How David Rockwell Created BOOP!'s Technicolor World

Betty has arrived! Previews officially begin tonight, March 11, for BOOP! The Musical on Broadway. Tony Award-winning director/choreographer Jerry Mitchell brings the Queen of the Screen to the theater, with celebrated multiple Grammy Award-winning composer David Foster, Tony Award-nominated lyricist Susan Birkenhead and Tony Award-winning book writer Bob Martin.

Tony winner David Rockwell reunites with Mitchell, a frequent collaborator since their 2000 production of The Rocky Horror Show, as the musical's scenic designer. He is telling BroadwayWorld all about how he gave Max Fleischer's iconic cartoons new life on the Broadway stage and brought Betty into the 21st century.

You're in tech right now, correct?

Yes, and it's going really well. I love the Broadhurst Theatre. We've done this show in Chicago already, so we knew a lot about it, but we're reworking it for that theater, and reworking some of the changes the creative team has come up with. That's been great and spirits are high and everyone is totally into revealing Boop! to the city.

It seems like it's been a very happy rehearsal room...

It really is. Jerry runs a very positive, energetic, very high energy tech. As he likes to say, it's full out!

Can you talk me through the beginning stages of this particular design process and what your initial inspirations were?

We immersed ourselves in the world of Betty Boop and spent time with Jerry, which is, you know, always the first part of the process. We want to understand what the director wants to do and recognize a little bit about how the writers want to take Betty Boop from a two-dimensional cartoon world, which is where we begin the show, into present day in New York.

So we started by looking at the Fleischer cartoons. Finn Ross (projection design), Philip Rosenberg (lighting design), and Gregg Barnes (costume design)- we have a full collaboration. I would say the initial, really thrilling thing to figure out is- how is Betty going to come to the color world and how does she exist in the color world?

And how does that color world evolve throughout the show? 

Betty begins as a black and white character, and at a certain point in the show, she kind of becomes full-color Betty, which is a really big, amazing number for her. Jasmine [Amy Rogers] is just so incredible. Then we follow her in taking a day off from being one of the world's biggest super celebrities in the black and white world, and it turns out she's well known in the color world too. She goes on this adventure of discovering love and what it's like living in full color. 

What has been the biggest challenge on this project for you?

The biggest challenge has been the most fun, which is the representing the black and white world in a way that it lives and breathes on a Broadway stage. And that's something I've never had a chance to do before. In the first 20 minutes or so, the show exists in various versions of Betty's world with Grampy, her adorable dog, Pudgy.

What do you think is most going to surprise people about Boop!?

I think it's this 1930s character, which many people are aware of, but they just know her by myth. But she is really relevant today as a very strong kind of independent woman who's done everything... as we find out. She's done every job there is to do, but she has not been in love. I think seeing her take on the world now is really interesting based on her kind of character and her positivity, and versatility. Both of which are the names of songs! 

BOOP! The Musical will open on April 5 at the Broadhurst Theatre. View the full 2025 Spring Preview!