By David Gordon

When “The Full Monty” opened on Broadway in Oct. 2000, it was poised to become the next big Broadway smash. It was a crowd-pleasing favorite and got strong reviews, including a near-rave from the notoriously tough-to-please New York Times. And then, on April 19, 2001, “The Full Monty’s” hopes for that Best Musical Tony were dashed when a little show called “The Producers” took Broadway by storm and became the biggest hit in years.

Featuring a book by Terrence McNally and a score by David Yazbek, “The Full Monty” was nominated for 10 Tony Awards, but lost in all categories (like every other show did) to the freight-train that was “The Producers.” “Monty” closed up shop in 2002 but has since had an extensive life in stock and amateur performances. And now, under the direction of Lily Goodman, a junior drama major, it’s the fall production of Hofstra’s Masquerade Musical Theater Company.

Based on the ’90s film of the same name, “The Full Monty” tells the story of five unemployed steelworkers in Buffalo who decide to become male strippers to make a quick buck. As they work through their fears, their relationship problems, custody battles and more, the five guys come out with a new lease on life. But the question remains: will the guys go the full monty, like they did at the end of the Broadway show?

“There will be no nudity,” Goodman says. Though in the scheme of things, nudity is the least important. “It’s a show about pride and how people can get it back after losing so much,” she adds.

The show wasn’t a tough sell to the members of Masquerade. It’s a big musical, but it has more male parts than female. Goodman’s concept, however, makes “the women even more important than the men.”

Casey O’Keefe, a junior drama major who plays Vicki Nichols, one of the employed supervisors at the mill, is having a great time getting ready for a show she wasn’t familiar with. “I had only known about ‘The Full Monty’ because of the movie,” she says. But according to her, the show is “hilarious, and audiences can expect to have a ton of fun.”

Sophomore drama major Steve Spera, who plays Malcolm, the “loser who lives with his mother,” had seen the show before, multiple times, at a community theater where he worked. “Rehearsals have been a blast,” Spera says. “There’s a lot of racy humor, which keeps it very exciting.”

Spersa says “There is a much more important message than ‘Hey, these guys get naked.’ You really feel for these guys.”

Goodman says the show is geared towards a mature audience. “The topics within the show are very adult-oriented,” she says. There’s one catch, however: you must have a sense of humor. “I saw on a different ‘Full Monty’ poster once: ‘For mature audiences with a sense of humor,'” she says. “That is definitely the case.”

‘The Full Monty’Dec. 7, 8 p.m.Dec. 8, 8 p.m. and midnightMonroe Lecture Hall$5 with Hofstra ID$10 public