They Turned Their Dream To Create A Show-Stopping Museum Devoted To Broadway Into A Reality

In 2018/2019, the last time Broadway had a full 52-week season, more than 14.77 million people attended a Broadway show. According to the Broadway League these productions have drawn more people to its theaters than all New York City sports teams combined.

And yet, during its centuries of existence, Broadway never had its own dedicated museum in the heart of the theater district.

That is until now.

This past November the Museum of Broadway opened its doors on West 45th Street. Spread along four fun-packed floors, the 26,000 square foot space contains a plethora of costumes, original scripts, immersive exhibits and other unique artifacts.

There’s everything from the original Ziegfeld Follies costumes from the early 1900s to the actual wig made from 100,000 strands of hair created by wigmaker Paul Huntley for Patti LuPone in the original 1979 Broadway production of Evita to correspondence between Rent creator Jonathan Larson and his mentor, Stephen Sondheim.

This month they added Sara Bareilles’ costume from Into The Woods, a suitcase carried by Hugh Jackman in The Music Man, the hat worn by Jaquel Spivey in A Strange Loop and the costume that Alex Brightman wore in Beetlejuice.

The Museum of Broadway is the brainchild of prolific Broadway producer Julie Boardman and Diane Nicoletti, a marketing guru. Friends since college, the duo joined forces over five years ago.

“It started with Julie,” says Nicoletti. “She had a conversation with a friend of hers who questioned why there wasn’t a museum celebrating Broadway. We were meeting one day over drinks, and she brought up this idea and I thought, Wow, this is amazing. This is brilliant. Why isn’t there one? Broadway is such an important part of New York City culture and history. I think and hope people who love New York would appreciate learning more about Broadway’s impact on this great city.”

The duo began brainstorming. “We built not only the storyboard, but how we’d go about the Museum and the visual storytelling that we wanted to do,” says Nicoletti. Creating a sort of “good will tour” they polled many industry insiders to see if their vision even resonated. “From there we were off to the races,” she adds.

“We were excited to make this for fans and the community so that everyone would have a place to come together to celebrate Broadway,” says Boardman. “We believe it’s important to learn from our past so it can help inform our present and future.”

As several libraries and research centers are passionately devoted to the preservation of the history of Broadway, the Museum of Broadway takes a fully immersive approach. That includes a Stephen Sondheim-themed anagram puzzle, which visitors can solve and pays homage to the great composers puzzle passion. There’s a West Side Story dance-along where people can practice their best moves to a video that breaks down choreography from the show.

Boardman and Nicoletti sought to bring the exhibits together in an accessible format appealing to how people usually like to consume content these days. “It was curated in a way that is hopefully interesting to people,” says Boardman. “The idea was that if somebody is inspired here at the Museum of Broadway, they could do a deeper dive and go to the libraries.” Also, a portion of every ticket sold is donated to Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

Casting a very wide net covering the first documented performance in 1732 to present day, Boardman and Nicoletti worked for years with curators, historians and set designers to feature more than 500 productions. Resident historian and timeline curator Ben West worked with them for more than three years. For some of the hard-to-find artifacts their team went on a mission searching through old attics or going to a friend of a friend of a friend. “It was a bit of a treasure hunt,” says Nicoletti.

For example, their 3D curation team, Michael McDonald, Lisa Zinni, and Faye Armon-Troncoso, who all actively work in Broadway, were instrumental in finding gems. “They all played a huge part in helping us uncover and acquire so many treasures from over the years,” says Nicoletti. They also worked closely with Goodspeed Musicals to showcase costumes from their collection.

McDonald, who designed costumes for the Hair revival also worked at the Public Theater many years before and knew what they kept had in storage. (The Hair military jacket on display was not only worn in revival productions, it was also used in the original 1968 production.)

“Everything was steps and layers,” says Nicoletti. When they identified which productions would be featured in an exhibit they determined what the story of the show would be. “We asked ourselves “What are the stories within that show that we need to make sure that we’re highlighting?” she adds.

For Oklahoma!, they focused on choreographer Agnes de Mille and the dream ballet. For the Phantom of the Opera it was the chandelier. They commissioned artist Ulli Böhmelmann, who created a de-constructed chandelier from strands of crystals. When visitors stand in the right spot, marked by an X, they can see the iconic Phantom mask revealed among the strands. The chandelier features almost 14,000 gleaming crystals, each representing a performance that Phantom has played on Broadway since its opening on Jan. 26, 1988.

Not only does the Museum of Broadway delve into all things happening on stage they also a Making of a Broadway Show exhibit, designed by noted set designer David Rockwell, describing what life is like and transpires backstage. So visitors get a glimpse of the role all those involved, from costumers to stage managers, bring a show to life.

“Most people just know the magic onstage, but don’t realize what goes into making a show, how many people work on it in various capacities over the years and it takes to develop them,” says Boardman. “We wanted to highlight people behind the curtain and show younger generations that there could be a place for them working in Broadway if that was a career path that interests them. They don’t have to be an actor, they could work in general management, production, marketing, even journalism and still be part of the Broadway community.”