The musical adaptation of Cameron Crowe’s cult classic film “Almost Famous” premiered in San Diego at the Old Globe Theater in September 2019. The movie, a semi-autobiographical tale about a teen journalist, William Miller, on the road with a rising band, is based on Crowe’s experiences as a young writer for Rolling Stone and became beloved for its authentic portrayal of what it means to truly love music. As for the debut of the musical version, critics called it “as shimmering as a stadium of lighters during a Led Zeppelin encore,” “a love letter to the music and the concert experience … that feels both fantastical and real” and praised the show for its “unabashedly big heart.” Composer-lyricist Tom Kitt, who earned a Pulitzer Prize for “Next to Normal” and collaborated with Crowe to co-write the lyrics and pen the music for “Almost Famous” onstage, noted he had never received such positive reviews. But when the show hit Broadway in the fall of 2022, after the pandemic and then some, the comments were decidedly less enthused — saying the musical fell flat and “is not even almost great.”
But more than critical reception — or even that of audiences — Kitt and Crowe weren’t satisfied.
“Even that first open week [on Broadway], I said, ‘I don’t want to stop working on it,” Kitt recalled.
Typically, the Broadway rendition of a show becomes the definitive one — the script and, in the case of a musical, the score, provide the basis for any major production in the future as its licensed version. “Everyone is always hoping, praying, working towards getting it to Broadway — that’s what you dream of — and hopefully that’s when the work ends,” said Kitt, who’d written the music to six Broadway musicals prior. But that couldn’t be the case with “Almost Famous” — not for him.
Even before Kitt officially found out the show’s Main Stem run would be shorter lived than he’d dreamed, he asked Crowe to meet him: “I said, ‘Cameron, this has been so difficult. I just think there’s more in this story, and now is the point when we have to look at: How do we keep it alive in the world?”
“The story, and our collaboration, just kept tugging at our shirt-sleeves for more,” Crowe told Broadway News.
Kitt and Crowe did what few creators have: Even before “Almost Famous” closed on Broadway, they began to redevelop their musical.
An unusual turn of events
It’s worth noting that revising a show after its Broadway premiere — in general — isn’t unheard of. The revival of “Chess” just opened on the Main Stem with a brand-new book by Danny Strong, who was not part of the first writing team; “Seussical” has been rewritten by its original creators, Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty. What’s rare is that “Almost Famous” didn’t wait decades until a revival or years until a national tour.
“I didn’t want to wait,” said Kitt. “I felt like I could control it in a way that [I wouldn’t if] who-knows-when someone would come to it and reinvent it.”
Fascinatingly, Kitt recalled having this feeling — the desire to continue work on a show — once before. On “Next to Normal.” Kitt caveated, “It’s very different, obviously.” On Broadway, “Next to Normal” ran for nearly two years, earned 11 Tony nominations (winning three) and won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. But Kitt was referring to an earlier version of the hit musical. “After Second Stage [Off-Broadway], we could have licensed it,” Kitt said of “Next to Normal.” There was interest; but Kitt, his writing partner Brian Yorkey and director Michael Greif didn’t feel ready. They wanted to make changes. So they took the show out of town to Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., before moving it to Broadway and licensed that version.
