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Broadway’s $25 million Lost Boys musical picked up 12 Tony nominations after its April Palace Theatre opening, with vampires flying on automated rigging.
The Lost Boys: A New Musical, the $25 million Broadway adaptation of the 1987 cult vampire film, landed 12 Tony Award nominations after opening at the Palace Theatre in April. The nominations include nods for set, lighting, and sound design.
The show is built around automation. The New York Times’ walkthrough of the production’s stagecraft and the choreographed traffic of moving set pieces and flying performers documents the scale of the operation, with the show’s signature image of vampires flying over the audience executed through nonstop, computer-controlled rigging.
The music comes from the indie pop-rock band The Rescues, who were recommended to the production by director Michael Arden. The book is by David Hornsby and Chris Hoch.
The production’s path to opening was unusually long. Producers Patrick Wilson, James Carpinello, and Marcus Chait spent years trying to secure stage rights from Warner Bros, with the rights finally clearing during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns. The producers used that downtime, by their own account, to figure out how to bring vampires to life on a Broadway stage.
An industry presentation of the musical ran in March 2025. The single Have to Have You dropped that October, featuring an electric guitar solo by Slash on the demo recording. The Santa Carla Sessions EP, featuring two more numbers from the show, followed on Halloween.
Previews opened March 27, 2026; the official opening was April 26. The cast features Shoshana Bean, LJ Benet, Benjamin Pajak, Ali Louis Bourzgui, and Maria Wirries in the principal roles. Entertainment Weekly’s writeup of Dane Laffrey’s scenic design and the show’s two-floor Emerson home that rises and falls mid-scene captured the technical ambition.
Opening night drew its own crowd of VIPs. Broadway.com’s opening-night gallery covering the cast, creative team, and celebrity attendees documented appearances from Steph and Ayesha Curry, Zooey Deschanel, JoJo, P!NK, and Vera Farmiga.
The musical hews to the original film’s beats. Lucy Emerson and her sons Michael and Sam move to seaside Santa Carla; Michael falls in with The Lost Boys, the local rock-band-slash-vampire-coven fronted by David; Sam links up with the Frog Brothers, a pair of comic-book-shop vampire hunters. The plot is largely unchanged from the 1987 source.
The Tony tally puts The Lost Boys near the top of this year’s Best Musical conversation. The 12 nominations cover above-the-line categories like Best Musical, Best Score, and Best Book, alongside below-the-line craft awards for scenic, lighting, sound, and costume.
The Palace Theatre, where the show is housed, recently emerged from a multi-year renovation. The Lost Boys is one of the first major tenants since that work concluded.
The Tony Awards ceremony is upcoming. Whether the technical heft converts to wins is the show’s open question.
The vampires fly until then.
