Broadway.com’s 25 Big Moments, Movements and Milestones of the Last 25 Years

When Broadway.com came on the scene 25 years ago, long-running hits like Les Misérables, The Phantom of the Opera and Miss Saigon were neighbors with new musicals like Aida, Contact and The Wild Party. So much has changed since then: on stage, backstage, in the world at large. And Broadway.com has witnessed it all. 

As Broadway.com marks its landmark 25th anniversary, we’ve been thinking about how much has changed onstage, in the audience and behind the scenes. From broader trends to era-defining productions, here are 25 game-changers from the last 25 years. They’re listed in no particular order because honestly, how could we rank them?

1. The Producers and the Power of Buzz
Remember when The Producers had a chokehold on Broadway? Audiences were scrambling for seats, Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick were the comedy power couple, and Mel Brooks somehow made a chorus line of swastikas funny. The show swept the 2001 Tonys with a record-breaking 12 wins. Hamilton came close with 16 nominations and 11 wins, but The Producers still holds the crown.

2. My Name is Alexander Hamilton
And speaking of Hamilton, the past 25 years has seen Lin-Manuel Miranda go from Wesleyan student shopping his bodega musical In the Heights to the winner of a Pulitzer Prize, five Grammys, three Tonys, two Primetime Emmys, and two Oliviers. Not to mention those two Oscar nominations. “This is not a moment, it’s the movement.” Can you even believe there was a world (and a Broadway.com) before LMM?

3. From Showstoppers to Soul-Searchers
In the ’80s and ’90s, Best Musical winners leaned big: Cats, Les Misérables, The Lion King. But starting in 2007 with Spring Awakening, Tony voters began favoring shows that felt more intimate and emotionally raw. Fun Home, The Band’s Visit, A Strange Loop, Kimberly Akimbo—these aren’t just musicals with heart, they’re musicals with wounds. Spectacle hasn’t disappeared, but in recent years, vulnerability has taken center stage.

4. The Saga of Spider-Man
Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark had its harrowing twists and turns: injured actors, lawsuits, Bono and the Edge trapped in neverending notes sessions. But the daily tally is what defined the first half of 2011 for many Broadway fans, with the show racking up 182 previews—a record (presumably) safe for many years to come. And yet, it also racked up a total of 1,066 performances—proving how recognizable IP mixed with some strategic marketing and big technical swings can turn a flop into a hit. It's a case study in Broadway's operations of the 21st century. 

5. Stephen Sondheim Revived 
Stephen Sondheim’s death in November 2021 marked the end of an era, but Broadway's Sond-aissance is still in full swing. Just in the past few years, we've seen a celebrated revival of Into the Woods, the first-ever hit production of Merrily We Roll Along, a lush Sweeney Todd, and now, a Gypsy featuring Audra McDonald as Broadway’s first Black Momma Rose. The past 25 years have turned Sondheim's ambitious projects into bona fide classics, which Broadway.com commemorated mid-pandemic with the unforgettable online concert Take Me to the World: A Sondheim 90th Birthday Celebration. Revisit the event if you want a warm hug from Old Friends. 

6. Broadway’s Comeback
After the events of September 11, 2001, Broadway became a pillar of New York’s emotional recovery. Musicals like Mamma Mia! and Thoroughly Modern Millie offered a joyful escape, while Urinetown bravely opened on September 20, 2001, embodying the city's resilience. Decades later, after the pandemic, Broadway declared once again that the city would heal through art, reopening its doors with an overwhelming sense of hope. In both moments of crisis, Broadway reminded us that no matter the challenge, the lights will always come back on.

7. Puppets Storm the Stage
Few productions made puppetry look more elegant than Julie Taymor's production of The Lion King. Since those zebras stampeded through the aisles in 1997, it's been puppets galore: from the raunchy city dwellers in Avenue Q (2003) to the graceful title character of War Horse (2011), to the gragantuan gorilla of King Kong (2018), to the menagerie of creatures in Life of Pi (2023). Whoever says puppets are for kids has never been to a Broadway show.  

