How Often Are Musicals Based on Documentaries?
The latest documentary to musical is The Queen of Versailles, starring Kristin Chenoweth.
By: Jennifer Ashley Tepper Oct. 21, 2025
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This time, the reader question was: How often are musicals absed on documentaries?
A previous version of this article ran in January of 2024. Since that time, multiple musicals have come to Broadway that are based at least in part on documentaries.
The Queen of Versailles, currently in previews at the St. James Theatre, is based on the 2012 documentary of the same name. The show follows Jackie Siegel, played by Kristin Chenoweth on stage, from humble beginnings to success as a Florida pageant winner and eventual lavish lifestyle maven building a mansion fit for royalty with her ambitious husband.
The Queen of Versailles documentary by Lauren Greenfield aimed to show the darker underside of the life of the Siegels, who seemed to have everything with their hospitality empire but struggled personally and financially. With discourse about billionaires heavily in the zeitgeist and reality television as popular as ever, the show strives to depict contemporary wealth normally viewed on our screens on Broadway.
The musical unites Tony Award winner Chenoweth with Stephen Schwartz, penning music and lyrics for his first new Broadway musical since Wicked. The book is by Lindsey Ferrentino for this musical vehicle for Chenoweth which first premiered in Boston last year. The musical leans in to the documentary style of its source material, with technical elements reminding audiences of the story’s roots depicting real-life folks on screen.
Currently running one block over at the Schoenfeld Theatre is Buena Vista Social Club. A hit of last season, the show with an authentic sound that has stayed true to the original album of the same name is sending audiences to their feet each night. The show has a book by Marco Ramirez, and music orchestrated and arranged by music director Marco Paguia who won a Tony Award for his orchestrations. Saheem Ali directed and developed the show, with David Yazbek and Nick Gold as creative consultants.
In the late 1990s, several legendary Cuban musicians reunited and recorded an album called Buena Vista Social Club. The album celebrated and archived the dynamic songs they played during mid-century years of major political unrest in Cuba. A documentary of the same title was created by Wim Wenders, following these artists as they traveled internationally, including to the United States, to record and perform the songs on the album. Because travel between the United States and Cuba was restricted for so many years, while political tensions raged, this creative endeavor was particularly historic.
The musical was inspired by the documentary and its music, premiering first off-Broadway at Atlantic Theatre Company in 2023 before transferring to Broadway in 2025. The show won a special Tony Award for its on-stage band, whose extraordinary artistry makes the music in the musical both vibrant and historically accurate. The new musical won four other Tony Awards as well, including for leading lady Natalie Venetia Belcon who plays the character of Omara. In the show, much of the story is centered on Omara Portuondo, who chooses to stay in Cuba as her beloved sister leaves for America. The character is a partially fictionalized version of the real woman of the same name, who is still with us today at the age of 94. Her vocals were an essential part of the Buena Vista album. The album is brought to the stage complete with its original Spanish lyrics in Buena Vista Social Club.
How To Dance in Ohio, a new musical which ran at the Belasco Theatre in 2023, was based on a 2015 documentary of the same name, which won the Peabody Award for Documentary Film. Alexandra Shiva directed the documentary, about autistic young people preparing for a formal dance.
Eight years later, the musical How To Dance in Ohio started previews on Broadway, with book and lyrics by Rebekah Greer Melocik and music by Jacob Yandura, directed by Sammi Cannold. The legendary Hal Prince was involved as director and also dramaturg before he passed, and the show is now dedicated to him. How To Dance in Ohio cast actors with autism to play characters with autism, opening doors for new conversations to be had.
It is rare for a Broadway musical to be based on a documentary rather than on a film of another genre. Every season, multiple musicals premiere based on comedies and dramas from the big screen. A musical based on a documentary is more uncommon—and having three within three seasons on Broadway is definitely outside the norm.
In 2013, Hands on a Hardbody went this route. The musical with book by Doug Wright, music by Trey Anastasio (of Phish) and Amanda Green, and lyrics by Green, directed by Neil Pepe, became a favorite of many musical theatre aficionados. The show, based on the 1997 documentary of the same name, followed a group of underdog Texans who compete to see who can keep their hands on a truck the longest. The competitor who wins gets to take the truck home, a significant change of fortune. Hardbody told the stories of folks who don’t often get musicals written about them, and was incredibly moving. Several of the real-life people featured in the documentary even attended the show and took on-stage bows.
A few years earlier, in 2006, Broadway saw Grey Gardens come to life. The 1975 documentary was about a mother and daughter both named Edith Beale who were cousins of First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and became extremely eccentric recluses. Book writer Doug Wright (who also wrote Hardbody), composer Scott Frankel, lyricist Michael Korie and director Michael Greif brought these characters to the stage, first at Playwrights Horizons and then on Broadway. Christine Ebersole and Mary Louise Wilson received Tony Awards for their acclaimed performances in the leading roles. The show ran for over 300 performances, and continues to inspire fans.
The 2017 hit West End stage musical Everybody’s Talking About Jamie has not been on Broadway (yet), but is a significant show of recent years that falls into the musical-based-on-a-documentary category. The uplifting, pop-infused show about a British teenager’s journey to become a drag queen is based on a 2011 television documentary called Jamie: Drag Queen at 16. Everybody’s Talking About Jamie has book and lyrics by Tom MacRae and music by Dan Gillespie Sells, and was directed by Jonathan Butterell. In addition to its years on the West End, the show has also toured in the UK, and premiered in both L.A. and Mexico City.
While not based on a film or television documentary, there are also other Broadway musicals with documentary-like aspects. Shows like A Chorus Line, Working, and Come From Away, that are partially based on interviews with real people, might be considered offshoots of the musical-based-on-a-documentary sub-genre. There are also musicals like Kinky Boots, which are based on source material that in turn was based on a documentary. (The 2013 Best Musical winner was based on the 2005 British film of the same name, which was based on a 1999 television episode of the documentary series Trouble at the Top.) And of course there are many shows, including a large number of jukebox musicals, which are based on the stories of real people, and thus have documentary-like elements.
