How to Write a Broadway Script

Video Transcript

"Hi. My name is Laura, and I'm going to talk with you about how to write a Broadway script. Now, if you've been to Broadway in recent years, you're going to notice that the trend has been to put on large-scale musicals, usually based off Disney movies, rather than putting on actual plays that you're going to sit down and write by yourself. So, first of all when writing a Broadway script, you're probably going to want to get together with a composer and start writing a musical, because it's pretty much the only thing out there that's gaining any audience right now. So, think about if you would like to write a musical, and how you can appeal to a large audience. Because Broadway, over the years has become something that is, sort of just like the main stream. Whereas is used to be, you know sort of what theater was. Right now, it's just sort of becoming more commercialized. It's something that people are trying to get more and more people to go see. So, you need to think of an idea that appeals to a large audience and is truly marketable ok, for Broadway. An example of a play that is not quite Broadway like is a play WIT, by Margaret Edson. This play is a play that contains a cast of, one, two three, six. Six possible people. Number one, this doesn't provide a whole lot of jobs for working actors in New York. Not a lot of producers can get attached, you know to something like this, because it's very small-scale production. You're going to be wanting doing this type of play in a really small space. The set of this play is also very minimal. It says here; most of the action, but not all takes place in a room of the University Hospital Comprehensive Cancer Center. This stage is empty and furniture is rolled on and off by the technicians. So, you have the really bare bones production here. For a Broadway stage, it's going to be a huge stage, with you know, almost unlimited budget in many ways. You're going to want to really take advantage of using that space. And using that possibility to do special effects, to make big sets, to draw people in with the visual elements of it. Because Broadway is a lot about glitz and glamor. If you wanted to do WIT, you would probably do it in a regional theater, or you would do it off Broadway, or off, off, Broadway. So, if you want to write a serious play, and this play is a play that is about a woman with cancer, And that's something that not everyone is going must go see, because it's kind of upsetting. So if you want to write a good Broadway play that's going to appeal to a lot of people, you want to write something that is not, basically not totally dramatic and you know, down. You want to write something comedic. This is not true of everything, but if you're going to write a Broadway script, you're going to want to really put on the glitz and glamor of Broadway. And that's my opinion of how to write a Broadway script."