“Big, Black, and queer-ass American Broadway”—welcome to the world of A Strange Loop, the season’s most critically acclaimed—and often surprising—musical.

A Strange Loop is a musical about a theater usher (named Usher) writing a musical about a theater usher, conceived and written by a former theater usher. Michael R. Jackson’s script and score borrow from and fictionalize moments of his own life to create a story centered on a 20-something-year-old protagonist and a chorus of personified Thoughts that represent his “daily self-loathing,” his parents, and even Harriet Tubman at one point.

Though A Strange Loop leads the Tony Awards with 11 nominations, it isn’t an obvious hit: it’s one of the few entirely original productions of the Broadway season, lacking any familiar intellectual property that would easily attract tourists.

Additionally, the show is often graphic and deeply, painfully intimate. There are sharp exchanges with Usher’s parents, who try to dissuade him from his long-established “homosexuality,” and a sexual encounter during which Usher’s partner demeans him using racist language and roleplay.

CNN spoke with director Stephen Brackett, who has been involved with the show for a decade since its early development stages. Brackett was nominated for a Tony for Best Director, while Jackson was nominated for Best Score and Best Book. The show’s star, Jaquel Spivey, a recent college graduate making his Broadway debut, is also nominated. Many awards prognosticators expect the show to do exceptionally well on Sunday.

During the years when the show was being workshopped and refined into the 100-minute revelation it is today, the team behind A Strange Loop didn’t anticipate it would become a hit—if it even got produced. Now, it’s a Pulitzer Prize winner and Tony nominee for Best Musical. Here’s how A Strange Loop evolved from a complex idea to a Broadway sensation.

From Michael R. Jackson’s Imagination to the Broadway Stage

The journey of A Strange Loop to Broadway has been long and winding, though not precisely a loop. Versions of the musical had been in Jackson’s mind since his 20s, and Brackett has been its director for the last decade. From workshops and concert performances to its off-Broadway debut, Pulitzer Prize for Drama win in 2020, and Broadway run, “the DNA of the piece has always remained the same,” Brackett said.

The show has always been centered on Usher, but it took years to determine the final shape of the musical. Jackson and Brackett eventually settled on the noisy “gospel play” segment as the climax of Usher’s insecurities and complex personal history came to light. This segment offers a biting critique of Tyler Perry’s works, which have been criticized for stereotypical portrayals of Black women and gay Black characters (Perry is referenced repeatedly throughout the production).

The show’s other characters are portrayed by Usher’s six Thoughts, who play every other role to flesh out his life. Though they are all aspects of Usher himself, they often appear to be at odds with him, participating in painful scenes involving his parents’ use of homophobic slurs or fictional manifestations of Usher’s profound insecurities.

Numerous moments in A Strange Loop will shock audiences, move them to tears, or remind them of forgotten memories. Many have likely never seen a racially charged sexual act on stage in a musical playing just down the street from the family-friendly hit The Lion King. Yet, Brackett said, the provocative elements of the play serve a purpose: to tell an honest, original story that has never before reached Broadway.

“We’re reaching out to the audience as much as possible so that people can see versions of their own lives onstage,” Brackett explained.

Influences ranging from bell hooks to Sondheim

A Strange Loop’s influences are diverse, spanning from Liz Phair’s indie anthems to the writings of Black feminist bell hooks and scholar Douglas Hofstadter, who authored a book on “strange loops” of self-perception. The musical also takes jabs at Broadway staples like Hamilton, The Lion King, and Wicked.

Despite its unique subject matter, Brackett views many of the musical numbers as homages to classic musical theater. Usher doesn’t have the manufactured confidence of a Harold Hill, nor is his suffering as grand as the Phantom’s. Though some critics are quick to label the show “avant-garde” due to its concept, Brackett said it often looks and sounds like a traditional musical—minus the lyrics about gay sex.

“One of the things Michael and I share is a great love of the tradition of musical storytelling,” Brackett said. “When I think of this piece, I think of a classic hero’s journey. There’s something almost Greek about it to me.”

Brackett sees in the show elements reminiscent of Stephen Sondheim’s Company, an episodic musical with a large ensemble typically anchored by one compelling, lonely male performance, as well as the works of William Finn, composer of the witty, winsome The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and Falsettos. (Unlike those shows, however, all the performers in A Strange Loop are Black. Brackett noted that choreographer Raja Feather Kelly ensured the show’s movements “explode with Blackness and queerness” at every turn.) The shows above are also staged similarly, with small casts and lyrically dense songs that reveal a character’s interiority to empathetic audiences.

In A Strange Loop, Usher’s solo number near the end is “Memory Song,” in which he recalls sneaking cupcakes in the high school gym and watching The Young and the Restless, as well as being “the one lone Black gay boy [he] knew who chose to turn his back on the Lord.” A meditation on his youth and the man he is becoming, the song is much quieter than Act II showstoppers like “Rose’s Turn.” Yet, this 11 o’clock number provides its protagonist with the exact moment of clarity to conclude the show.

“I’m so excited for those moments onstage that are the simplest, where the audience feels a real connection to Usher and understands what he’s thinking and feeling,” Brackett said.

A Personal Story with Universal Resonance

Brackett believes that something in Usher’s story resonates with every audience member, even though his experience is highly specific.

“Everyone knows what it feels like to be misunderstood, to feel trapped, to be working against something that seems to be against them,” he said.

Brackett noted that the specificity of Usher’s character is intentional. Dressed in a green plaid flannel and a bell hooks tee, Usher shares vivid memories of family disputes and painful sexual experiences, coming to life through these details.

“The moment you start to generalize, it starts to feel a little inauthentic,” he said. “We go to the theater to see humanity onstage—to see life reflected.”

Brackett shared that he hears from audience members who connect with aspects of Usher’s journey after every show, whether it’s his complex family relationships, overwhelming self-loathing, or being stuck in a low-paying job. At the same time, his life’s work remains unfulfilled.

“It was essential to us that this show is about a young, gay, overweight Black man,” he said. “It’s peculiar to that identity, but we also wanted it to have a universal appeal.”

Its Success Shows That ‘Big, Black, Queer-Ass’ Musicals Can Thrive on Broadway

While it may now seem inevitable that the Pulitzer Prize winner would transfer to Broadway after receiving rave reviews, Brackett said the musical’s creative team once wondered if A Strange Loop was “too out there, too extreme” to find a home on stage.

Winning the Pulitzer during the pandemic “opened up this new door of possibility for us,” he said. After a successful run in Washington, DC, in 2021, the show announced its much-anticipated Broadway transfer.

Brackett said Jackson continued to refine the script until the Broadway opening in April, honing a work that had already earned one of the highest honors in the arts.

No Broadway production is guaranteed success, even one based on a beloved film (consider this season’s musical adaptation of Mrs. Doubtfire, which closed shortly after it opened). Original works can be even more challenging to produce and market. Still, Brackett believes that the success of A Strange Loop demonstrates that “audiences are eager to be challenged and also to be rewarded.”

Fans of the show will find out on Sunday whether the Broadway League and American Theatre Wing will recognize this “big, Black, and queer-ass” musical when the Tony Awards air on CBS.