This post ain’t gonna get picked up and go viral, that’s for sure.

Because it’s as obvious as who’s going to win the Tony Award for Best Musical this year.

But sometimes what is so obvious gets taken for granted . . . and therefore it isn’t given the focus it needs.

So it begs repeating.

I was walking down 44th Street the other day, and took a look up at the famed The Phantom of the Opera mask adorning the Majestic Theatre marquee, where it has been for over 25 years.  My mind immediately went back in time to the first time I saw The Phantom of the Opera, in 1988, and I thought about the falling chandelier, the special effects, and getting swept up in the overall staging of the production.

And then, for some reason, I imagined what the very first script of Phantom looked like when ALW and his collaborators finished it.  I’m sure it didn’t describe the moving bridges that the Phantom and Christine use to descend into the depths of the Phantom’s lair . . . or the simple pas de deux-like staging of “The Music of the Night” . . . or any of what makes Phantom the musical that it is.

It was about then that a bus drove by with a Lion King ad on it.  Huh, I thought.  Was the thrilling Act I opener with that incredible puppetry what the Writers had in mind when that first draft of that musical was done?  Or what about Mufasa’s dramatic death?

Then I saw a poster of Chicago.  Heck, that show didn’t even really work the first time around, and yet here the revival has been running for a few decades and shows no sign of slowing down.  Did that script have the minimalist staging with the band onstage?

The answer of course, is that none of these scripts had any of what made the shows what they are, and more importantly, made them so memorable.

Plays and musicals were not meant to be read.  They were meant to be seen.  And if you want your show to be seen by the most amount of people possible, then you better have a strong Director with a strong vision of how your story is going to be told.

I’d even argue that a Director is as important as an Author . . . especially of a musical (which is why their royalties are usually equal to or more than any of the individual Authors on a musical).

Now please don’t think I’m undermining the work of our great Writers out there . . . their work is the foundation on which the production is built.  The greatest staging in the world wouldn’t keep Phantom going without that “majestic” score.

My point is that we need to give even more credit to our Directors.  After all, they get handed a black and white, flat script . . . and have to turn it into a full color, 3D, pop-up book.

That’s why choosing the right Director may be the most important decision an Author and a Producer make.