Musical theatre is a type of play that combines songs, spoken words, acting, and dancing. The story and emotions, like humor, sadness, love, and anger, are shown through words, music, movement, and other parts of the performance. Even though musical theatre is similar to other types of plays, like opera and dance, it is different because music is as important as the words, movement, and other parts. Since the early 1900s, these stage plays have been called "musicals."

Music has been part of plays since ancient times, but modern musical theatre began in the 1800s. Many of its features were created by works from Jacques Offenbach in France, Gilbert and Sullivan in Britain, and Harrigan and Hart in America. These were followed by musical comedies in Britain and plays by American creators like George M. Cohan at the start of the 20th century. The Princess Theatre musicals (1915–1918) were important steps forward, leading to famous shows like Show Boat (1927), Of Thee I Sing (1931), and Oklahoma! (1943). Some well-known musicals from later years include My Fair Lady (1956), The Fantasticks (1960), Hair (1967), A Chorus Line (1975), Les Misérables (1985), The Phantom of the Opera (1986), Rent (1996), Wicked (2003), and Hamilton (2015).

Musicals are performed around the world. They can be in big places like Broadway or West End in New York or London. Or they can be in smaller places like off-Broadway, off-West End, regional theaters, fringe theaters, or community theaters. They might also be performed by groups in schools, churches, or other places. Besides the United States and Britain, countries like Europe, Asia, Australia, Canada, and Latin America also have strong musical theatre scenes.

Definitions and scope

Since the 20th century, the "book musical" has been described as a musical play where songs and dances are combined into a well-organized story with serious dramatic goals that can create real emotions, not just laughter. The three main parts of a book musical are its music, lyrics, and book. The book or script of a musical includes the story, character development, and dramatic structure, such as spoken dialogue and stage directions. It can also refer to the dialogue and lyrics together, which are sometimes called the libretto (Italian for "small book"). The music and lyrics together form the score of a musical, which includes songs, incidental music, and musical scenes. These scenes are "theatrical sequences set to music, often combining song with spoken dialogue." The interpretation of a musical is managed by its creative team, which includes a director, a musical director, usually a choreographer, and sometimes an orchestrator. A musical's production also includes technical elements like set design, costumes, stage props, lighting, and sound. The creative team, designs, and interpretations often change between the original production and later versions. However, some elements may stay the same, such as Bob Fosse's choreography in Chicago.

There is no fixed length for a musical. It can be as short as one act or as long as several acts and several hours, or even multiple evenings. Most musicals last between one and a half to three hours. They are usually presented in two acts, with one short break between them. The first act is often longer and introduces most characters, music, and a dramatic conflict or problem. The second act may add a few new songs but usually repeats important musical themes and resolves the conflict. A book musical is usually built around four to six main theme songs that are repeated later, though some musicals use songs that are not directly connected. Spoken dialogue is usually placed between musical numbers, though "sung dialogue" or recitative may be used in certain musicals like Jesus Christ Superstar, Falsettos, Les Misérables, Evita, and Hamilton. Some shorter musicals on Broadway and in the West End in the 21st century are presented in one act.

The most intense moments in a book musical are often performed in song. When emotions are too strong for speech, characters sing; when emotions are too strong for song, they dance. In a book musical, a song is ideally created to match the character or characters and their situation in the story. However, in some earlier musicals (from the 1890s to the 1920s), the connection between music and story was weak. As a critic once said, "There is no separation between song and character in the best musicals." Typically, fewer words are sung in a five-minute song than are spoken in five minutes of dialogue. This means musicals have less time to develop drama compared to plays of the same length because they spend more time on music than dialogue. Within this format, writers must develop characters and plot quickly.

The material in a musical can be original or adapted from novels (Wicked, Man of La Mancha), plays (Hello, Dolly!, Carousel), classic legends (Camelot), historical events (Evita, Hamilton), or films (The Producers, Billy Elliot). Some musicals have also been adapted into films, such as West Side Story, My Fair Lady, The Sound of Music, Oliver!, and Chicago.

Musical theatre is closely related to opera, but they are usually different. First, musicals focus more on spoken dialogue. Some musicals are entirely sung, while some operas have spoken parts. Second, musicals include more dancing as part of the story, especially by main performers and the chorus. Third, musicals often use popular music styles.

Musicals usually avoid certain opera traditions. For example, they are almost always performed in the language of the audience. Musicals on Broadway or in the West End are always in English, even if they were originally written in another language. Opera singers are primarily singers, while musical theatre performers are often actors who also sing and dance. Someone skilled in all three is called a "triple threat." Composers for musicals consider the vocal abilities of performers. Today, musicals often use microphones to amplify singing, which is less common in opera.

