Carnival - repro

Bob Merrill and Michael Stewart’s 'Carnival!' is a brilliant, beautifully melancholic mid-century musical masterpiece that turned the stage of the Imperial Theatre into an absolute commercial phenomenon in 1961, running for 719 performances. Based on the film Lili, the narrative follows Lili, a naive, vulnerable young orphan girl who joins a cynical European traveling carnival troupe, finding her loneliness transformed through her profound, star-crossed conversations with an embittered, crippled puppeteer who can only express his love through his four whimsical puppet creations. Directed and choreographed by Gower Champion, the original production famously starred Anna Maria Alberghetti and Jerry Orbach.