Le monde des musicals

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George M! est un musical de Broadway basé sur la vie de George M. Cohan, la plus grande star de Broadway de son époque qui était connue sous le nom de "L’homme qui possédait Broadway."

Acte I

Jerry and Nel­lie Cohan waste no time adding their young son to their trav­el­ling vaude­ville act, "The Four Co­hans", with sis­ter Josie. By the time George is 20, they are play­ing the Co­lum­bia The­atre in Cedar Rapids, and George has landed an au­di­tion for the fam­ily with im­pre­sario E. F. Albee. But Albee doesn't make a good enough offer, and George books the act into the Adams Street The­atre in New York. There they meet singer Ethel Levey, and soon George and Ethel get mar­ried. Now George is de­ter­mined to move "The Five Co­hans" from vaude­ville to mu­si­cal com­edy, and so he writes his first full-length show, The Gov­er­nor's Son. The mu­si­cal is a flop, but George is un­de­terred and opens his next show, Lit­tle Johnny Jones. After a mo­men­tary cri­sis of con­fi­dence, the com­pany is on stage as George be­gins the song "Give My Re­gards to Broad­way". By the time the song is over, the Yan­kee Doo­dle Kid is a hit.

Acte II

George's ca­reer soars higher and higher. He is now a pro­ducer, and he and his part­ner, Sam H. Har­ris sign Fay Tem­ple­ton to ap­pear in their show, and we hear some of Cohan's most fa­mous songs, "Mary", "Forty-Five Min­utes from Broad­way", and "So Long Mary". Ethel feels ne­glected by her high-fly­ing hus­band, and the two are di­vorced. George is crushed, but later meets Agnes Nolan from the cast of Lit­tle Johnny Jones. Soon they are mar­ried and, to­gether with Agnes, George writes some of his most en­dur­ing work, in­clud­ing the songs "Yan­kee Doo­dle Dandy", "Har­ri­gan", "Over There", and "You're a Grand Old Flag." But George loses fam­ily mem­bers, and Broad­way is chang­ing – ac­tors are union­iz­ing, and Ac­tors Eq­uity is mak­ing de­mands. George first re­sists evolv­ing and then re­treats from the stage for many years. Even­tu­ally, though, Har­ris of­fers him a role in I'd Rather Be Right, and, lonely for the stage, he ac­cepts. But his old style is no longer right for 1937, and George is used to being the boss, not just an­other actor. On stage, alone, George re­mem­bers his for­mer glory, singing "Give My Re­gards to Broad­way." He can still tap, after all, and his wife Agnes joins him to reprise "Yan­kee Doo­dle Dandy" be­fore he leaves the the­atre – at least he's on Broad­way.