10 Facts about A Chorus Line

Thu 12 Aug 2021
Promotional artwork for A Chorus Line. A lone chorus performer dances in silhouette on a dimly lit stage. Gold capitals across the image read 'A Chorus Line', and in the top right corner 'The one singular sensation at Curve this Christmas'.

As our Made at Curve Christmas show is only 16 weeks away, we looked into what makes A Chorus Line such a singular sensation.

 

  1. Michael Bennett conceived of the idea for the show when he spoke to his fellow dancers and learnt an incredible amount about their personal histories. He realised everyone has a story to tell.
  2. A Chorus Line is a musical about a musical. It is based on a group of highly-skilled dancers who travel from chorus to chorus. A Chorus Line reinvented musicals by turning the spotlight off the stars and onto the unsung heroes.
  3. The concept of the show was truly original: no real set, no costumes to speak of, no star and no narrative. This had never been seen on Broadway before. To this day, it remains a landmark musical, alongside West Side Story, Rent and Hamilton (watch Hamilton’s celebration of 40 years of A Chorus Line here).
  4. Broadway, at the end of 1970s, was not the glitzy, glamorous district we think of now. It used to be a bit of a dump. A Chorus Line brought prosperity and reason to visit the Great White Way.
  5. In 1983, A Chorus Line became the longest-running musical on Broadway (it still remains the seventh longest-running). To celebrate, Michael Bennett assembled over 300 current and former cast members to create a tag-team performance. You can watch the performance finale here.
  6. A Chorus Line has been performed all over the world including Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. It has also been translated and performed in France, Sweden, Japan, Argentina, Brazil,  Mexico,  Singapore, Belgium, Denmark, Hong Kong and many more countries!
  7. In 1975, A Chorus Line won nine of the 12 Tony Award nominations it received.
  8. There hasn’t been a new UK production of the show since 2013.
  9. This Christmas production at Curve will reunite Nikolai Foster with choreographer Ellen Kane, the team behind our 5 star 2019 production of West Side Story.
  10. Artistic Director Nikolai Foster made his directorial debut with A Chorus Line in 2003. The production was described as “exemplary”, “excellent” and “perfectly polished”.