The Black Crook

In the spring of 1866 the Academy of Music burned down stranding a recently imported Parisian ballet troupe. When Niblo’s Garden manager William Wheatley offered to integrate the ballet into a melodrama he’d acquired from playwright Charles M. Barras, the musical was born, running five hours long, including over a hundred performers, and featuring the most modern scenic technologies to date.

The Black Crook returns to its downtown roots to celebrate its 150th anniversary, marking the rumored birth of the American Musical. Rather than hundreds of performers, our reimagining requires little more than eight actor-musicians, including Randy Blair and Kate Weber, inhabiting dozens of roles, dancing a “grand ballet”, and performing original music from the 1866 score.