of Georgie and three friends entering the men's room because
the line for the ladies' room is too long. Jerry and Dave take refuge
in an empty stall while Georgie and her friends powder their noses. The
three ladies are joined by Jerry's ex-wife Pam, and Jerry and Dave overhear
revelations about each other from each of the ladies. The ladies leave,
and Jerry and Dave soon find themselves confronted by Keno in a G-string
making a quick change into a cowboy outfit. Keno mistakes Jerry for a
new dancer for the evening, and Jerry acidly proclaims his heterosexuality.
Keno bitchily dismisses him, and as Jerry takes a swing at Keno, he misses,
and Keno slugs him, hard.
After Keno leaves, Jerry begins brainstorming about the money Keno
makes and that if he and Dave - "real men" - were to strip,
they could clean up. Dave needs to be convinced, and Jerry does his best
- after all, he's a man!
The next day Jerry is served with papers threatening to take Nathan away
from him because he is over two months behind in child support payments.
Pam is now living in a nice neighbourhood with a more stable man, Teddy
Slaughter, who has asked her to marry him. Pam tells Jerry that he should
take any kind of job he can get and start to grow up. After an unpleasant
confrontation with Teddy, Jerry leaves more determined than ever to make
his stripping plan work.
Jerry and Dave are jogging (or rather, Dave is accompanying Jerry as
he trains) when they come upon Malcolm attempting suicide by asphyxiation.
They save him and offer him alternative ways to commit suicide. Jerry
invites Malcolm to join him in stripping and, since Malcolm has a part-time
job as the night security guard at the abandoned steel plant, they now
also have a place to rehearse.
Jerry engages Nathan to find them a dance teacher, and Nathan takes
them to a dance school where they meet their old boss Harold Nichols
and his wife Vicki. They're brushing up on their "cha-cha" for
a trip to Puerto Rico. Harold hasn't told Vicki that he has been out
of work for the past six months, and through desperation and the hint
of blackmail Harold agrees to become the guys' choreographer. But before
he can agree to that, Vicki tells them all about life with Harold.
The guys hold auditions and they aren't going well. However, their
showbiz-savvy accompanist Jeanette Burmeister -ho simply showed up "piano and all" -
tells them they'll know when the right guy shows up. "He'll glimmer."
Enter Horse, a gnarled, depressing and seemingly arthritic 50-year-old
man who seems to fulfil a certain kind of fantasy.
Later, the good-natured Ethan shows up and openly proclaims that he
can't dance or sing, but that he has something to offer. He drops his
pants and Jeanette simply says, "Gentlemen, put on your sunglasses.
We suddenly have a lot of glimmer."
That night, while Georgie sleeps, Dave confronts his body image with
a love song to his stomach. And, at the same time, Harold reflects on
his adoration of Vicki.
At the first rehearsal the following day, Harold is having a rough
time getting the guys to do anything together. While Horse is off in
the corner rehearsing "the funky chicken," Ethan and Malcolm
bond over an affection for the film The Sound of Music. However, it is only when Harold
reminds them that choreography is just like basketball that Jerry picks
up an idea, and suddenly their moves become teamwork - as long as they
are imagining that they're playing with Michael Jordan's Ball.
ACT TWO
At rehearsal a week later, the mistress of understatement, Jeanette,
sings that "things could be better." To no avail, Ethan keeps
insisting he can do Donald O'Connor's flip up a wall from Singin' in the Rain.
And any attempt at choreography brings about disastrous results.
In order to perform at Tony Giordano's club, Jerry needs to come up with
$1,000 as a deposit. He tries to get it from Pam but she'll have none
of it. Nathan, however, has money from his college savings account and
gives it to Jerry. Jerry's love of his son is all-encompassing and overwhelming.
Harold persuades Vicki to leave the house so that they can hold a rehearsal
there. Jerry has given their group a name - Hot Metal. This is the day
that the guys are going to take off all their clothes in front of each
other for the first time. They are fraught with anxiety. When they are
hypercritical of the sexy women in a Victoria's Secret catalogue,
they realise that their audience might be just as critical of them.
Nathan has gathered a small audience from a nearby nursing home for the
final dress rehearsal at the steel plant, but as they are taking off their
first layer of clothing they're raided by the police. In the confusion
that follows, Malcolm and Ethan successfully escape to Malcolm's home
where their attraction to one another is almost acknowledged, until Malcolm
senses something is wrong with his mother. Pam and Teddy arrive at the
police station to pick up Nathan, and it's very clear to everyone that
even if Jerry were to come up with the child support money, he wouldn't
be able to share custody of Nathan.
At his mother's funeral, much to the surprise of Jerry and Dave and a
few other mourners, Malcolm expresses his loneliness and longing, and
finds that both will be ended by the warm heart and hand of Ethan.
Jerry was afraid to disclose to the guys that sales for the show weren't
going well. When told by a few women that the Buffalo Bills are playing
that night, and, asked why after having seen "the real thing," they should
want to see a bunch of amateur local guys strip, Jerry quickly says (much
to the shock and disbelief of the guys), "We're different - we go all
the way! You heard me. What do they call it? The Full Monty." Ticket
sales start to take off.
Jerry considers Dave a traitor for having taken a job at Wal-Mart, and
their friendship is dissolved. When Dave returns home from his first day
at work, Georgie, upon discovering part of his stripping costume, confronts
him about it. When, embarrassed, he confesses what he had been up to with
the guys, she is relieved and supports him. She reaffirms her love for
him, and he for her. At the same time, when Vicki finds out that Harold
has been out of work, she reminds him that she loves him for himself,
and not for what he can buy her. Both couples find their marriages and
their love on stronger ground than ever.
It's the night of the show, and backstage at Tony Giordano's club
nervousness runs high. A beautifully coifed Jeanette wishes all the
guys good luck. Vicki tells them that Harold has got a job so he doesn't
need to do this for the money, but she reminded him, "Harold, you have the rest of your
life to wear a suit and tie - but only one night to be a member of Hot
Metal!" Even Keno, just passing through town, shows up to see if
the guys will really go all the way.
Before they take their places Jerry decides that, since Dave chickened
out, he also isn't going to do the show. But then Dave shows up and
Jerry no longer has an excuse not to go through with it, except his
old refrain - he's a failure. Nevertheless, the rest of the guys decide
to give a good show, but not to do The Full Monty. They take their
places on-stage and the number begins. While they're performing, Nathan
confronts Jerry about why he isn't out there with the rest of the guys,
and through a mixture of wisdom, passion and frank common sense, he
tells his father,
"This time don't be what everyone thinks you are - a loser." Jerry
realises not only how much his son loves him, but that he can't think
of himself in the same way ever again. He joins his friends on stage
midway through the number and by the end of the show, we know that
The Full Monty isn't just about showing off the outside, it's about
what all of us have on the inside.
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