Some works, like those by George Gershwin, Leonard Bernstein, and Stephen Sondheim, have been made into both musicals and operas. Older operettas, such as The Pirates of Penzance, have also been adapted as musicals. The way a work is produced can affect whether it is classified as a musical or opera. Sondheim said, "When something plays on Broadway, it's a musical. When it plays in an opera house, it's opera." There is some overlap between lighter operas and more complex musicals, making it hard to distinguish between different types of musical theatre, such as "musical play," "musical comedy," "operetta," and "light opera."

Like opera, musical theatre uses an instrumental group called a pit orchestra, which is located in front of the stage. While opera uses a full symphony orchestra, musicals often use smaller ensembles. Rock musicals may use only a few rock instruments, and some musicals may use only a piano or two instruments. The music in musicals includes styles like operetta, classical techniques, folk music, jazz, and local or historical styles. Some musicals begin with an overture, which is a short piece played by the orchestra that combines famous melodies from the score.

There are also musical traditions in other cultures, such as Chinese opera, Japanese Noh, and Indian musical theatre, including Sanskrit drama, Indian classical dance, Parsi theatre, and Yakshagana. Since the 20th century, India has created many musical films called "Bollywood" musicals. In Japan, there are 2.5D musicals based on popular anime and manga comics.

History

Musical theatre in Europe began with plays from ancient Greece around 500 BCE. These plays included music and dance in both comedies and tragedies. However, the music from these early plays has been lost, and they had little influence on later musical theatre. In the 12th and 13th centuries, religious dramas taught people about church teachings. Actors used outdoor wagons with wheels as stages to perform different parts of the story. Sometimes, poetic lines were mixed with spoken dialogue, and religious songs were replaced by new melodies.

During the European Renaissance, older forms of theatre evolved into two early types of musical theatre: commedia dell'arte, where actors performed funny stories with improvisation, and opera buffa, a type of opera with humorous themes. In England, plays from the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods often included music, and short musical plays became part of evening performances. Court masques, which involved music, dancing, singing, and acting with expensive costumes and complex stages, developed during the Tudor period. These performances later became known as English operas, with The Siege of Rhodes (1656) considered the first. In France, Molière turned his comedic plays into musical performances with songs by Jean-Baptiste Lully and dance in the late 17th century. These influenced English composers like John Blow and Henry Purcell.

By the 18th century, the most popular forms of musical theatre in Britain were ballad operas, such as The Beggar's Opera by John Gay, which used popular songs for lyrics, and pantomime, which came from commedia dell'arte. Comic operas with romantic stories, like The Bohemian Girl (1845) by Michael Balfe, were also popular. On the continent, forms like singspiel, comédie en vaudeville, opéra comique, and zarzuela emerged as light musical entertainment. The Beggar's Opera was the first long-running play, performing 62 times in a row in 1728. It took nearly 100 years for another play to reach 100 performances, but by the late 1820s, the record reached 150. Other forms, like music hall, melodrama, and burletta, became popular in England because most theatres were licensed only as music halls and not for plays without music.

Colonial America had little theatre until 1752, when William Hallam, a London entrepreneur, sent actors to the colonies managed by his brother, Lewis. In 1753, they performed The Beggar's Opera and similar plays in New York. By the 1840s, P. T. Barnum operated an entertainment complex in Manhattan. Early American theatre included British forms like burletta and pantomime, though names did not always define the type of performance. Theatre in New York moved from downtown to midtown around 1850 and reached Times Square in the 1920s. New York shows had shorter runs than those in London, but Laura Keene’s Seven Sisters (1860) broke previous records with 253 performances.

Around 1850, the French composer Hervé created a new form of comic musical theatre called opérette. Jacques Offenbach and Johann Strauss II became famous for their operettas. Offenbach’s melodies and witty stories influenced later musical theatre. Adaptations of French operettas, musical burlesques, and other forms dominated London stages into the 1870s.

In America, mid-19th century theatre included vaudeville, minstrel shows, and Victorian burlesque. The first American musical, The Doctor of Alcantara (1862), was written by Benjamin E. Woolf with music by Julius Eichberg. The Black Crook (1866) was a successful show in New York, combining dance and original music, and ran for 474 performances. That same year, The Black Domino/Between You, Me and the Post was the first show to call itself a "musical comedy." Evangeline or The Belle of Arcadia (1874) was based on Longfellow’s poem and had an original American story and music. Comedians Edward Harrigan and Tony Hart created musicals on Broadway between 1878 and 1885, featuring everyday life in New York. These shows used talented singers instead of performers from earlier, less respectable shows. The Brook (1879) was another success, using American dance styles and stories.

