Disaster! (musical)
Disaster! is a jukebox musical comedy created by Seth Rudetsky and written by Rudetsky and Jack Plotnick. Earthquakes, tidal waves, piranhas, infernos and the songs of the '70s take center stage in this comedic homage to 1970s disaster films.
| Disaster! | |
|---|---|
| A 70s Disaster Movie Musical! | |
Key art of the 2016 Broadway Production | |
| Music | Various |
| Lyrics | Various |
| Book | Jack Plotnick Seth Rudetsky |
| Setting | New York City, 1979 |
| Premiere | May 23, 2011: The Box, New York City |
| Productions | 2011 Off-Off-Broadway 2012 Off-Broadway 2013 Off-Broadway 2016 Broadway |
The show debuted at The Box on March 23, 2011. A second production at Triad Theatre, with choreography by Denis Jones and music supervision by Steve Marzullo, opened on January 22, 2012, and ran through March 25. A third production ran from November 2013 through April 2014 at New York's St. Luke's Theatre. The show opened on Broadway at the Nederlander Theatre on March 8, 2016, with previews beginning on February 9, 2016. The show starred Rudetsky, along with Roger Bart, Kerry Butler, Kevin Chamberlin, Adam Pascal, Faith Prince, Rachel York, Max Crumm and Jennifer Simard. Baylee Littrell (son of Brian Littrell) and Lacretta Nicole made their Broadway debuts. The show closed on May 8, 2016, after playing 32 previews and 72 regular performances.
The plot follows a group of New Yorkers that attend the opening of a floating casino and discothèque that quickly succumbs to multiple disasters. These calamities correlate with plots of various disaster films of the 1970s, such as earthquakes or killer bee incidents. Additionally, this play keeps with a 1970s theme by using popular songs of the decade as musical numbers.