Plays that Inspired Musicals

Many of our favorite musicals were adapted from hit plays. Explore this list of Concord Theatricals plays that inspired Concord Theatricals musicals!

A Raisin in the Sun and Raisin

Play: A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 3w, 7m, 1 boy)
One of the most important plays in the American theatrical canon, and the first play written by a Black woman to be produced on Broadway, this compelling family drama is set on Chicago’s South Side in the 1950s. The plot revolves around the divergent dreams and conflicts within three generations of the Younger family: son Walter Lee, his wife Ruth, his sister Beneatha, his son Travis, and matriarch Lena. Hansberry’s portrait of one family’s struggle to retain dignity in a harsh and changing world is a searing and timeless document of hope and inspiration.

Musical: Raisin by Lorraine Hansberry, Robert Nemiroff, Judd Woldin, Charlotte Zaltzberg and Robert Brittan (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Drama / 6w, 8m, 1 boy)
In 1973, a musical version of Hansberry’s portrait opened on Broadway, where it would run for three years and go on to receive two 1974 Tony Awards, including Best Musical. Here, the classic builds upon the dynamic role of Walter Lee and is transformed into a soulful, inspiring musical as a proud Black family’s quest for a better life explodes in song, dance and incisive human drama.

Ah, Wilderness! and Take Me Along

Play: Ah, Wilderness! by Eugene O’Neill (US)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 6w, 9m)
First presented on Broadway in October 1933, this full-length comedy was a sharp departure from the gritty reality of O’Neill’s renowned dramas. Taking place in an idyllic Connecticut town over the course of July 4th weekend, 1906, the light comedy offers a tender, retrospective portrait of small-town family values, teenage growing pains and young love. The play was later revived to great acclaim in 1998 at Lincoln Center, receiving two Tony nominations, including Best Revival of a Play.

Musical: Take Me Along by Bob Merrill, David Merrick, Eugene O’Neill, Robert Russell and Joseph Stein (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Dramatic Comedy / 4w, 7m + ensemble)
The musical version premiered on Broadway in October 1959 — 26 years after Ah, Wilderness! swept The Great White Way. This heartwarming musical adaptation features the songs “Staying Young,” “That’s How It Starts,” “Promise Me A Rose,” and “Take Me Along.” It went on to receive two nominations at the 1960 Tony Awards, including Best Musical.

Auntie Mame and Mame

Play: Auntie Mame by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 12w, 25m, 3 boys)
This fabulously successful hit hardly needs introduction. Besides being the source material for one of America’s most popular musicals, this 1956 Broadway play set a new standard for theatrical comedy, garnering five Tony Award nominations and running for 639 performances. Seventy years after her debut, unconventional, warmhearted Auntie Mame continues to thrill audiences as she dotes on her young nephew, pursuing new adventures with whimsy and gusto.

Musical: Mame by Jerome Lawrence, Robert E. Lee, Jerry Herman and Patrick Dennis (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 6w, 6m + ensemble)
Premiering on Broadway in 1966, this lively musical adaptation of the hit play brought its central figure to new heights. Jerry Herman’s ebullient score, featuring unforgettable numbers like “Open a New Window,” “We Need a Little Christmas” and the 11-o’clock stunner “If He Walked Into My Life,” elevated Mame’s story to musical theatre heaven with spirit, humor, class and wit.

Blithe Spirit and High Spirits

Play: Blithe Spirit by Noël Coward (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 5w, 2m)
The play first graced the stages of Broadway in November 1941 before becoming a smash hit on both London and New York stages. This much-revived classic from the playwright of Private Lives offers wit, conflict and big laughs as a fussy, cantankerous novelist finds himself haunted by the ghost of his late first wife.

Musical: High Spirits by Noël Coward, Timothy Gray and Hugh Martin (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 5w, 2m)
In 1964, the bombastic musical adaptation came to haunt Broadway. The delightful score from Hugh Martin and Timothy Gray includes “Home Sweet Heaven,” “Faster Than Sound” and “Go Into Your Trance.” This “Improbable Musical Comedy” went on to receive eight Tony Award nominations, including Best Musical and Best Composer/Lyricist.

