'It was the call I least expected to get,' Tracz remembers. A national tour earlier this year sold out some of the largest auditoriums in the country.īut Broadway, where the musical is playing a holiday season run at the Longacre, was a surprise for all involved, especially the writers. Tracz and Rokicki further adapted the property into a full two-act, two-hour musical that received three Drama Desk Award nominations in 2017, including Outstanding Musical. This was the adaptation of the story they wanted to see. In the process, the writers and their producers learned that the fans were going nuts for this show. It toured schools and libraries, as TheaterWorks' theater for young audiences productions always do. Tracz knew he was the ideal writer to adapt The Lightning Thief for the stage when TheaterWorks USA gave him the opportunity, and he knew that Rokicki, who understood the book's aesthetic right away, was the perfect songwriter.Īn hourlong version of their Lightning Thief musical premiered in 2014 at the Lucille Lortel Theatre. So when it came to creating a musical-theater version, everyone was extremely skeptical.Įnter book writer Joe Tracz, also obsessed with the Percy novels, sci-fi fantasy, and YA literature, and composer Rob Rokicki, a longtime fan of young adult horror and Greek mythology - with a particular affinity for the film Clash of the Titans. It's just as well known that Riordan himself didn't particularly care for it.

It's well known that the fans of Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson book series didn't like the movie version of The Lightning Thief.

Author of the lightning thief