Twang!!

Twang!!
London Cast Album cover
MusicLionel Bart
LyricsLionel Bart
BookLionel Bart & Harvey Orkin
BasisThe Robin Hood legend
Productions1965 West End

Twang!! is a musical with music and lyrics written by Lionel Bart and a book by Bart and Harvey Orkin, an American theatrical agent and former writer for The Phil Silvers Show. When production faced issues, American writer Burt Shevelove was called on to help fix the book. The piece, a spoof of the character and legend of Robin Hood, was a disastrous box-office failure and cost Bart his personal fortune.

After a preview in Manchester, Twang!! opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London's West End on 20 December 1965 and closed on 29 January 1966 after just 43 performances, receiving scathing reviews and playing to mostly empty houses.[1] Bart produced it with Bernard Delfont and John Bryan, and Joan Littlewood directed but quit before it opened. She was replaced by Shevelove and Bart.[2] Twang!! is remembered as "the most expensive flop" in West End history up to that time.[3]

In 2008, the Estate of Lionel Bart commissioned Julian Woolford to write a new book for the musical which was performed in 2013 at Guildford School of Acting. This version is now licensed through MTI.

  1. ^ Roper, p. 98
  2. ^ Roper, p. 84
  3. ^ Feiner, Michael. "Bart's Twang!! – Most Expensive Flop in London", The Montreal Gazette, 2 April 1966