By Mervyn Rothstein
31 Aug 2009

Q: Why do you think it was so successful?

A: I think it was the right show at the right time. Broadway was finishing its golden age, and it was ripe for parody. It was repeating itself; strange new shows, British shows, were coming in. It was the era of "Saturday Night Live," and it felt good to make fun of sacred cows. I think my take was different enough from other shows — I took the music and changed the lyrics. People have been writing parodies for centuries, of course, but this seemed a very fresh take. I don't know whether I did it accidentally, but I had been studying lyric writing for many years, and it seemed pretty simple to take the lyrics of a real show and fit my lyrics to them. We did the first few productions for just a few hundred dollars. We didn't have a press agent. There was no advertising budget. People just discovered it. It was all very surprising. Stephen Sondheim told me that Forbidden Broadway was one of the first metamusicals — one of the first self-referential musicals. We were singing about theatre. Now, of course, everyone does it.

Q: How do you do it?

A: I guess I just have a talent for parody. I've been writing lyrics since I was a child. When I was a boy I tried to translate the lyrics of operas and operettas. I even tried to write lyrics to The Nutcracker when I was young.

A: I just love that it was all considered 'underground' in those days. I also love that it has continued all these years. I really appreciate that it has survived and I've been able to make a career out of it. But I miss the days when it wasn't an institution, when it was something subversive and countercultural, when it was a secret that people discovered.

Q: Any favorite lyrics, or sketches?

A: There are so many. But maybe the newest was in the most recent version, where I had 'Daniel Radcliffe, a.k.a. Harry Potter' sing 'Let Me Enter Naked.' It's a real parody. Instead of 'Entertain You' I wrote 'Enter Naked,' which is so close to the original. Those are the ones that make me laugh — when you take the original and change just a few words to give it a totally different meaning.

Q: You were quoted as saying that last season's show was the last in New York. Are you sticking with that?

A: I think the press picked up incorrectly what I said. I said I was done for now, not forever. I said I closed the show in New York because I think Broadway needs to renew itself. I felt I had said all I could about what was going on on Broadway in the last 28 years. I need to have a new set of shows to parody. I thought my last show was a good one, so it was a good one to end on. I don't have plans to bring it back, but in theory I might in two or three years, when there are all new shows on Broadway. I hope to bring it back. I really do.

Q: Meanwhile, you're doing Forbidden Broadway in London, right?

A: Yes, this summer. I've done new numbers. Billy Elliot. And I'm spoofing some of the American shows playing there — Carousel, A Little Night Music. And there's a new Andrew Lloyd Webber spoof, just for there.

Q: What are you doing now?

A: I'm the co-writer and director of Creature From the Black Lagoon, a musical based on that terrible old monster movie from the 1950s, for the Universal Studios Hollywood theme park. It has funny, huge special effects and giant puppets.

Q: And, appropriately, its publicity notes that it has 'hilarious, toe-tapping music.' What about the future?

A: I hope to write a new musical, an original musical comedy with three-dimensional characters, more like a musical play, where the book is prominent. I'm trying to find something to do with a major composer — I can't say who. I plan to be doing that for the next couple of years, and I hope that it will be good enough to bring to Broadway.

Q: And if it comes to Broadway, and if Forbidden Broadway returns, would you parody it?

A: Absolutely. There are many more nasty things to say about myself than I can think of to say about Patti LuPone.