Death Takes a Holiday

Play: Death Takes a Holiday by Walter Ferris (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 6w, 7m)
Back in 1929, Death took its first holiday when playwright Walter Ferris adapted this striking drama for the American stage, opening on Broadway to great success. Based on the poetic conception of Death suspending all activities for three days – during which he falls in love with a beautiful girl – this play is as simple as it is appealing.

Musical: Death Takes a Holiday by Thomas Meehan, Peter Stone and Maury Yeston (US)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 7w, 7m)
In 2011, Death decided to take another holiday – this time, with musical flair. Although “death” is in the title, the operative word is “holiday!” in the musical version of Alberto Casella’s original story. This beautiful and heartbreaking musical is a celebration of the limited time we spend on earth as Death experiences the joys and heartbreaks of life in post-WWI Italy.

Golden Boy

Play: Golden Boy by Clifford Odets (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 2w, 17m)
This stirring drama – often considered Clifford Odets’ biggest hit – about a young Italian American man who dreams of becoming a professional musician premiered on Broadway at the Group Theatre in 1937. This tragic story of an aspiring musician who gets into prizefighting instead is pungent in its dialogue and characters, in a way that brings gritty, raw life to the stage.

Musical: Golden Boy by William Gibson, Clifford Odets, Charles Strouse, Lee Adams (US)
(Full-Length Musical, Drama / 4w, 7m + ensemble)
Freely adapted from Odets’ classic drama, this 1964 Broadway musical shifts the narrative from a young Italian American to the tale of a young Black man from Harlem trying to rise up out of the ghetto to fame in the brutal world of boxing. The rousing musical begins and ends with the rhythmic, breathing exhaust of the prizefighting ring. Sammy Davis famously originated the lead role of Joe Wellington, a promising boxer who makes one mistake: falling in love with his manager’s girl.

Green Grow the Lilacs and Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Oklahoma!

Play: Green Grow the Lilacs by Lynn Riggs (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 4w, 10m)
When this play first premiered in 1931, playwright Lynn Riggs could hardly imagine that his drama charting the romance between a headstrong farm girl and a cocky cowhand would go on to inspire the first modern musical. It premiered on Broadway at the Guild Theatre, directed by Herbert J. Biberman and starring Franchot Tone as Curly McClain, June Walker as Laurey Williams, Helen Westley as Aunt Eller and Lee Strasberg as the Peddler.

Musical: Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! by Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II, Agnes de Mille and Lynn Riggs (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 4w, 6m + ensemble)
Only a decade later, Oklahoma! – the first partnership between Rodgers & Hammerstein  – opened at the St. James Theatre on Broadway in March 1943. The musical, based on Riggs’ play, set the stage for all that followed, leading the charge for what we now consider musical theatre. Rodgers & Hammerstein’s exuberant classic is a lively, tuneful musical full of cowboys, farmers, romance and fearless optimism. At that time, the longest-running show in Broadway history had run for three years. Oklahoma! surpassed that record by two more years, running for a marathon 2,212 performances. It received a special Pulitzer Prize in 1944, earned two Academy Awards for the film adaptation in 1956, and is still performed around the globe today.

I Am A Camera and Cabaret

Play: I Am A Camera by Christopher Isherwood and John Van Druten (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 4w, 3m)
In November 1951, audiences got their first look at 1930s Berlin, the rooming house of Fraulein Schneider, and leading lady Sally Bowles in John Druten’s play I Am A Camera. This play brought the story of these characters from The Berlin Stories by Christopher Isherwood to the stage for the very first time in a subtle and rewarding drama that would go on to receive the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best American Play.

Musical: Cabaret (Original 1966) by Fred Ebb, Christopher Isherwood, John Kander, Joe Masteroff and John Van Druten (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Drama / 3w, 4m + ensemble)
Fifteen years later, Cabaret swept Broadway in 1966 with its iconic score by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb, book by Joe Masteroff, and direction by Hal Prince. In a Berlin nightclub, as the 1920s draw to a close, a garish Master of Ceremonies welcomes the audience and assures them they will forget all their troubles at the Cabaret Club. With the Emcee’s bawdy songs as wry commentary, Cabaret explores the dark, heady, and tumultuous life of Berlin’s natives and expatriates as Germany slowly yields to the emerging Third Reich. Musical numbers include “Willkommen,” “Cabaret,” “Don’t Tell Mama” and “Two Ladies.” The original went on to win eight Tony Awards in 1967 and inspired new versions and updates in 1987 (US/UK) and 1998 (US).

