The Lost Boys: A New Musical is soaring on Broadway. As we head into the 79th annual Tony Awards, the show boasts 12 nominations, including Best Musical. But the journey to critical acclaim and packed houses roaring with excitement was far from guaranteed when director and co-lighting designer Michael Arden, who is nominated in both Tony categories, got involved. 

In an interview with Mashable, the two-time Tony Award–winning director (Maybe Happy Ending, Parade) recalled how his involvement with The Lost Boys began. He was approached by producers James Carpinello, Marcus Chait, and Patrick Wilson, when the proposed musical had no script and no songs — just the idea that Joel Schumacher's 1987 cult classic about leather-bound teen vampires could be a thrilling theatrical production. 

"It was just, 'We want to do this on stage," Arden recalled,  "That was literally all we knew when we started."

They started in 2021, a time when theaters across the country were shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic. With the future of theater was uncertain, Arden and his collaborators dared to dream of what it could be. "I was like, 'Well, what else am I doing?' But it felt like a real opportunity to have fun — sure, let's make a vampire musical."

How The Lost Boys went from screen to stage

Ali Louis Bourzgui hovers over LJ Benet in "The Lost Boys: A New Musical." Credit: Matthew Murphy

Though a millennial, Arden hadn't grown up with The Lost Boys. But when he watched the movie after being offered the opportunity to adapt it for the stage, he immediately saw its potential.

"I knew that there were these certain moments that were iconic tentpole things we needed to deliver on," he said, adding, "We have a responsibility, when we go to create a piece of theater, to do something a bit more elevated. And so we were chasing themes that were in the movie and expanding [on them], making them more operatic. It was great, because we had these tentpoles to play with, but we really got to build in a more complex story." 

As noted in my review of The Lost Boys, among those changes to flesh out the story was an abusive father for the Emerson family — this unseen force prompted their recent move to Santa Clara, home of the vampire David (Tony nominee Ali Louis Bourzgui) and his blood-sucking lost boys. Speaking of mother Lucy (Shoshana Bean) and her teen sons Michael and Sam, Arden said, "It's a mom and her two kids, and they don't talk about Dad. So we were like, well, that's clearly something. Maybe when we go to the theater, we want to know about Dad." 

Building in this domestic violence element not only gives a sharper understanding of why the Emersons are moving to Lucy's hometown, but also why she and her eldest son are so at odds. Michael (LJ Benet) harbors anger about her failure to protect him from his abusive father. This disconnect urges him to find a new family with David and the beguiling Star (Maria Wirries). Plus, David's fear of his own potential for violence is given a deeper root, as he hallucinates his abusive father beckoning him. 

Exploring the women of The Lost Boys 

Shoshana Bean is Lucy Emerson in "The Lost Boys: A New Musical." Credit: Matthew Murphy

The book — by David Hornsby and Chris Hoch — also added depth to the female characters, such as Star and Lucy. "All hail Dianne Wiest," Arden said of the rightly acclaimed actress's performance in the movie The Lost Boys, before noting that her character was "not on the page; it's definitely in the performance." 

"Watching the movie, I was like, 'Oh, these ladies are, like, glorified costumes,' you know what I mean?" In his production, "Lucy is certainly at the center of our story. We knew that family had to be the key there." 

First suggested by Arden, the L.A. rock band The Rescues wrote The Lost Boys' original music and lyrics, including songs focused on the perspectives of Lucy and Star. Within their Tony–nominated score, "Wild" allows Lucy to sing about her youth and being a hippie, and how she wishes to embraces that free side of herself outside of her role as mother. Sung by Star, "War" offers her a space to express how it feels to have your life's path determined by power-hungry men. Arden called this "one of my favorite songs in the show," adding, "It's not lost on me that if you just look at those lyrics outside of the context of Lost Boys, it is about the moment we are living in right now."

Maria Wirries and LJ Benet play Star and Michael in "The Lost Boys: A New Musical." Credit: Matthew Murphy

The director continued, "We are in a never-ending war, and she has this unbelievable lyric that [The Rescues] wrote: 'Again, the violence of men is what rules us in the end, because in the end, you're either predator or prey.' This idea that these men are deciding things for us all, who lives and who dies, and without a thought of the humanity. Star gets to voice that as a character who is at the mercy of these men. We really wanted to highlight that."

Recalling what he requested from The Rescues, he said, "When we were looking for a song for Star in Act Two, I remember saying to The Rescues, 'If you could say anything, get up in front of a crowd [in] this country, and talk about what it feels like to be an American right now, what would you say?' And they delivered that unbelievable banger, which I think will probably... I hope enters the canon of, like, great songs. What the best musical theater songs can do is they can exist on two planes — one for the story and one for, like, the time we're in."

Expanding the LGBTQ+ representation in The Lost Boys

Benjamin Pajak, Jennifer Duka, and Miguel Gil as Sam Emerson, Alan Frog, and Edgar Frog in "The Lost Boys: A New Musical." Credit: Matthew Murphy

Before there was Challengers and the three-way kiss, there was The Lost Boys. Coming out during the AIDS crisis, Schumacher's movie dealt with a hot teenage vampire love triangle and repressed desires being deadly. So, fans of the film didn't have to work hard to see queer undertones. Arden and his team expanded on this in their musical, making subtext text. 

