This impractical project will take place in consultation with a lawyer over 5 weeks at the EFA Project Space in Manhattan. The project will exist as an ongoing live performance (rehearsals will be open to the public) and in its final form as a 30 to 45 minute video documenting the process of putting on the production, from auditions to opening night. The project will also serve as an inquiry into the murkiness of copyright law and fair use for artists interested in working with the pervasive popular content that so intimately shapes our notions of identity and self.

All of the performers will be adults and the casting of each part will be based more on the willingness and desire of the performers than on singing, dancing ability, or appearance. We hope to tap into a population who perhaps fantasized as children about being the orphan star of [unnamed Broadway musical] or being in [unnamed Broadway musical], but for whom it wasn’t a possibility perhaps because of gender, race, talent, or other circumstantial barriers. Through interviews with the cast each person’s relationship to the idea of abandonment / being overlooked will be explored in the hopes of uncovering the allegorical appeal of the orphan tale.

While new obstacles again threaten these childhood aspirations, we persevere with plucky optimism in the hope that [unnamed Broadway musical] will be transformed into something completely different, original, and more relevant; that the participants will still fulfill an unrequited dream and the resulting performance and video will be absurd, sad, funny, and radically simple without making fun of anyone involved, except [unnamed Broadway musical], but only if we are legally required to do so.

Unnamed Broadway Musical: The Musical! is the second project to join EFA Project Space’s Artist/Organizer Series. This series provides the use of EFA Project Space in between exhibitions to highlight the activities of Artist/Organizers—pivotal artists who, through the act of organizing, are compelled to readdress and refresh the framework through which we use artistic expression to build community.