Ken Ludwig’s Lend Me a Tenor and Lend Me a Tenor: The Musical

Play: Ken Ludwig’s Lend Me A Tenor by Ken Ludwig (US)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 4w, 4m)
A sensation on Broadway and in London’s West End, this madcap, screwball comedy – set behind the scenes at the Cleveland Grand Opera Company in 1934 – is guaranteed to leave audiences teary-eyed with laughter.

Musical: Lend Me a Tenor: The Musical by Brad Carroll, Ken Ludwig and Peter Sham (US)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 6w, 4m + ensemble)
A riotous tale of mistaken identities and unexpected romance explodes in this brand-new musical comedy based on the Tony Award-nominated play. Thanks to a menacing soprano, a tenor-struck ingénue, a jealous wife, and the Cleveland Police Department, mayhem, lunacy, and sheer panic ensue, but in the end, the show must always go on!

Liliom and Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Carousel

Play: Liliom by Ferenc Molnár (US/UK)
This 1909 tender drama was first penned by a Hungarian playwright. It follows the title character, Liliom, a shiftless young bully in Budapest who works intermittently as a barker for a merry-go-round where many servant girls fall victim to his charms. Among these girls is Julie, whom he eventually marries. Learning that he is about to become a father, Liliom participates in a robbery to enhance his fortunes. He is caught and stabs himself rather than submit to arrest. He is then tried in court on high, where they see through his cocky exterior to honor the repentance in his heart. He is sentenced to a term of years in the purifying fires with the promise that after that sentence has been served, he can go back to earth with a chance to do one good deed there. In this version, he never makes it back, and the ending is more tragic than hopeful.

Musical: Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Carousel by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Drama / 5w, 5m + ensemble)
About 40 years later, Rodgers & Hammerstein’s adaptation of Liliom – Americanized and renamed Carousel – opened at the Majestic Theatre. In this version, the setting changes from Budapest to a coastal village in Maine, and Liliom becomes Billy Bigelow, a swaggering, carefree carnival barker who captivates and marries the gentle millworker Julie Jordan. The basic plot lines of Molnár’s drama are honored, including threads of fatherhood, attempted robbery and repentance. In a divergence from the original, Billy is allowed to return to earth for one day 15 years later and encounter the daughter he never knew. With the famous song “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” Billy instills in both the child and her mother a sense of hope and dignity in a dramatic testimony to the power of love. This sweeping musical – with a more hopeful twist to its end – also features the hits “If I Loved You” and “June Is Bustin’ Out All Over.”

My Sister Eileen and Wonderful Town

Play: My Sister Eileen by Jerome Chodorov and Joseph Fields (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 6w, 21m)
In December 1940, Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov compiled the stories of Ruth McKenney originally published in The New Yorker and crafted a story of sisters audiences would love for decades to come. Sisters Eileen and Ruth move from Ohio to Greenwich Village in New York City, and this comedy charts their adventures in the most distracting apartment ever seen.

Musical: Wonderful Town by Joseph Fields, Jerome Chodorov, Ruth McKenney, Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden and Adolph Green (US)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 5w, 9m + ensemble)
In 1953, a new team of writers took the adventures of the hit play and its subsequent film to new musical hysterics. The Tony Award-winning Best Musical, with a thrilling score by Leonard Bernstein with lyrics by Comden & Green, features the sibling duet “Ohio,” along with “Conga,” “One Hundred Easy Ways” and “Wrong Note Rag.”

