Would critics see Groundhog Day over and over again?

Sarah Crompton, WhatsOnStage

★★★★★

"It was a huge challenge for composer Tim Minchin and director Matthew Warchus to follow the world-beating success of Matilda. Yet they have totally pulled it off."

"Minchin, whisper it quietly, might just be a genius. This is such an original and warm-hearted work. But it would be nothing without direction so seamless that even a full-blown tap number seems entirely fitting."

"Broadway star Andy Karl is a revelation as Phil, finding infinite variations of grumpy misery that are eventually transmuted into a realisation of what life is about."

Dominic Cavendish, The Telegraph

★★★★★

"A much-loved, ingeniously funny and clever Hollywood film has made a triumphant theatrical rebirth – in a show that looks, on first viewing, equal to, and perhaps better than, the movie."

"There’s barely any let-up in the music, the movement or the scene-shifting on the revolving stage. Minchin uses repetition and sustained notes as a means of deepening the levels of irony, every dab of a refrain contributing to the mood."

"With this beacon of hope for new musical theatre, the Old Vic is finally on an incredible roll."

Michael Billington, The Guardian

★★★★

"Minchin’s songs breezily add to the satire on small-town life. At one point, as he finds himself undergoing humiliating hospital tests, Phil cries: "Who needs enemas with friends like this?"

"Karl exudes all the self-regard of the minor TV star and sneering contempt for a town of "hicks and magical beavers" and, even more than Murray, endows the man with a sexual swagger. "

"The action, especially in the first half, is so fast and furious that the songs have little room to breathe. It’s a score that serves the plot perfectly, but it’s not exactly one you ache to hear again."

Andrzej Lukowski, Time Out

★★★★

"Groundhog Day is not quite as good as Matilda, being a little bit more slick and saccharine. It is still bloody good, and probably the third best British musical of the twenty-first century."

"Groundhog Day is unlikely to upset big fans of the film. It's co-written with Danny Rubin, who wrote the original, and basically holds on to every incident and much of the dialogue from the movie. Ned is very much still Ned."

"[Andy Karl] is really very good, his matinee-ish looks making sense of Phil's womanising arrogance. It does not star Andie MacDowell as Phil's TV producer love interest Rita, but rather Carylss Peer, who brings a bit more depth and spikiness to the role, while still holding on to the perky goodness that first infuriates then purifies Phil."

Henry Hitchings, Evening Standard

★★★★★

"The book is the work of Danny Rubin, who wrote the original film script, and it has the same nerveless mix of fantasy and misanthropy."

"But while the movie’s spirit is intact, Minchin packs in a multitude of new jokes, and his score inhabits half a dozen different idioms, ranging from country and western to anthemic rock."

"Director Matthew Warchus matches him for wit, with Rob Howell’s clever designs integral to the show’s fluency and ingenuity. There are some superb illusions courtesy of Paul Kieve and nimble choreography by Peter Darling."

Quentin Letts, Daily Mail

"It needs more work, more heart and, most of all, a leading man who can match the quirky appeal Bill Murray brought to the film."

"[Phil's] attitude to women feels glaringly chauvinist. The world has moved on since 1993, guys. I was also troubled by a skit on suicide. That, along with some juvenile bad language, jarred."

"Mr Minchin has an easy way with melodies but I could not immediately identify a song here to match anything in Matilda."

Mark Shenton, The Stage

★★★★★

"The show refuses to stand still. Choreographer Peter Darling’s typically electrifying and energising parade of movement keeps driving the population of townspeople around our increasingly hapless weatherman into repeated frames of action that subtly alter each time they come around "

"The production and its wonderful ensemble cast keep you watching on the edge of your seat. Kieve’s sleight-of-hand abilities to propel Andy Karl’s Phil Connors through different stage locations in the same number is amazing. "

"Minchin and his collaborators have thrillingly made a show that stays in the same time and place for more than two and a half hours, yet has an inner momentum that never induces a sense of deja vu."

Groundhog Day runs at the Old Vic until 17 September.