I made some pretty juicy announcements about some new musicals we’re developing recently, and yesterday I realized . . . I never blogged about ’em!

Well, today’s the day . . . especially since these two will definitely count towards our #5000By2025 mission we announced here two weeks ago.

So here are the two new musicals we just announced and more importantly, why we’re producing them.

JOY

Like so many people on earth, I first met Joy Mangano when I was hanging up a shirt.

That’s right, if you have a velvet hanger in your closet, then you know her too.

Joy is also the woman behind the Miracle Mop. And the mini steamer.

But this isn’t a story about consumer goods.  This is a rags-to-riches story about an unstoppable single mother of two, who defies the odds and turns a dream into a reality and then into a mega-million dollar empire.

Hollywood spun her story into a movie starring Jennifer Lawrence, but there’s so much more to it than that.

It’s a joy-filled tale of a female who triumphs over adversity. . . which is exactly what Broadway needs right now.

Oh, and the dancing mop number is going to be amazing.

BROADWAY VACATION

I’ve been after the rights to the Vacation movie franchise for years.  Literally years.  Every twelve months, an alarm would go off on my ToodleDo and say, “Bug Warner Brothers for the rights to Vacation.”

Well, not too long ago they finally said they were open to it . . . and they also said, “Hey, you know who also has been bugging us?  Kurt Deutsch.  You two should talk.”

Talk we did. And then we secured the rights . . . but not to do the movie on stage.  But instead, to take those iconic Griswold characters, and set them out on a new adventure.

That’s right, you’ve seen Vacation, European Vacation, Vegas Vacation  . . . here comes Broadway Vacation.  The Griswolds take Manhattan.

As I mentioned in my Facebook Live video on the day of this announcement, I’m a believer that if you’re going to take a big brand and adapt it into a musical, you gotta do something different with it.  It has to be unique.  You can’t just put a movie on stage . . . that’s not the medium that the story was designed for!

But when you can take the characters and create a new story (like what Harry Potter has done) you get all the value of the original brand, and you get the excitement of creating something new.

We’ve got a long “Holiday Road” ahead, but we’re excited.

(Oh, and note to you folks trying to get the rights to something . . . in business, “No” often means “not now.”)

Both of these rights acquisitions have been in the works for some time, and are all part of a new focus of mine towards the development of large-scale new musicals (In the last year, I even raised money for a “front money fund” to pay for the development of up to ten musicals so I could focus solely on the creative).

You’ll see a few more announcements in the coming months about the other shows that I’m growing up from the ground floor.

And they are just as exciting as the above.

Stay tuned.

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I announced both of these shows LIVE on my Facebook Page.  Join me every day for an impromptu Facebook Live giving you a glimpse into the day and the life of a Broadway Producer.  Click here to see the past videos . . . and make sure you like the page, and turn your notifications on to see the next time that I go LIVE!

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