8. Broadway Theaters Get Resurrected
While the 1980s took a wrecking ball to Broadway institutions, the millennium had the opposite effect. Famous den of iniquity Studio 54 became a Broadway theater in 1998 (inaugurated by Cabaret); the Selwyn Theatre was restored to its former glory in 2000 as the American Airlines (now the Todd Haimes); the Biltmore became MTC’s Samuel J. Friedman Theatre in 2008; Henry Miller’s Theatre (a ‘70s porn cinema that's now the Stephen Sondheim) was resurrected in 2009; and after several decades of being a hotel event space, the Hudson Theatre reopened in 2017. In a world where everyone says theater is dying, Broadway is proving them wrong with an ever-expanding footprint.

9. Broadway Blockbusters: The Next Generation
Pre-millennium, Broadway was dominated by the megamusical, with large-scale spectacles like Phantom of the Opera, Les Misérables, Miss Saigon and Cats defining the era. Since Y2K, however, the spotlight has shifted to a new breed of Broadway institution. Shows like Wicked (2003), The Book of Mormon (2011) and Hamilton (2015) redefined the modern blockbuster with contemporary music, sharp writing and cultural relevance. Meanwile, The Lion King, now in its 28th year, continues to reign as the leader of Disney's Broadway presence.

10. Put Another Dime in the Jukebox, Baby
Artists from Jimmy Buffett to Alanis Morissette have hung their hit catalogues on original storylines with varying degrees of zaniness. Shout-out to some of our favs from the past quarter-century: the ABBA-fueled success of Mamma Mia! (2001), Billy Joel's Movin' Out (2002), the Beach Boys' Good Vibrations (2005, featuring a fresh-faced Tituss Burgess), the Elvis Presley extravaganza All Shook Up (2005, featuring future Tony winner Nikki M. James) and the homage to '80s glam metal Rock of Ages (2009). Without them, we wouldn't have today's hits & Juliet and Moulin Rouge! 

11. A Life in Song
Not to be confused with the jukebox musical, "biomusicals" are your rags-to-riches artist stories. Some stick to simple titles: The Cher Show (Cher), Tina (Tina Turner), Summer (Donna Summer). Others get a little more creative Beautiful (Carole King), On Your Feet! (Gloria Estefan), Just in Time (Bobby Darin). But for this trend we have to thank the godfather of the form: the 2006 Tony-winning Best Musical about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, Jersey Boys. It proved the biomusical had legs both commercially and artistically, and we've seen them birth a hearty list of Tony winners: John Lloyd Young (Jersey Boys), Jessie Mueller (Beautiful), Stephanie J. Block (The Cher Show), Adrienne Warren (Tina), Myles Frost (MJ). And credit to Hugh Jackman, who got there early with The Boy From Oz in 2004.

12. Broadway Gets Real
Even Broadway felt the surge of reality TV in the mid-2000s. Who could forget the 2007 competition show Grease: You’re the One That I Want that launched Laura Osnes and Max Crumm (dubbed “Small-Town Sandy” and “Slacker Danny”); or the 2008 competition show Legally Blonde: The Musical: The Search for Elle Woods, which featured a pre-Tony Award Lena Hall (then Celina Carvajal). The Top Model method of Broadway casting didn’t stick around long, but the world of reality entertainment still has its place in the Broadway community. American Idol brought us stars like Justin Guarini (Wicked, Romeo and Juliet, Once Upon a One More Time), Tony nominee Constantine Maroulis (Rock of Ages) and Fantasia Barrino (The Color Purple). And of course, we have Bravo's Real Housewives franchise to thank for some of Chicago’s most legendary Roxie Harts.

13. The Movie Musical Returns
In 2002, Rob Marshall’s film adaptation of Chicago became the first musical to win the Academy Award for Best Picture since Oliver! in 1968, opening up a two-way channel between Broadway and Hollywood. Movies are musicals (Legally Blonde, Tootsie, Beetlejuice, Pretty Woman, School of Rock, Young Frankenstein), musicals are movies (Into the Woods, Les Misérables, Wicked) and movies are musicals are movies again (Hairspray, The Producers, Mean Girls).

14. Stage Cinematography and VFX
Think eye-popping visual effects are just a Hollywood thing? Broadway begs to differ. Long before Redwood, The Woman in White (2005) made innovative use of scenic projections, followed by similarly digital dazzlements in the 2008 revival of Sunday in the Park with George. Years later, the immersive designs of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (2014) and Dear Evan Hansen (2016) also drew on the technology. And long before this season's screen-driven spectaculars Sunset Boulevard and The Picture of Dorian Gray—even before Network (2018) and West Side Story (2020)—the set of American Idiot (2010) aimed to overwhelm audiences with an array of screens.

