Drawing on archival research, personal interviews, and text and performance analysis, this dissertation reconstructs changes in Broadway culture wrought by the AIDS epidemic while critically examining consequent productions in relation to their social, political, and medical contexts. It addresses the following questions: How has Broadway theatre contributed to and been informed by contemporary audiences’ understanding of HIV/AIDS? How has the AIDS epidemic affected working conditions? How have the commercial constraints of Broadway affected representations of AIDS?

The first chapter documents the early presence of the virus off-stage. Including the history of the combined charity, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS (BC/EFA), it considers the effect of the crisis on the Broadway community.

Chapter two considers the place of Tony Kushner’s landmark Angels in America in the history of the Broadway “AIDS play” by examining two preceding Broadway plays and one that emerged from its shadow. William Hoffman’s As Is, Harvey Fierstein’s Safe Sex and Christopher Durang’s Sex and Longing have received far less critical attention than Angels but remain historically valuable for the ways in which they engage with other popular representations of the disease.

Chapter three concerns AIDS and the Broadway musical. It first addresses the early effect of the epidemic on musicals through analysis of documented audience perception of AIDS allegories. The social politics of overt depiction are considered before the chapter concludes with analysis of the emergence of musical “memorials” following a treatment breakthrough in 1996.

The final chapter offers a term for an alternative performance genre on Broadway: the “philanthroproduction,” a professionally produced, largely original theatrical event with artistic and ideological spines designed to raise money for charity. The chapter considers the evolution of Broadway Bares as its primary case study. Employing the donated resources of the Broadway theatre community to support BC/EFA, Broadway Bares was designed to reverse victim mentality by offering a celebration of the body through choreographed musical performance.

The substantial effect of AIDS on Broadway theatre remains undeniable. This study addresses a significant gap in its documentation while illuminating how theatre, in turn, has documented the social history of the American AIDS epidemic.