When it opened on Broadway in the spring of 2001, Mel Brooks' musical comedy "The Producers" became an instant cultural phenomenon steeped in irony. The day after its premiere, 33,000 tickets were sold at $100 each, a record high price, and the production was able to pay off its initial investment of $11 million in a mere 36 weeks.
The irony is that the play itself is about two men who stage a Broadway musical hoping that it's a flop. In 1959, cynical theatrical producer Max Bialystock and milquetoast accountant Leo Bloom raise several million dollars for their production by overselling fraudulent shares. They then sink only a tenth of the money into the show with the idea that when it closes after one performance they can keep the rest. Naturally, it's a hit.
Brooks based "The Producers" on his 1968 movie of the same name starring Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder, which was itself an homage to the musical comedies he loved while growing up in New York. By adding real songs, the 2001 theatrical version completes the homage, which is another irony: The musical that many believe saved Broadway is a throwback to the musical comedies that dominated the White Way up to the 1960s.
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