How to Steal an Election Tickets

Opening the The York Theatre Company's Fall 2023 Musicals in Mufti Series is the first New York revival of the 1968 musical How to Steal an Election: A Dirty Politics Musical, with music and lyrics by Oscar Brand (the “Dean of American Folk Music”) and book by William F. Brown (The Wiz). Brown and Brand had the notion of Jazz Age President Calvin Coolidge materializing in the present day (that is, 1968). There he meets a couple of fervent young protesters, just back from the skull-cracking Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Disillusioned, these two protesters have no taste for the political machine. But what’s wrong with pragmatism, Coolidge asks them? What about learning to work within a corrupt system? Thus, Coolidge begins his history lesson, with vignettes and songs depicting cynical power grabs of yore. How to Steal an Election opened to rave reviews at Off-Broadway’s Pocket Theatre in 1968 and after 50 performances, the show was set to move to Broadway. But there was a glitch--according to Oscar Brand, the $80,000 lined up for the move was Mob money. The authors refused to cooperate; end of deal, end of production. Until now!