Sam Emerson, who had a Rob Lowe poster on his wall in the movie, is more directly identified as queer in this musical, culminating in the song "Superpower." In this number, he is flanked by superheroes in spandex costumes that collectively form a rainbow, as he sings about recognizing that what makes him "queer" makes him great. Arden noted the double meaning of "queer" to mean "different" or "gay," depending on its context. Then, he said of Sam's arc, "This isn't about Sam realizing his homosexuality. That might be part of it, but it's not all of it. 'Superpower' is actually an anthem for anyone who has felt like they didn't belong. That is a mirror to Michael's experience. They both [feel like] outsiders... They have that to bond over, that they both have felt like they couldn't quite be themselves. And what's interesting about those characters, it isn't because the world is telling them they're wrong. It's because they themselves think they don't belong. It's actually [a] self-obstacle, which I love... It's a pretty fun journey to go on with those brothers."

Beyond the Emerson brothers, there's also the Frog Brothers. In the movie, both Alan and Edgar Frog were male-presenting boys. In The Lost Boys: A New Musical, Alan Frog is played by Jennifer Duka. Arden spoke on this casting choice, saying, "Well, why do the Frog Brothers both need to be dudes?"

In development, the team discussed what it meant for Alan to be played by a woman. For instance, "How do we deal with the name the Frog Brothers?" He shared, "And I was like, 'Well, why doesn't she just want to be a brother with somebody, because that would allow her to do things that girls [in 1987] don't get to do, and be involved in situations that girls don't get to be involved in?"

He noted the language on gender identity wasn't as developed in the '80s as it is now. So, while he declined to outright describe Alan as a trans or non-binary character, he noted that in the '80s setting, she'd be considered "a tomboy," adding, "She likes to be a Frog Brother, and in the army, you go by your last name. And her last name is Alan."

So, in the play, Alan introduces herself as Alan Frog, and when Sam questions it, she says, "Jessica Alan. But I go by Alan." This change might seem small, but it underscores the aforementioned themes of understanding yourself and found family. As Sam declares in the climax, they are all family. ("Did I stutter?") 

How The Lost Boys took flight

LJ Benet, Ali Louis Bourzgui, Brian Flores, Dean Maupin, and Sean Grandillo fly in "The Lost Boys: A New Musical." Credit: Matthew Murphy

Last but not least, Arden and I talked about the mesmerizing flying sequences in The Lost Boys: A New Musical.

In translating Schumacher's vision from screen to stage, Arden was sure to include such iconic elements as the oiled-up, muscle-bound saxophone player, the '80s rock attitude — complete with David's signature bleach blonde mullet — and the train track sequence, where the lost boys fly. Flight becomes a major element of the spectacle of The Lost Boys as Bourzgui and his fellow vampires (Brian Flores, Sean Grandillo, and Dean Maupin) ascend to menace or awe their prey. Arden explained how he wanted to make The Lost Boys' flight style specific to their story and distinctive from the many Peter Pans who've whimsically flown through theater history. 

When I mentioned my own childlike wonder at the near-invisible wirework, he said, "That's awesome. That's what we want. We want to go to the theater to be fully with the imagination and belief system of a child. In fact, it's called The Lost Boys. We want to stay kids, because we don't want to lose our ability to believe in things that are seemingly impossible."

Arden knew it was crucial that the flight be astounding to the audience. But how to suspend disbelief if the audience can see the wires from which the actors hang? After all, theater doesn't have a visual effects team that can paint out the wires in post-production, as there is no post-production. "How are we gonna make this seem like they are really flying?" He recalled, "We talked about, like, 'Oh, should they  always fly on chains so that we see them? Because it's really going to be impossible to hide the wires.'" However, Arden, who has a background in lighting, decided, "We just gotta fucking figure it out."

This process meant creating a flying rig that Arden told Deadline was tested in Las Vegas a year before the show opened. From there, the custom rig was sent to SUNY Purchase, where the cast would rehearse before moving into the Palace Theatre. But before they even got to that point, the auditions for The Lost Boys demanded performers for certain roles not only be able to sing and dance, but also prove they could learn to fly. The training required the actors discover how to hold their bodies, move around the wires smoothly, and fly not just convincingly but with an awe-striking grace. 

"We did have one flight [in the show] that was kind of funny," Arden recalls of the development, "But we ended up cutting very early on, because it wasn't right. [Flight] needed to be emotional. We did tell the cast, 'This is spiritual.' This is the grandest, most beautiful thing a vampire can do." 

Arden explained how the flight was a necessary foil to the killing the vampires do. "They are the darkness and the light, if you will, of their power," He explained. "It's like flight, because it is the thing that is venerable for everyone. So, it needed to be beautiful enough that you would really consider killing someone to get that power."

Of this masterfully choreographed collision of performance, lighting, and staging, he said, "To be able to achieve that was really difficult, and really has been really rewarding, because people are just — there's something about it. It ignites your inner child, and that's why we knew that the flying needed to be beautiful and needed to represent joy." 

The Lost Boys: A New Musical is now on Broadway.