Purlie Victorious and Purlie

Play: Purlie Victorious by Ossie Davis (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 3w, 6m)
This uproarious comedy premiered on Broadway in 1961 with the playwright taking center stage as the titular Reverend Purlie Victorious Judson. The traveling preacher returns to his small Georgia town hoping to reacquire the local church and ring the freedom bell. With the assistance of Lutiebelle Gussie Mae Jenkins, Purlie hopes to pry loose from the Cotchipee Plantation colonel an inheritance due his long-lost cousin and use the money to achieve his goals. Eventually, the church is saved, services are held, and the freedom bell rings. In 2023, Leslie Odom Jr. brought the show back to victorious life on Broadway.

Musical: Purlie by Ossie Davis, Gary Geld, Phillip Rose and Peter Udell (US)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 4w, 4m + ensemble )
On March 15, 1970, the musical adaptation Purlie premiered on Broadway at the Broadway Theatre. Witty, memorable music and a whole lotta of fun unfold as Purlie outmaneuvers ol’ Colonel and gets his girl Lutiebelle once more – this time, with a tuneful flair. The score, from the composers of Shenandoah, features the hit “I Got Love,” introduced onstage by the unparalleled Melba Moore.

The Madwoman of Chaillot and Dear World

Play: The Madwoman of Chaillot by Jean Giraudoux and adapted by Maurice Valency (US)
(Full-Length Play, Dramatic Comedy / 8w, 17m)
In December of 1948, this poetic and comic French fable set in the twilight zone of the not-quite-true made its way to Broadway. Known in France for its irresistible humor, the comedy starts with a plot by a group of promoters to tear up Paris to find oil and strike it rich. When the Madwoman of Chaillot hears of these grandiose plans, she brings together the other “mad” women of Paris at a tea party to lure the greedy culprits of the city’s destruction to a bottomless pit in her cellar. Through quirky and unconventional humor, the play dramatizes the exodus of the wicked and a more beautiful miracle: Joy, justice and love returning to the world again.

Musical: Dear World by Jerry Herman, Jerome Lawrence, Robert E. Lee, Jean Giraudoux, Maurice Valency & David Thompson (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 4w, 2m + ensemble)
This musical adaptation opened on Broadway in 1969 starring Angela Lansbury and Milo O’Shea. The haunting, delicate and charming musical celebrating life, passion and madness takes place in a Parisian café and in the underground tunnels of Paris just after WWII, sharing the high decorum of its predecessor. Angela Lansbury would win her second Tony for playing the Countess Aurelia, and the show’s score – featuring glorious songs like “I Don’t Want to Know,” “Kiss Her Now” and “I’ve Never Said I Love You” – is widely considered one of Jerry Herman’s best.

The Matchmaker and Hello, Dolly! 

Play: The Matchmaker by Thornton Wilder (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 7w, 9m)
Wilder’s uproarious farce about love and money stars the irrepressible busybody Dolly Gallagher Levi, who loves to meddle with love. Through Dolly’s subtle machinations, several unlikely couples come together to find happiness in 19th-century New York. The Matchmaker opened on Broadway on December 5, 1955 starring Tony-nominated Ruth Gordon and directed by Tony Award winner for Best Director, Tyrone Guthrie. The show ran for 486 performances, Wilder’s Broadway record.

Musical: Hello, Dolly! by Michael Stewart, Jerry Herman and Thornton Wilder (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 5w, 4m + ensemble)
Michael Stewart and Jerry Herman brought The Matchmaker to vivid, musical life on Broadway in January 1964. With Carol Channing in the title role, the show ultimately played for 2,844 performances, making it – at the time – the longest-running Broadway musical in history. The show would go on to win ten 1964 Tony Awards, including Best Musical. The exuberant adaptation produced some of the greatest songs in musical theatre history, including “Put On Your Sunday Clothes,” “Ribbons Down My Back,” “Before the Parade Passes By,” “Hello, Dolly!,” “Elegance” and “It Only Takes a Moment.”

The Philadelphia Story and High Society

Play:The Philadelphia Story by Philip Barry (US)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 6w, 9m)
In March 1939, a smash Broadway comedy about an eventful wedding weekend at the estate of a wealthy American family opened at the Shubert Theatre. The play originally starred Katharine Hepburn as Tracy Lord of the Philadelphia Lords, a headstrong and spoiled daughter. Divorced from C.K. Dexter Haven, she is engaged to a successful young snob. A gossip weekly sends a reporter and a camerawoman to cover the wedding arrangements, and they are injected into the house by Tracy’s brother, who hopes to divert their attention from Father Lord’s romance with a Broadway dancer. Between ex-husbands, fiancés and new crushes on reporters, Tracy’s love life becomes quite the escapade, so much so that the plot was later adapted into a film with Hepburn reprising her role alongside Cary Grant and James Stewart.

