In honor of Women’s History Month, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts welcomes theater historian, author, and producer Jennifer Ashley Tepper (Creative and Programming Director, 54 Below) to the Bruno Walter Auditorium on Monday, March 31, from 6-7:30 pm, to celebrate her recently released book Women Writing Musicals: The Legacy that the History Books Left Out (Applause Theatre & Cinema Books, November 2024) – the premiere publication about female musical theater writers, offering an inside look at more than 300 women from Tin Pan Alley to the present, many of whose works are included in The New York Public Library collections.
Tepper’s entertaining and enlightening presentation will feature discussions of behind-the-scenes photos and stories, gleaned from her many years of research, about such acclaimed Broadway writers as Betty Comden (her hits include On the Town, Singin’ in the Rain, The Will Rogers Follies), Jeanine Tesori (Caroline, or Change, Fun Home, Kimberly Akimbo), Dolly Parton (9 to 5: The Musical), and Sara Bareilles (Waitress), as well as some lesser-known creative forces like Micki Grant – the first woman ever to write the book, music, and lyrics for a Broadway musical (Don’t Bother Me, I Can’t Cope, considering the Black experience).
Joining Tepper will be Broadway stars Badia Farha (Hell’s Kitchen, School of Rock) and Alyse Alan Louis (Mamma Mia!, Off-Broadway’s TEETH), accompanied on keys by pianist Ruiran Xun (music assistant for The Jonathan Larson Project, conceived by Tepper and now playing Off-Broadway at the Orpheum), sharing performances of some memorable songs written by women for stage musicals and bringing them to life from a female perspective.
The program is free and open to the public; registration is requested. Check-in line forms 45 minutes before the start time; registered guests are given priority check-in 15-30 minutes in advance of the start of the event. If registration is sold out or has ended, you can wait in the standby line, which forms 45 minutes before the advertised start time; all remaining seats are released five minutes before the program begins. ASL interpretation and real-time (CART) captioning are available upon request. Please submit your request at least two weeks in advance by emailing accessibility@nypl.org.
Jennifer Ashey Tepper: Women Writing Musicals takes place on Monday, March 31, 2025, 6-7:30 pm, at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Bruno Walter Auditorium, 111 Amsterdam Avenue, between West 64th and 65th Street, NYC. The program is free; to reserve your tickets, go online.
