The only effort Betsy Wolfe has to put forth to sell a new musical is to use those incredible vocal cords to mesmerize an audience, but in the “new true musical”, “Joy”, with a book by Ken Davenport and music and lyrics by Annmarie Milazzo, she has her work cut out for her. The show is based on the life of Joy Mangano and her book “Inventing Joy: Dare to Build a Brave & Creative Life”. The general public might recognize Ms. Mangano from QVC where she pitched her successful invention of the “Miracle Mop” along with other products she has invented. A movie released in 2015 titled “Joy” starring Jennifer Lawrence was also loosely based on Ms. Mangano’s life but depended mostly on a fictionalized narrative. So, the question that remains, is why anyone would believe the story now needed to become a musical comedy. The genre is difficult enough to master, but when the story and outcome is already known, it becomes even more difficult to deliver something that garners the attention of an audience. Enter Betsy Wolfe, phenomenal actor and vocalist, who gives it her all, even handing out “Miracle Mops” to members of the audience. Sadly, she seems to be challenged at every turn of the shallow, stereotypical script, and repetitious, pedestrian score.

For those who are unfamiliar, the plot follows Long Island housewife Joy Mangano, who has been inventing things since her childhood, but her ideas seemed to be disregarded by her family. She gets terminated from the job she loathed as an airport gate attendant and is left unemployed with not many options. After a mishap in the kitchen, she starts on her journey to invent a new mop that will save time and energy. She is a divorced single mom living in a crowded household that includes her dead-beat ex Tony (Brandon Espinoza), who shares the basement with her father Rudy (Adam Grupper). Rudy has been divorced three times. Also living there are her agoraphobic, demanding mother, Toots (Jill Abramovitz), and her daughter Christie (Honor Blue Savage), who feels neglected. She makes a prototype of the mop with the help of money from her father’s new girlfriend, Lorraine (Jaygee Macapugay), who was a classmate in high school. Her father becomes her business manager and takes care of the patents and finances, which of course becomes a disaster after teaming up with Cowboy Eddie (Paul Whitty). She approaches QVC to pitch her new mop, but it fails to sell, and being persistent, she convinces QVC to give her a second chance and let her do the pitch on air. The rest of the story is history after selling 18,000 mops in less than a half an hour. Of course, there are quite a few bumps in the road before she is on her way to becoming a successful entrepreneur and inventor.

Unfortunately, most of the characters fall into exaggerated stereotypes that are superficial and two dimensional. The plot line seems to be served by all too convenient events that are revealed as needed and the musical numbers do nothing to serve the characters’ development or move the plot forward. The choreography by the usually amazing Joshua Bergasse, falls flat and seems uninspired by the material, at one point providing a cowboy production number that seems out of place. At least there were no dancing mops but on second thought, that could have been more entertaining. Director Lorin Latarro lacked the ability to find the passion and drama that the story needs, leaving the character of Joy Mangano to seem like a pushover and doormat, rather than the intelligent, determined and passionate woman she should be. Ms. Wolfe does what she can to save this production, including delivering a powerful eleven o’clock number, “A Better Way,” that is a showstopper, but cannot overcome the overall shortcomings of the script, music and lyrics. The show is in no way offensive and may be compared to a musical Lifetime movie. It is entertaining but lacks the elements of good musical theater.