Floyd Collins – 9 May 2025

Floyd Collins is utterly unlike the rest of this Broadway season’s musicals, and I found it an incredible breath of fresh air. Structured more like an opera than a musical, Floyd Collins tells a simple story of a man in distress because he has gotten himself caught under a giant rock in an underground cavern, Floyd Collins makes excellent use of its ensemble cast to showcase how everyone feels in each moment through elaborate metaphors and moments where emotions are wordlessly sung into the air like prayers put out into the world that don’t need words to be understood. Add in the modern ability to loop an actor’s performance each measure such that they can sing with layers and layers of echoes of themselves, and you’ve got a truly unique theatrical experience. Floyd Collins is also one of the only Broadway musicals with very minimal design elements—the storytelling is done by the actors, who create most of the world through their interconnected moments and their disjointed moments as they balance their personal feelings of what’s important with what feels important to the community.

The first person I’d like to recognize for excellent work on this show is the front of house mixer, Bridget O’Conner. I used to mix musicals myself, and Bridget O’Conner has a gift. This is the only musical that I saw on Broadway this year that felt like was mixed properly. In moments where multiple characters were singing different parts over each other, O’Conner (at the direction of sound designer Dan Moses Schreier), made it very clear who we should be listening to in each moment, and also beautifully balanced moments where someone was singing in the background but the spoken lines were most important. The pit orchestra was also perfectly mixed, with each instrument’s solo parts brought out, changing the tone and color for each moment as the composer intended. The clarity of this mix and its execution were difficult to execute and masterfully done. It was clear that not only did Bridget O’Conner know the score, she knew how particular actors were going to perform particular moments and was able to emphasize their strengths.

Overall, I felt drawn to the uniqueness of Floyd Collins. Though I was initially pulled in by the beautiful voices and operatic approach to the lyrics (and, at times, music), there was a lot of thematic content in this simple storyline, because each of the supporting characters had a unique attitude toward the rescue of Floyd Collins (Jeremy Jordan). Nellie (Lizzy Alpine) felt spiritually connected, but was literally prohibited from entering the cavern; her moments express a lot of confidence with helplessness underneath. Homer (Jason Gotay) has mixed feelings because he wants to rescue his brother, but he wants to be the one to do it. He has never had his moment in the spotlight, and he wants it– that’s why he is easily seduced by Hollywood promises. Lee (Marc Kudish) understands better than anyone that this is a race against time, and he pushes people away because he already feels alone. Carmichael (Sean Allan Krill)I is completely absorbed by the pressure to get Floyd out, but he doesn’t really care about Floyd at all—just advancing his career.

Floyd Collins is the rare slice of life musical in which everyone on stage has a recognizable, clear purpose for being there and nobody was just a person in the crowd. It felt like getting to know the whole cast of characters, not just the titular character. Everyone had a beautiful voice that wove together a beautiful tapestry of voices that was especially necessary in some of the chords less frequently heard in musical theatre—it’s a risky score (Adam Guettel) that’s not just acoustically pleasing thirds and fifths. The music is a huge part of conveying when something is wrong. The minimalist design elements also contribute by getting out of the actors’ way. I enjoyed that this production trusted the actors and the score to tell the story without the need for flashy effects. It felt like theatre returning to its roots, in some ways, and it was wonderfully refreshing.

Though the yodeling isn’t for everyone, the harshness of it is important from an audio perspective for two reasons: it keeps the clarity of the pitches as the sections get looped and echo, and because it’s part of the harshness of the story’s characters and the backbreaking work that the characters are undertaking in their spelunking and the absolutely brutal nature of trying to dig Floyd out. Nellie’s need for harshness comes to create contrast between her harsh need to believe that Floyd has what it takes to survive and the fragility of her sadness when she wants to be doing something to help.

Unique and quirky, Floyd Collins has a folksy yet operatic feel while telling a high stakes story with elements of futility and conflicting feelings among the family and the larger community. Some undoubtedly profited off of Floyd’s downfall, others were freed, others were devastated and lost, but ultimately all were irrevocably changed. It’s a rare musical that I would want to see a second time, but, for me, Floyd Collins has earned a place in that category.

I attended this performance on a press pass from Lincoln Center Theater.