PNC Broadway in Kansas City has brought the musical Mrs. Doubtfire to the Kauffman Center as part of its continuing series. Yes, it’s the movie you remembered. No, it’s not the same.
The show traveled a long road to get here. 20th Century Studios released the film in 1993. The stage version, based on both the movie and the book by Karey Kirkpatrick and John O’Farrell, premiered on Broadway in 2021. Now, in 2026, the tour has reached Kansas City under tour director Steve Edlund, with music and lyrics by Wayne Kirkpatrick and Karey Kirkpatrick. The team coaxed scenes from the movie, updated them, and built a modernized musical version of a cinema classic.
Leading man Daniel, played by Craig Allen Smith, opens with a strong comedic turn, reciting the rules about phones, no photography — the usual audience constraints. The director fires him on stage for it, and he heads home to tell his wife he has lost his job again. She wants a divorce, and the story begins. To keep a place in his children’s lives, Daniel reinvents himself as Scottish nanny, Euphegenia Doubtfire.
A strong lead on an uneven night
Smith carries the production on an amazing voice with incredible range that never wavers. The other soloists could not match him on opening night, each a bit off. That is the nature of a tour. A different city every week means a different stage, different acoustics, role rotations, and opening night in a new house can take its toll. This probably was not the company’s best night. Music director and conductor Eli Bigelow seemed off in the first act as well, though he and the pit found their footing in the second.
Chaotic kitchen dance steals the show
The production’s finest stretch arrives in the kitchen. Edlund’s direction is perfect as Mrs. Doubtfire asks Siri for an easy meal to fix, and tour choreographer Michaeljon Slinger, working from Lorin Latarro’s original choreography, clearly has fun with it. Each ingredient turns up a cooking term Daniel does not know. He asks, “Siri, what is clarified butter?” and a new virtual chef appears to walk him through the step.
What begins as simple chanting and simple steps builds into a full-scale, chaotic tap dance across every kitchen surface and spills into the living room. The dinner is ruined, the room fills with smoke, and the family orders take-out to pass off as home cooked. It is a truly funny scene, and the dancing that powers it is the night’s high point. The styles throughout the show are varied, and they do not disappoint. The dance numbers had the audience truly engaged, and another audience member said it was her favorite part of the show.
A first act built on one-liners
The first act leans on a lot of mean, one-line jokes. They are funny, but shallow. Jokes can make you laugh and still leave you feeling sad, and character development is thin. A long stretch of incomprehensible screaming during Daniel’s makeover is meant to land as comedy, and for much of the house, I am sure it did.
Lights at war with the story
Not every choice serves the material. Philip S. Rosenberg’s lighting design runs too neon and garish for a simple, sweet show about a father’s love for his children. The mismatch is sharpest when Daniel suffers a surreal meltdown, replaying in his head the voices of everyone who warned him his scheme would fail, set to psychedelic light, music, and dance. Like the neon palette, the number simply does not fit the show around it.
A ribbon of love
For all that, a ribbon of love runs through the show, and the ending ties it in a tidy package as every character comes to see that love takes different shapes and forms. Daniel and his older daughter Lydia, played by Alanis Sophia, sing two sweet duets about the nature of love. The full company closes on “As Long as There Is Love.”
The verdict
“Mrs. Doubtfire” is not the film, and it does not try to be. The comedy stays on the surface, the lighting fights the story’s gentle spirit, and an opening-night company was still finding its feet. Yet the production wins back goodwill with its strengths. Smith’s voice anchors the night, the dance numbers elevate the show, the kitchen scene is a marvel, and the steady thread of love gives the evening its warmth. The audience seemed to agree. Asked for her reaction, a lady from Prairie Village said, “Everything was great!”
“Mrs. Doubtfire” runs nightly through June 7 at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts, with matinees on Saturday and Sunday. Tickets are available from BroadwayinKC.com.