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Floyd Collins (musical)
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Floyd Collins (musical)
Floyd Collins is a musical with music and lyrics by Adam Guettel, and book by Tina Landau. The musical is a dramatization of the death of American cave explorer, Floyd Collins near Cave City, Kentucky in the winter of 1925.
The musical opened Off-Broadway on February 9, 1996, where it ran for 25 performances. There have been subsequent London productions as well as regional U.S. productions.The show made its Broadway premiere in 2025 at the Vivian Beaumont Theater as part of Lincoln Center Theatre's 2024–25 season.
The musical tells the story of Floyd Collins during the Kentucky Cave Wars, a period where poor landowners in Kentucky were exploiting the caves found on their land in an attempt to draw business and tourism to the area that was later taken by the federal government to create Mammoth Cave National Park. The show opens with a prologue, "The Ballad of Floyd Collins," in which those close to Floyd introduce the audience to the setting and the character.
On a brisk January day, Floyd enters Sand Cave, a cave on his neighbor's property, hopeful that he will find a cavern large enough to develop into a tourist attraction and turn his family’s fortunes around ("The Call"). He expertly navigates narrow and difficult passages, using his voice and its echo to determine where to go next. Eventually, he does come upon such a cavern. Overjoyed, he yodels into the space, harmonizing with his own echo—but since the cavern is too large for his lantern to illuminate fully, he can only speculate about the wonders it holds ("It Moves").
Floyd begins to make his way out of the cavern, excited to tell everyone what he has found and work on making it accessible to the public ("Time to Go"). But as he heads out headfirst, a rock falls on his foot, trapping him inside a tunnel so narrow that he cannot even move his arms, let alone shift the rock. He calls for help, but is too far below ground for anyone to hear.
The next day, a trio of locals—Bee Doyle, on whose land Floyd has been exploring; Ed Bishop, a fellow caver; and Jewell Estes, a local teenager—find Floyd's jacket outside Sand Cave. They speculate that Floyd must have found something big down there. And if Floyd's gotten himself stuck? Well, it will probably turn out fine. After all, each of the three other men has been in equally tough situations and survived ("'Tween a Rock and a Hard Place").
When the Collins family learns that Floyd is trapped, Floyd's father Lee is certain it is only a matter of someone being able to get down there and help him. As the men try to strategize, Miss Jane (Lee's wife and Floyd's stepmother) confides to Nellie (Floyd's sister) that Floyd recently told her about a dream he had about being trapped. Nellie, who has recently returned home from a mental asylum and who has a special connection with Floyd, tells Miss Jane that Floyd's gotten out of worse scrapes than this, and they should not worry ("Lucky").
In some versions: Floyd's family and fellow cavers discuss Floyd's love of exploring and the dangers involved ("Where A Man Belongs"). When this song is used, it replaces "'Tween a Rock and a Hard Place".
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Floyd Collins (musical)
Floyd Collins is a musical with music and lyrics by Adam Guettel, and book by Tina Landau. The musical is a dramatization of the death of American cave explorer, Floyd Collins near Cave City, Kentucky in the winter of 1925.
The musical opened Off-Broadway on February 9, 1996, where it ran for 25 performances. There have been subsequent London productions as well as regional U.S. productions.The show made its Broadway premiere in 2025 at the Vivian Beaumont Theater as part of Lincoln Center Theatre's 2024–25 season.
The musical tells the story of Floyd Collins during the Kentucky Cave Wars, a period where poor landowners in Kentucky were exploiting the caves found on their land in an attempt to draw business and tourism to the area that was later taken by the federal government to create Mammoth Cave National Park. The show opens with a prologue, "The Ballad of Floyd Collins," in which those close to Floyd introduce the audience to the setting and the character.
On a brisk January day, Floyd enters Sand Cave, a cave on his neighbor's property, hopeful that he will find a cavern large enough to develop into a tourist attraction and turn his family’s fortunes around ("The Call"). He expertly navigates narrow and difficult passages, using his voice and its echo to determine where to go next. Eventually, he does come upon such a cavern. Overjoyed, he yodels into the space, harmonizing with his own echo—but since the cavern is too large for his lantern to illuminate fully, he can only speculate about the wonders it holds ("It Moves").
Floyd begins to make his way out of the cavern, excited to tell everyone what he has found and work on making it accessible to the public ("Time to Go"). But as he heads out headfirst, a rock falls on his foot, trapping him inside a tunnel so narrow that he cannot even move his arms, let alone shift the rock. He calls for help, but is too far below ground for anyone to hear.
The next day, a trio of locals—Bee Doyle, on whose land Floyd has been exploring; Ed Bishop, a fellow caver; and Jewell Estes, a local teenager—find Floyd's jacket outside Sand Cave. They speculate that Floyd must have found something big down there. And if Floyd's gotten himself stuck? Well, it will probably turn out fine. After all, each of the three other men has been in equally tough situations and survived ("'Tween a Rock and a Hard Place").
When the Collins family learns that Floyd is trapped, Floyd's father Lee is certain it is only a matter of someone being able to get down there and help him. As the men try to strategize, Miss Jane (Lee's wife and Floyd's stepmother) confides to Nellie (Floyd's sister) that Floyd recently told her about a dream he had about being trapped. Nellie, who has recently returned home from a mental asylum and who has a special connection with Floyd, tells Miss Jane that Floyd's gotten out of worse scrapes than this, and they should not worry ("Lucky").
In some versions: Floyd's family and fellow cavers discuss Floyd's love of exploring and the dangers involved ("Where A Man Belongs"). When this song is used, it replaces "'Tween a Rock and a Hard Place".