A Chorus Line won the 1976 Tony Award for Best Musical and is set largely in a 1970s theater audition room. The plot follows seventeen dancers competing for places in the chorus of a Broadway musical.
The show grew out of recorded conversations with Broadway dancers conducted by Michael Bennett and others in 1974. Nicholas Dante and James Kirkwood Jr. wrote the book, with music by Marvin Hamlisch and lyrics by Edward Kleban. Bennett directed and choreographed the original production.
A Chorus Line opened Off-Broadway in April 1975 and transferred to Broadway in July of that year. It opened at the Shubert Theatre, where it became a major hit. The characters reveal personal histories as the director Zach asks them to explain why they became dancers.
The musical’s best-known songs include “What I Did for Love,” “One,” and “At the Ballet.” Its title refers to the line of performers waiting for their audition and to the chorus line they hope to join, rather than to a specific named theater company.