A rising Broadway talent plays a global cartoon icon in a star-making turn

 

I’ll admit it, I got BOOPed twice. I watched with bated breath as the nominees for Best Leading Actress in a Musical appeared on the screen at a Tony’s watch party: Megan Hilty (Death Becomes Her), Audra McDonald (Gypsy), Jasmine Amy Rogers (BOOP! The Musical), Nicole Sherzinger (Sunset Blvd.), and Jennifer Simard (Death Becomes Her). Ms. McDonald, whose 11 all-career Tony nominations and 6 wins keep her name on folks’ lips, was a likely choice. Ms. Sherzinger, who performed her headlining number barefoot (as her character does) on the awards stage earlier that evening, was also a top prediction. While I would’ve been delighted to see Audra make history again, I was secretly rooting for Ms. Rogers who is, by all accounts, an underdog. 

Tellingly, BOOP! The Musical was not nominated in the Best Musical category, but it was clear from the moment the curtains lifted at the Broadhurst Theatre that the best thing about this musical was Jasmine. She certifies her status as a triple threat in the first six minutes singing and tapping to “A Little Versatility” with so much effort that I broke a sweat from my seat in the side orchestra. It’s no wonder that Betty Boop, who lives at the center of her own black and white universe wanted a vacation: they had my sis working! When she arrives in the real world, she’s thrust into the technicolor of New York ComicCon, the new millennium, and the arms of a blue-eyed man. She doesn’t recognize this new New York, but convention goers sure do recognize her: her head dwarfs her body, she’s black and white, and she’s still a global icon. A teenage girl named Trisha (Angelica Hale), who’s Booped-out from head to toe, takes her home and introduces her to her interracial family.  

 

Though Betty came to our world to clock out, it’s not long before she’s punching back in. Within days she’s helping Trisha with her self-esteem, singing at a jazz club, and doling out mayoral endorsements. Plus, her old world needs her back because without her they cease to exist. Across universes, all of these problems are somehow Betty’s to fix. So long soft life, so long OOO.  

The most powerful characters in this show are played by Black women — Betty, and Trisha’s Aunt Carol (Anastacia McCleskey) who is cornered into running for mayor to “fix the city” — but not in a way that benefits them. Duty calls and they answer. Both Betty and Carol have determination and influence that other people want for themselves never mind what it costs either woman to share. When the audience cheered for Carol’s campaign, I couldn’t help but think of a certain other Black woman in politics, one who despite not being elected is still expected to save us from ourselves. When Dwayne (Ainsley Melham), Betty’s blue-eyed love interest, asks Betty if she’s ever been in a love story she has to parse through the times she’s been chased around furniture before she can confidently answer no. 

 

The 2023 movie Barbie followed a similar format: an icon of girlhood comes to our world to experience something new and in doing so creates conflict in two places and has to clean the whole mess up. The takeaway from Greta Gerwig’s Barbie was that “being a girl is hard”, an idea particularized by America Ferrara’s monologue. The movie ends with Margot Robbie as Barbie wearing a supportive shoe on her way to her first ever gynecology appointment. Betty returns to her world to keep making movies and films, but she has new terms. She doesn’t want to be chased around by yuckos and this is not a request, it’s a mandate. Anyone who considers these endings to be a win for feminism needs to loosen their little pink pussyhat. BOOP also aims to send an admirable message about income inequality, loving out loud, and the allure of a socialist democracy — likely too subtle and fractured to be well-received.  

 

The book is wobbly, acted out by a scrappy Chicago cast in front of sets that resemble what you’d get from typing “Times Square”, “New York City block”, or “purple teenage girl’s room” into an image generator — but Jasmine is solid and polished and authentic. Like the character she plays, she’s a class act trapped in a world that doesn’t deserve her. Time stops when she sings “Something to Shout About” and it’s a relief that the music and lyrics by David Foster and Susan Birkenhead let Jasmine dig in and go big. In her white ensemble against the inter-dimensional bridge of a starry sky, it’s BOOP! The Musical’s version of “Home” from the The Wiz. But rather than a tune that reaffirms that you’ve been home all along, “Something to Shout About” vocalizes Betty’s longing to feel something enticing, amazing, and powerful and this is pretty much where our heroine’s arc ends.

Rogers has mastered the cadence and inflection patterns from the “talkies” and folded it into the sweet puckered speech we expect from the cartoon. Her endearing giggle and exaggerated facial expressions soar to your heart like Cupid’s arrow, even if you’re way up in the balcony. You’re sure to blush when she flirts with Dwayne on the rooftop, even if (like me) you’re on your second watch. Ms. Rogers is so believable and so deeply in character it’s difficult to imagine what her real voice sounds like or how she’d walk down the sidewalk as herself. Even her Playbill headshot resembles a Betty-esque expression, her lips are pursed as she looks up and to the side. 

 

BOOP! The Musical has closed but Internet sleuths who’ve chosen to read into Instagram comments are convinced that it’s not gone for good. BOOP! can come or go, to me, it’s Jasmine that has staying power. Her talent and demeanor warrant more nominations, awards, and leading roles to come her way. If she can find a stage and story that deserve her, she won’t be an underdog for long.       

  

blacklove 🖤 and starlight 🌟 

 

BOOP! The Musical opened in New York at the Broadhurst Theatre on April 5, 2025 and closed on July 13, 2025. The production was directed and choreographed by Jerry Mitchell with music by David Foster, lyrics by Susan Birkenhead, and a book by Bob Martin. The Broadway cast recording is available on music streaming services. I purchased an in-person rush ticket for the performance on May 30 and a discounted ticket through TDF for the performance on June 4th.