30 Days of NYMF: Bonnie and Clyde: A Folktale

By: Faetra Petillo Sep. 09, 2008

“Guns and Music”

By Rick Crom (Music and Lyrics)

Hunter Foster and I were actors in Broadway’s Urinetown. He was a book writer (Summer of 42) and I was a songwriter (Newsical). So of course we decided to write a show together. Bonnie and Clyde was Hunter’s idea. Why hadn't it been done before? Turns out that while the personalities of everyone involved with the real Bonnie and Clyde were fascinating, their story was gruesome. “If only you could put these characters in a musical comedy…” we thought. Quickly answered with, “Well why not?”

We were amazed at how liberating it is when you're not concerned with the facts. Much of the information published about “The Barrow Gang” is anecdotal. So using some actual anecdotes, embellishing others, and making up the rest, we created, Bonnie and Clyde: A Folktale.

Every good story needs an antagonist and while the real J. Edgar Hoover was not intimately involved in their capture, in our version he gets the job. And now with what we know about the late Mr. Hoover’s sexual peccadilloes; well you can imagine the fun we had.

Hunter and I are great fans and students of the classic musical comedy structure, i.e. Scenes that lead into songs. The form has been spoofed to death yet so many people lament, “They don't write them like they used to.” Our theory as to why this is: It’s freakin’ hard! It’s tricky. There’s a science to it. It’s easy to spoof, not so easy to actually do and do well. So our goal with Bonnie and Clyde is to take a shot at writing them like they used to. We're breaking old ground here.

Now with an amazing cast and production team along with NYMF we are tickled to be presenting Bonnie and Clyde: A Folktale in the American Theater for Actors. Fun fact: It’s the same theater that Urinetown began its Off-Broadway run seven years ago and the perfect place to present a good ol’ musical about the bad ol’ days.

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