On Tour: The Cher Show

The Cher Show falters as the bio-jukebox musical attempts to tackle Cher’s life and career.

Dressed in Bob Mackie costumes and laced with big hits like “I Got You Babe,” “Believe,” “If I Could Turn Back Time,” and “Woman’s World,” The Cher Show creates a caricature of its namesake. The musical covers Cher’s early career in the 1950s and 60s to her rise to stardom in the 1990s, telling the story through three Chers—Babe (Cher in the 50s and 60s), Lady (Cher in the 70s), and Star (Cher in the 80s and 90s). While the story is mostly biographical, it adds theatricality to its storytelling by having the different versions of Cher interact and provide commentary on stage.

The book of the musical is fairly straightforward, intertwining Cher’s life story with cheesy jokes and easy laughs. So much so that by the end of the production, some of the recurring jokes are so tired that you can’t laugh anymore.

Despite its book, the costume design is one of the production’s highlights—of course, the recreation of Bob Mackie’s designs is stunning and brings Cher to life on stage. The costume design and choreography of the production could almost distract from the lack of set design and weak book.

The musical selections for the production are a great capsule of Cher’s body of work and utilize hits that fans might expect to hear. This is perhaps another highlight of the production and definitely sells to Cher’s fanbase. Even for those who might not be as familiar with Cher, many of her hits from across the decades made the cut into the musical.

One challenge evident in this production is its unclear intention. Does it want to be a theatrical concert of Cher’s life, with bits of her life story sprinkled in between musical numbers? Or does it earnestly want to tell Cher’s story?

The cast is really the strength of this production. It’s no fault of the cast that creative elements seem to miss the mark. Ella Perez is a gem as Babe, perfectly capturing Cher’s innocent years while giving the audience a peek at the voice and icon to come. Perez plays well opposite Lorenzo Pugliese (Sonny Bono), capturing the audience’s hearts early on with “I’ve Got You Babe.”

Morgan Scott is a highlight of the production as Star. Scott beautifully captures Cher as the icon on stage and screen that we have come to know today. She captivates the audience with spot-on renditions of “Believe,” “Just Like Jesse James,” “Strong Enough,” “The Beat Goes On,” and “You Haven’t Seen the Last of Me.”

It’s hard to say who this production is for other than Cher’s most dedicated fans. While the cast does an excellent job bringing these figures to life, the production struggles with whether to be more of a concert-style production or a full theatrical production. It would appear that this production would be a wonderful night for a Cher superfan but a production to pass for the average theatergoer.