Show Synopsis: Monty Navarro is quite content with his life, but he would like to have enough money to ask the wealthy Sibella to marry him. One day, a mysterious woman named Miss Shingle tells him that his mother was part of the large and wealthy D?Ysquith family, meaning that he has a claim to part of their fortune. In fact, he would be the sole heir to the fortune and estate if eight D?Ysquiths die. Monty decides to get in the family?s good graces by working for Lord Asquith D?Ysquith Senior?s banking house, but the Lord?s son denies him a place and the existence of Monty?s mother. Monty tours the D?Ysquith?s ancestral home Highhurst Castle and is driven out by Lord Adalbert D?Ysquith the Earl of Highurst. Monty speaks to Reverend Lord Ezekiel D?Ysquith, who tells Monty it?s best to stay out family affairs, before he falls off of a tower due to high winds (and a little bit of Monty blowing through his lips). Monty tries to poison Lord Asquith D?ysquity Junior but decides it?s easier to cut a hole in the ice on the pond and let him fall and drown. Lord Asquith D?Ysquith Senior gives Monty a job at his house to teach him the family business in the wake of the tragedy. Sibella gets engaged to Lionel Holland, and Monty befriends Henry D?Ysquith to learn his weaknesses. Henry is stung to death by his beloved bees when Monty covers his beekeeping gear with lavender oil, and Monty begins flirting with Henry?s wife Phoebe. Monty overloads bodybuilder Major Lord Bartholomew D?YSquith?s barbell and decapitates him, and loads real bullets into the prop gun for Lady Salome D?Ysquith Humphrey?s play so that she kills herself onstage. Lord Asquith D?Ysquith Senior dies of a heart attack, and Monty is suddenly next in line to inherit Highhurst. He and Sibella continue their romance, and Phoebe decides to marry Monty, and Monty would like both of them. Lord Aldalbert D?Ysquith invites Monty, Sibella, and Phoebe to Highhurst Castle, where Sibella finds out about Phoebe?s engagement and angrily asks Monty to break it off. Monty learns that Miss Shingle has been a servant of the D?Ysquith family for thirty-nine years, and Lord Adalbert dies of poison in his wine, though Monty is shocked because he didn?t put any in there. Monty and Phoebe get married but Monty is arrested for the murder of Lord Aldabert. He meets a distant D?Ysquith relation named Chauncey, who cleans the jail cells because his ancestors were also disowned by the wealthy D?Ysquiths. Phoebe learns that Sibella truly loves Monty, and the women concoct a plan with contradicting evidence so that Monty may go free and have relations with both of them. Miss Shingle confesses to having poisoned Lord Aldabert in the end. Character: Phoebe D'Ysquith, an exceptionally smart and flirtatious woman who loves clothes and wealth. Song Context: Phoebe and Monty find that they are very similar people, and Phoebe is very sympathetic to the story of Monty's mother and her history with the D'Ysquith family. They lament that people cannot always demonstrate who they truly are inside. Fun Facts: 1. This musical is based on the novel Israel Rank: The Autobiography of a Criminal by Roy Horniman. 2. Lauren Worsham originated the role of Phoebe on Broadway and described her in a Playbill.com interview as "a beautiful, delicate doll with a quirky, bizarre center. [Laughs.] She seems just like a delicate perfume, a breath of fresh air, and then she?s obsessed with poverty and working men. She finds that very sexy, and she also is, at the very end ? I don?t want to give it away ? but she accepts that her husband may not be that perfect man that she thought he was." 3. Worsham won a Theatre World Award and a Drama Desk award for her performance, and she was also nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical.
"An oyster shell itself is unassuming But look inside, You'll find a pearl. The man who otherwise is unpresuming May share the same blood As an earl. Do not dismiss so of an off position. She can be tenderhearted, I've no doubt. The world would be in awfully good condition If we could all live Inside out. Though belladonna is my favorite flower I love its shape And its perfume, You'd likely join the angels in an hour Should you ingest Its rather deadly bloom. The man who seems a paragon of virtue May be a scoundrel Better versed in sin. There may be many fewer who could hurt you If we could all live Outside in. And everyone you'd meet On any London street, If they be sweet or horrid, It would show I would be overjoyed The hearty guide avoid If I could look at you And know And when I meet the man for whom I'm fated, I'll know the one I've waited for is he, For he will find these wealthy trappings overrated And he will see what no one sees in me: A girl who reads the classics and the sonnets Who needs no folderol, it'll fill her cup, A girl who thinks a bit beyond her bonnets. He'll be of gentle heart And good renown. He'll be the most admired man in town, He'll take a world that's mostly upside down And turn it right side up. If we lived inside out Or even outside in The change in how we see would be immense. If we lived right side left Or even left side right, Back side front Or front side back Would shed a better light, Black might just be white, Day might just be night. If we knew the truth about each other on sight, The world might just make sense."