Beyond Spring Awakening: Remembering Duncan Sheik’s Remarkable Musical Legacy

Do you have a burning Broadway question? Dying to know more about an obscure Broadway fact? Broadway historian and self-proclaimed theatre nerd Jennifer Ashley Tepper is here to help with Broadway Deep Dive. BroadwayWorld is accepting questions from theatre fans like you. If you're lucky, your question might be selected as the topic of her next column!

Submit your Broadway question here!

---

On September 17th, we lost Duncan Sheik, a major composer and influence on 21st Century Theatre, whose music for Spring Awakening pushed the art form forward. 

Sheik was impressively prolific. While the headline of his theatre career may be the impactful Spring Awakening, his career was filled with over a dozen other varied and worthwhile theatrical projects, in addition to his achievements in popular music. He wrote music and sometimes lyrics for an impressive slate of musicals in addition to composing music for plays, and amassed a notable collective of collaborators on his many shows. 

Even before Spring Awakening, in 2002, Sheik penned the music for a Shakespeare in the Park production of Twelfth Night. At the Delacorte and under the auspices of the Public, Sheik composed an original score for a starry production that featured Julia Stiles, Christopher Lloyd, Jimmy Smits, Oliver Platt, Kristen Johnston, and Zach Braff. Under Brian Kulick’s direction, Sheik composed a modern, guitar-heavy score that was intentionally incongruous with the Shakespearean time period, pointing toward his later work with Spring Awakening. (Incidentally, Sheik and his Spring Awakening collaborator Steven Sater would later work on a television series inspired by Twelfth Night.) 

One of Sheik’s first theatre projects, Nero, premiered in 2006 and was also one of the final projects he worked on; the show will make its London bow later this year. The then-titled Nero (Another Golden Rome) opened at the Magic Theater Northside in San Francisco two full decades ago, then billed as a play by Sater with music by Sheik. An exploration of the life of the young Roman emperor meant to shine light on current politics, Nero will star Andrew Barth Feldman in the title role when it bows at London’s Southwark Playhouse. 

In 2005, Sheik contributed the music for one song to Songs from an Unmade Bed. The solo musical about a gay man’s romantic heartbreak created by Mark Campbell featured music from 18 different composers and played at New York Theatre Workshop.

2006 was the year that Spring Awakening hit off-Broadway, at the Atlantic Theatre Company, and then transferred to Broadway, opening at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre and becoming the hit of the season. The musical, with music by Sheik and book and lyrics by Sater, won eight Tony Awards and four Drama Desk Awards. Based on the play Spring’s Awakening by Frank Wedekind, the show expressed the struggle of young people to be seen and heard during their sexual awakening in 19th century Germany. Pairing this story with Sheik and Sater’s galvanizing rock score caused sparks to fly. The original cast, including Jonathan Groff, Lea Michele, and John Gallagher Jr., ascended to star status and the show itself became a landmark achievement, bringing new generations to the theatre. 

Spring Awakening has continued to deeply affect audiences since its premiere, becoming a popular title all over the globe, in both schools and professional settings. An acclaimed 2015 Broadway revival directed by Michael Arden re-imagined the show with Deaf West Theatre and a new off-Broadway revival will land at Studio Seaview this fall. The show has also had a ripple effect on theatre, inspiring both artists and audiences to embrace a new contemporary rock sound in musicals.

Sheik collaborated with a fellow singer-songwriter and longtime friend Suzanne Vega on a musical in 2011. Carson McCullers Talks About Love, later retitled Lover, Beloved, told the story of early 20th century writer McCullers, best known for The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. Vega played McCullers and also wrote book and lyrics as well as co-writing music with Sheik. Joe Iconis was the show’s on-stage pianist and Vega’s occasional scene partner. 

Continuing his work composing music for plays, Sheik penned a score for The Caucasian Chalk Circle at Classic Stage in 2013. He returned to CSC several times with new scores for plays, including A Man’s a Man the following year and Mother Courage and Her Children in 2015. Sheik’s music for plays also comprised The Absolute Brightness of Leonard Pelkey (2015, Westside, off-Broadway), The Taming of the Shrew (2016, Shakespeare Theatre Company, Washington D.C.), and The Whirligig (2017, Signature, off-Broadway). 

