About the work
Crazy for You is a musical with music by George Gershwin and lyrics by Ira Gershwin, with a book by Ken Ludwig, premiered on Broadway in 1992. Billed as a "new Gershwin musical" loosely based on the 1930 show Girl Crazy, it weaves classic Gershwin songs into a new plot and won the Tony Award for Best Musical.
Plot
The wealthy New Yorker Bobby Child dreams of dancing rather than his family's banking business. Sent to the sleepy desert town of Deadrock, Nevada, to foreclose on a bankrupt theatre, he falls in love with Polly, the theatre owner's daughter. To save both theatre and girl, Bobby impersonates the famous impresario Bela Zangler and stages a big show. Mistaken identities, when the real Zangler turns up, cause mayhem until everything resolves in happiness and love.
Cultural significance
Crazy for You revived the classic Gershwin songbook for a new generation and sparked a wave of nostalgic "jukebox" musicals drawn from the Great American Songbook. With standards such as I Got Rhythm, Embraceable You, and Someone to Watch Over Me, and its exuberant tap numbers, it celebrates the joie de vivre of the classic musical. It ran for more than 1,600 performances on Broadway and is a perennial favourite of companies worldwide.