As transportation improved and cities became safer, more people attended theatre. Plays ran longer, leading to better profits and more elaborate productions. Families began attending shows together. The first musical to exceed 500 performances was The Chimes of Normandy (1878), with 705 shows. English comic opera borrowed ideas from European operettas, especially the long-running Gilbert and Sullivan plays like H.M.S. Pinafore (1878) and The Mikado (1885). These shows were family-friendly, unlike earlier risqué performances. Dorothy (1886) set a new record with 931 performances. Gilbert and Sullivan’s work influenced later musicals by showing how to integrate music, lyrics, and story.

The Trip to Chinatown (1891) was Broadway’s longest-running show until Irene (1919), with 657 performances. New York shows had shorter runs than London’s until the 1920s. Gilbert and Sullivan’s plays were widely copied in New York, such as Robin Hood (1891) and El Capitan (1896). A Trip to Coontown (1898) was the first musical comedy with an African American cast.

International musicals

The United States and Britain were the main countries that created book musicals from the 19th century through much of the 20th century. During this time, Europe also produced popular forms of light opera and operetta, such as Spanish Zarzuela, earlier than the 19th century. In recent decades, other countries have become more active in creating light musical stage performances.

Musicals from other English-speaking countries, such as Australia and Canada, often succeed in their home countries and sometimes perform on famous stages like Broadway or the West End. Examples include The Boy from Oz and The Drowsy Chaperone. South Africa has an active musical theatre scene, with performances like African Footprint and Umoja as revues, and Kat and the Kings and Sarafina! as book musicals that tour internationally. Locally, musicals such as Vere, Love and Green Onions, Over the Rainbow: the all-new all-gay… extravaganza, Bangbroek Mountain, and In Briefs – a queer little Musical have been successfully produced.

Successful musicals from continental Europe include shows from Germany (Elixier and Ludwig II), Austria (Tanz der Vampire, Elisabeth, Mozart!, and Rebecca), the Czech Republic (Dracula), France (Starmania, Notre-Dame de Paris, Les Misérables, Roméo et Juliette, and Mozart, l'opéra rock), and Spain (Hoy no me puedo levantar and The Musical Sancho Panza).

Japan has developed its own type of musical theatre, based on anime and manga, including both animated and live-action performances like Kiki's Delivery Service and Tenimyu. The Sailor Moon series has produced 29 musicals over 13 years. Since 1914, the all-female Takarazuka Revue has performed popular revues, with five troupes currently active. In Asia, India’s Bollywood musicals, mostly in films, are very popular.

Starting in 2002, Western musicals like Les Misérables were performed in mainland China in English. In 2008, Fame was adapted for Chinese audiences in Mandarin with a full Chinese cast at the Central Academy of Drama in Beijing. Since then, other Western musicals have been staged in China in Mandarin with Chinese casts. The first Chinese musical inspired by Western theatre was The Gold Sand in 2005. In 2007, Li Dun, a well-known Chinese producer, created Butterflies, based on a classic Chinese love story, and Love U Teresa in 2011.

Amateur and school productions

Musicals are frequently performed by amateur and school groups in churches, schools, and other venues. Amateur theatre has been around for many years, even in the New World. In 1914, François Cellier and Cunningham Bridgeman wrote that before the late 1800s, professional actors looked down on amateur performers. After amateur groups were allowed to perform Gilbert and Sullivan operas, professionals began to see that these groups helped support music and drama. They are now considered helpful training for professional theatre, and many current famous performers started as volunteers. The National Operatic and Dramatic Association was created in the UK in 1899. In 1914, it reported that nearly 200 amateur theatre groups in Britain were performing Gilbert and Sullivan works that year. Around the same time, more than 100 amateur theatres were started in the United States. Today, there are an estimated 18,000 amateur theatres in the US. The Educational Theater Association in the US has nearly 5,000 member schools.

Relevance

The Broadway League reported that during the 2007–08 season, 12.27 million tickets were sold for Broadway shows, earning nearly one billion dollars. In the 2006–07 season, about 65% of tickets were bought by tourists, and 16% of the people who attended were from other countries. The Society of London Theatre said that 2007 had the highest attendance in London’s history. That year, 13.6 million people visited major theatres in Central London, and ticket sales brought in £469.7 million. Over the past few decades, international musicals have become more popular. However, Stephen Sondheim said in 2000:

Nevertheless, noting the success of new plays and creative new versions of films, plays, and books, theatre historian John Kenrick responded: