Musical Comedy never went anywhere, so The Producers didn't have to bring it back (I could name two dozen hit musical comedies on Broadway in the decade prior to the Producers' opening, if you'd like). It was the first show to charge $100 -- hardly an accomplishment. Broadway was doing fine before the Producers with lots of soldout hits (Lion King, Phantom, Les Miz, Chicago, Rent, Contact, Cabaret) -- the Producers was just one more. I enjoyed the show, but c'mon, the only thing it "changed" or influenced was its investors' and stars' bank accounts.
How did RENT "Change" Broadway? It wasn't the first rock musical (or the 20th for that matter) and, so far, hasn't spawned any imitators. It's a successful show in and of itself, but how has it influenced any others?
If DREAMGIRLS changed Broadway in any way, it wasn't that it "brought musical to the pop world" (that had been going on for decades, even since the rock era began with shows like Godspell and Hair spawning top ten hits on the Billboard charts), but due to the efforts of Bennett, Robin Wagner, Tharon Musser and their engineers, the most sophisticated computerized light/sound board in history was created, that became a standard in professional theatre for many years and made some of the eye-popping stage effects of the hit shows of the 80s possible.
OKLAHOMA, HAIR (the first all-rock musical and it changed Broadway forever), WEST SIDE STORY, A CHORUS LINE, CATS (for marketing, if nothing else), COMPANY, and I suppose LES MIZ are all givens on a list of shows that changed Broadway. MAMMA MIA probably deserved inclusion as well.
I would like to mention:
-- The 1955 Off-Broadway revival of THREEPENNY OPERA (the first hit off-Broadway show; it paved the way for dozens/hundreds of other shows in the last 50 years that have used "downtown" as a launching pad to mainstream success; so potent and influential that the show received a special Tony Award and Lotte Lenya was awarded the Tony for best featured actress, despite the fact that the show was Off-Broadway -- the Tonys soon changed the rule so that it never happened again)
-- PAL JOEY (the first show to feature an anti-hero in the lead, freeing generations of composers and book writers to create shows about less than admirable characters and situations -- some of the most interesting shows ever written)
-- PROMISES PROMISES (the first show that had electronic instruments in the pit, as well as supplemental pit singers, both of which have become standard in the years since)
-- ALLEGRO (perhaps the first high profile "concept musical"; it has been said often that Sondheim, who acted as a go-fer on the show and closely observed Rodgers and Hammerstein's efforts to fix the show and ultimately fail, spent his entire career trying to fix ALLEGRO -- finally succeeding with a concept musical of his own, COMPANY, as well as several others)
"What a story........ everything but the bloodhounds snappin' at her rear end." -- Birdie
[http://margochanning.broadwayworld.com/]
"The Devil Be Hittin' Me" -- Whitney
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