Musical: High Society by Cole Porter, Arthur Kopit, Susan Birkenhead and Philip Barry (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Dramatic Comedy / 4w, 5m + ensemble)
After the original play and subsequent movie adaptation, the play and movie received movie musical treatment in the 1956 film High Society. In the late 1990s, writers Arthur Kopit and Susan Birkenhead decided to adapt The Philadelphia Story and the subsequent film adaptations into a classy stage musical packed with Cole Porter standards, including “Ridin’ High,” “She’s Got That Thing,” “True Love,” “Just One Of Those Things,” “Let’s Misbehave,” “It’s All Right With Me” and “Well, Did You Evah?” The result? A 1998 Broadway premiere of a sparkling musical glittering with wit and sophistication.

The Rainmaker and 110 in the Shade

Play: The Rainmaker by N. Richard Nash (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Dramatic Comedy / 1w, 6m)
This haunting and heartwarming dramedy premiered on Broadway at the Cort Theatre in 1954. During the time of a paralyzing drought in the West, a family worries about the future of its lone daughter. There is no sign of relief from the dry heat, until suddenly, a picaresque, sweet-talking man with a compelling sales pitch arrives. Claiming to be a “rainmaker,” he promises to bring rain for $100. Rain does come, and so does love.

Musical: 110 in the Shade (Revised) by N. Richard Nash, Harvey Schmidt and Tom Jones (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Drama / 2w, 5m + ensemble)
This musical adaptation premiered on Broadway at the Broadhurst Theatre on October 24, 1963, starring Robert Horton, Inga Swenson and Stephen Douglass. On February 8, 1967, the musical opened in the West End at the Palace Theatre, where it played for 101 performances. This beautiful, touching musical adaptation of Nash’s stage play  yet again explores love, hope and redemption in a small southwestern town during the Great Depression. In the tiny town of Three Point, in the hot and drought-stricken American southwest, traveling con man Bill Starbuck promises the local farmers he can conjure some much-needed rain. Spinster Lizzie Curry, whose advances are rebuffed by Sheriff File, blossoms as she pursues a romantic relationship with the charismatic stranger. The musical has enjoyed multiple revivals, including in a notable 2007 Broadway production starring Audra McDonald, John Cullum and Steve Kazee. The original production received four 1964 Tony Award nominations, and the 2007 revival was nominated for five Tony Awards, including Best Revival of a Musical.

The Time of the Cuckoo and Do I Hear A Waltz?

Play: The Time of the Cuckoo by Arthur Laurents (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 5w, 5m)
From the book writer of Gypsy comes this bittersweet 1952 play tracing the romance between American executive secretary Leona Samish and Renato Di Rossi, a shopkeeper she meets in Venice. Leona Samish, a single American woman “of a certain age,” takes a long-planned European vacation and finds herself in a pensione in Venice, Italy. At a street market, she meets the handsome proprietor Renato DiRossi, entering into a casual flirtation which turns into an affair. Long-dormant frustrations and anger come to the surface as Leona faces the harsh reality of this newfound infatuation and her own romantic notions of love. The play was adapted into the 1955 film Summertime, starring Katharine Hepburn and Rossano Brazzi.

Musical: Do I Hear a Waltz? by Richard Rodgers, Stephen Sondheim and Arthur Laurents (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Dramatic Comedy / 5w, 4m, 1 boy + ensemble)
This musical adaptation of the bittersweet Venetian romance play opened on Broadway on March 18, 1965 as a unique collaboration of three giants of the musical theatre: Richard Rodgers, Arthur Laurents and Stephen Sondheim. It went on to receive three Tony Award nominations, including Best Composer and Lyricist — no wonder! This timeless story remains a bittersweet testament to the complexities of the heart.

