Peggy-Ann (1927)

Music by Richard Rodgers
Lyrics by Lorenz Hart
Book by Herbert Fields 
(Based on the play Tillie's Nightmare by Edgar Smith and A. Baldwin Sloan)

Directedy by Greg MacKellan
Musical Director: Michael Horsley
Choreographor: Steve Zee

Playbill Notes

"Finally I have found a musical comedy that's different!" "Fruity, frisky, frolicsome, festive, funny, fantastic, and fascinating!"

These superlatives from critics Robert Coleman and Alan Dale are indicative of the huzzahs which greeted the opening of Rodgers, Hart, and Field's Peggy-Ann in December, 1926. The show enjoyed a triumphant run in New York, a subsequent tour, a healthy run in London in 1927, and then-disappeared. Although dissertations on musicals from Oklahoma to South Pacific to (especially) Lady in the Dark would frequently cite Pegg-Ann as one of the seminal musicals of the 1920's, for reason, this delightful "absurdist"-flavored comedy has lain dorman on the shelves of the Richard Rodgers office for nearly seventy years.

Until now.

At the suggestion of Tom Briggs of the Rodgers and Hammerstein Organization, Peggy-Ann was made available to 42nd Street Moon, and it is a project we have undertaken with great enthusiasm. We would like to thank Mr. Briggs and R&H archivist Bruce Pemohac for their support and encouragement. Our thanks to Armand L. Fields, co author of the biography From the Bowery to Broadway (which includes a fascinating chapter about the making of Peggy-Ann) for his interest and advice.

42nd Street Moon's audiences are the first since 1927 to experience this unusual show. We hope you'll enjoy it as much as we enjoyed bringing it to you.

--Greg MacKellan

Plot Summary

The plot, told in one long dream, focuses on Peggy-Ann’s fantasies. In reality, Peggy-Ann is only the niece of the owner of a boarding house in New York and the fiancée of a local boy. She escapes from a hum-drum life through fantastic dreams of herself as a wealthy adventuress, with a yacht and a husband. (wikipedia)