"Much of the score is appealing. But the book tends to flatten most of the characters into comic cartoons...'Waitress' taps into its wellsprings of universal feeling with a slick surface professionalism rather than anything approaching real depth...It is when Mueller tears into the musical’s climactic number that her talents are most movingly harnessed...Suddenly, a pleasant and polished but weightless musical comedy rises to transporting heights, and sweeps up your heart along with it."
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"Fresh and delicious, 'Waitress' has an excellent ratio of sweet to tart; supporting characters who provide crustiness and flakiness; and cooked-to-perfection staging. The whole dish is love at first bite...Jessie Nelson’s broadly comic yet brooding book meshes wonderfully with a frisky, bright score by pop star Sara Bareilles...For all its folksy one-liners and radio-friendly sound, 'Waitress' has a subversive, feminist side."
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"'Waitress' is clearly, passionately, and for the most part delightfully a feminist musical....'Waitress' can be an uncomfortable genre mix: domestic-violence drama and workplace romcom. That’s in the source material, and the musicalization exaggerates it. What I didn’t expect is that the musicalization could also help to justify the mismatch. As the story rushed toward its conclusion, I began to understand that for these characters, life itself is an uncomfortable genre mix."
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"A tourist-trap rom-com that has little to offer but Ms. Mueller and her fine supporting cast...Everything that happens in 'Waitress' is as familiar as a cafeteria salad...Jessie Nelson’s book is full of holes...Ms. Bareilles has no notion of how to write for the stage. Her tunes are flat and unmemorably unhummable, and she shoves so many words into each stanza that none of them stand out...Ms. Mueller, on the other hand, is so good that you’ll actively resent the mediocrity of 'Waitress.'"
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"The positives far outnumber the negatives...The score is a beaut. Bareilles covers the territory with ballads, beautiful choral numbers, big dance numbers and Jenna’s killer anthems. The cast is pleasingly diverse without shouting about it...'Waitress' is a feel-good show that’s no mere guilty pleasure. It’s got soul and heart, sweetness and crust all in fine measure."
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"'Waitress' owes its sweetness to the mouth-watering goodness of Jessie Mueller...The musical resorts to comic overkill to create characters. But Sara Bareilles has written a charming score that suits the quirky material and Mueller’s dazzling voice and endearing personality...There are good things in the second act, which is more lyrical and less silly...Too bad it took so long to get here."
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"Echoing a weakness in the original screen source, Paulus and Latarro could be criticized for overplaying the whimsy. But the material is anchored at every step by Bareilles' melodious pop score and Mueller's supremely natural performance as Jenna...The ballads are not Broadway-style songs in that they advance the plot, but they do something just as vital, which is to deepen our affection for the characters and our access to their inner lives."
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"This show is all about the sugar. Sometimes it’s the light, powdery variety that Bareilles and the rest of the creative team sprinkle over this genial if overly formulaic evening...And at all times, the musical, is bolstered by the zesty energy of Bareilles’s score, a set of sharp pop tunes that provides an antidote to the proceedings’ saccharine sitcom sensibility...Mueller has great presence and even better vocal chops, performing Bareilles’s soothing, soaring ballads with style and power."
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