Two for the Seesaw and Seesaw

Play: Two for the Seesaw by William Gibson (US)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 1w, 1m)
This long-running Broadway hit gained its leading lady, Anne Bancroft, stardom from its premiere in 1958, where she starred as a girl from the Bronx whose love for a lonesome lawyer brings a few months of happiness into their lives. Their briefly fulfilling relationship is unhappily destined to failure, coloring this love story with a bittersweet balance of happy and humorous moments together and the sadness of utter hopelessness of their affair.

Musical: Seesaw by Michael Bennett, Cy Coleman, Dorothy Fields and William Gibson (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Comedy / 4w, 4m + ensemble)
The musical version of the comedy, shortened to Seesaw, first premiered in 1973 at the Uris Theatre. This intimate, engaging love story and a big, brassy musical-comedy rolled into one and went on to receive seven Tony Award nominations in 1974 including Best Musical.

Vanities and Vanities: The Musical

Play: Vanities by Jack Heifner (US)
(Full-Length Play, Comedy / 3w)
This bittersweet comedy premiered off-Broadway in 1976. An astute, snapshot-sharp chronicle of the lives of three Texas girls, the play follows their friendship through the years, from 1963 (as aggressively vivacious cheerleaders) to 1968 (as college sorority sisters) to a decade later, where their differences clash in a “for old times’ sake” reunion in New York City. This poignantly hilarious look at female friendship is a provocative, hilarious vehicle for three strong female actors.

Musical: Vanities: The Musical by Jack Heifner and David Kirshenbaum (US/UK)
(Full-Length Musical, Dramatic Comedy / 3w)
This direct adaptation – with a book by the original playwright Jack Heifner – premiered off-Broadway at Second Stage Theater on July 16, 2009, flying into the future with its new musical treatment. This life-affirming musical adaptation yet again chronicles the journey of three vivacious Texas teens from cheerleaders to sorority sisters to housewives to liberated women and beyond, offering musical moments for each actor. Unlike the play, which ends cynically with the breakup of their friendship, the musical adds a hopeful epilogue, in which the three estranged friends come together at a funeral.

More plays that led to musical iterations include:

• The play Berkeley Square (US) inspired the musical On A Clear Day You Can See Forever (US/UK).
• The play Breath of Spring (US/UK) inspired the musical 70, Girls, 70 (US/UK).
• The play Calendar Girls (US/UK) inspired the musical Calendar Girls The Musical (UK).
• The play Dream Girl (US) inspired the musical Skyscraper (US).
• The play Holiday (US/UK) inspired the musical Happy New Year (US).
• The play Jacobowsky and the Colonel (US/UK) inspired the musical The Grand Tour (US/UK).
• The play La Ronde (US/UK) inspired the musical Hello Again (US/UK).
• The play Look Homeward, Angel (US) inspired the musical Angel (US).
• The play Marian, or The True Tale of Robin Hood (US/UK) inspired the musical Marian, or The True Tale of Robin Hood: The Musical (US/UK).
• The play The Adding Machine (US/UK) inspired the musical Adding Machine: A Musical (US/UK).
• The play The College Widow (US) inspired the musical Leave It to Jane (US/UK).
• The play The Creation of the World and Other Business (US) inspired the musical Up From Paradise (US).
• The play The Flowering Peach (US/UK) inspired the musical Two by Two (US/UK).
• The play The House of Bernarda Alba – written in Spanish by Federico García Lorca, but available in translations by Michael Dewell and Carmen Zapata (US/UK) and Richard O’Connell and James Graham-Lujan (US/UK) – inspired the musical Bernarda Alba (US/UK).
• The play The Importance of Being Earnest (US/UK) inspired the musical Ernxst (US/UK).
• The play The Streets of New York (US) inspired the musical The Streets of New York (US).
• The play The Teahouse of the August Moon (US/UK) inspired the musical Lovely Ladies, Kind Gentlemen (US).
• The play The Warrior’s Husband (US) inspired the musical By Jupiter (US/UK).
• The play Wings (US/UK) inspired the musical Wings (US/UK).

To explore even more plays and musicals (whether adapted or not), visit Concord Theatricals in the US or UK.