His first new musical with a full cast since Spring Awakening, Because of Winn-Dixie received its world premiere at Arkansas Repertory Theatre in late 2013. The beloved book about the friendship between a young girl and a dog was adapted for the stage by Sheik (music) and Nell Benjamin (book and lyrics). Given the integral role of the dog in the piece, famed Broadway animal trainer Bill Berloni was part of the process, continuing his work during a 2019 production at Goodspeed Opera House and in further development of the piece as recent as this year. Winn-Dixie showcased Sheik’s ability to write in different styles, for the small town characters of the story here are quite different from the characters of his previous projects. 

Another Duncan Sheik musical hit Broadway in spring of 2016, when American Psycho stunned audiences. The unlikely adaptation of the Bret Easton Ellis novel had both music and lyrics by Sheik with a book by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa. Having first premiered in 2013 in London, American Psycho featured a score that was mostly original, with a handful of interpolated 1980s hits. Sheik’s original numbers were electro-pop-infused to tell the tale of the 1980s investment banker turned serial killer. The original Broadway production closed after only 54 performances but the show has continued to find fans in international productions and will return to New York for a new production in Brooklyn in 2027. 

Sheik’s most performed show after Spring Awakening is Alice By Heart, which made its New York premiere off-Broadway at MCC in 2019. The Alice in Wonderland-inspired musical set in World War II London during the Blitz has a book by Steven Sater with Jessie Nelson, lyrics by Sater and music by Sheik. The show, which was originally led by Molly Gordon and Colton Ryan off-Broadway, played out its brief run, received a cast recording, and then found a massive amount of fans thanks to the album. Alice By Heart has become one of the most licensed musicals in school and amateur theaters over the past few years. 

Alice By Heart wasn’t Sheik’s only 2019 off-Broadway musical. His The Secret Life of Bees also opened that year, and became a hard-to-get ticket at the Atlantic Theatre Company. This time, Sheik composed to lyrics by Susan Birkenhead and a book by Lynn Nottage for this adaptation of the Sue Monk Kidd novel which included LaChanze and Eisa Davis in its cast. Again, Sheik showed his propensity for creative variety, penning a score for a tale set in the South in the 1960s.

The New Group’s production of Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice was presented at the Signature off-Broadway in early 2020. This time, Sheik composed and co-wrote lyrics for an adaptation of a movie, the 1969 film of the same title, alongside Jonathan Marc Sherman (book) and Amanda Green (co-lyrics). The playful tale of would-be swinging couples of the 1960s exploring their sexuality and relationships was a four-person musical but also included a Band Leader, initially played by Sheik before Suzanne Vega stepped in so Sheik could focus on writing. The production’s run was cut-short by the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown. 

Sheik’s first two productions of new musicals coming out of the pandemic were darker. At the start of 2022, Whisper House hit the stage at 59E59, off-off-Broadway. It was the New York premiere for a show that Sheik had worked on right after Spring Awakening and which received its world premiere back in 2010 at The Old Globe in San Diego. Selections from the musical had actually appeared on Sheik’s studio album of the same title in 2009. Written with Kyle Jarrow, Whisper House was a World War II-set ghost story. 

In 2022, The Alley Theatre in Texas premiered Noir, another musical Sheik wrote with Jarrow which had received years of development, including at the 2015 NAMT festival. In contrast with most of Sheik’s other projects, Noir is an original musical, inspired by the genre of film noir. Sheik co-wrote lyrics with Jarrow as well as composed the music for the show which has yet to receive its New York premiere. 

This fall, Sheik’s newest musical, Memoirs of Amorous Gentlemen, will receive its New York premiere off-Broadway at the Night Egg at Culture Club. Based on a manga by Moyoco Anno, the show has a book by Leah Nanako Winkler and will star Sophia Anne Caruso. It is one of four of Sheik’s musicals that are already announced for major productions this season: Spring Awakening and Memoirs of Amorous Gentlemen off-Broadway, American Psycho in Brooklyn, and Nero in London. In addition to these upcoming productions, Sheik left behind several musicals in development including The Nightingale and Ma Vie en Rose.

Comments

To post a comment, you must register and login.