15. The Rise of the Pop-Star Broadway Composer
Broadway composers are flocking from the pop charts. Elton John brought his iconic Lion King score to Broadway in 1997, and a won a Tony for Aida three years later. It opened the door to so many more rock stars and singer-songwriters who've tried their hand at penning Broadway scores. Some big successes—Cyndi Lauper's Tony-winning score for Kinky Boots (2013) and Sara Bareilles' Tony-nominated score for Waitress (2016) topping the list. And don't count out the shorter runs but still Tony-nominated scores by Fountains of Wayne's Adam Schlesinger (Cry-Baby), Phish's Trey Anastasio (Hands on a Hardbody) and Edie Brickell (Bright Star). it’s been nonstop hitmakers on Broadway stages, and soon, we'll even have a Carly Rae Jepsen 10 Things I Hate About You musical on the boards. We don't hate it. At all. 

16. Double-Tap to Like
Since Broadway.com launched, the way fans connect with stars has shifted dramatically. From early features like The Rocky Horror Show casting contest and Ask a Star videos to backstage vlogs and MySpace dressing room clips, we saw digital fandom grow. Social media now gives audiences the power to elevate shows to Broadway or turn small productions into cult hits, forever changing how theater is consumed, marketed and discussed. From our vlogs to your TikToks, we've seen an evolution in how fans engage with their favorite stars. 

17. The Broadway Star Factory
Broadway.com was on the scene when Lea Michele and Jonathan Groff hard-launched their stage partnership on opening night of Spring Awakening. We handed over a vlog camera to a pre-Oscar-winning Ariana DeBose, who took us behind the scenes at Summer: The Donna Summer musical. We caught up with Wicked superstar Cynthia Erivo back when she was just a Fresh Face in The Color Purple. And before our eyes, Eddie Redmayne went from Broadway debut to Oscar-winning stardom. So many rockets were launched on New York stages, and Broadway.com is proud to say that we had a front-row seat.

18. For to Hottest of Hollywood, Broadway Is the Place to Be 
Broadway has long been a destination for the world’s biggest movie stars reconnecting (or connecting for the first time) with the smell of the greasepaint and the roar of the crowd. We'll never forget seeing Julia Roberts, Paul Rudd and an unknown Bradley Cooper share a stage in the 2006 revival of Three Days of Rain. And it’s only getting starrier and starrier. In the last few years, the Broadway stage has been graced by the biggest Hollywood stars of all, including Jessica Chastain, Robert Downey Jr., Kieran Culkin, treading the boards fresh off their Oscar wins. And then there are the movie stars who found Tony glory: Catherine Zeta-Jones (A Little Night Music ) and Scarlett Johansson (A View from the Bridge) both took home statues in 2010; Daniel Radcliffe, who made his Broadway debut in Equus in the middle of the Harry Potter craze, won a trophy for Merrily We Roll Along in 2024; and Bryan Cranston has nabbed two awards for both of his Broadway turns: All the Way (2014) and Network (2019). 

19. Broadway… on TV!
The Sound of Music (2013), Grease (2016), Jesus Christ Superstar (2018)… For a while there, it seemed like the live theatrical telecast event was here to stay. Alas, it was not. But just a few years later, Broadway accessibility reached new heights. A filmed capture of Hamilton was meant to hit movie theaters in 2021, but the global pandemic led to a change of plans: Instead, Hamilton arrived on Disney+ on July 3, 2020, bringing joy (and fun July 4th plans) to a record number of viewers. Broadway lovers have enjoyed even more shows from the comfort of their own homes since then, including Come From Away, Diana The Musical, American Utopia, Oh, Hello and Waitress. 

20. I Am My Own Orchestra
After the director John Doyle gave us Patti LuPone as Mrs. Lovett playing a tuba in his 2005 revival of Sweeney Todd, actor-instrumentalists became relatively commonplace on Broadway, turning up in Company (2006, also directed by Doyle), Once (2012), The Band’s Visit (2017) and Bandstand (2017). A high point of this trend occurred last year with the fictitious band from Stereophonic, whose ‘70s soft-rock sound was so convincing that they performed a live set at a Brooklyn venue.

21. Leading the Way with Representation and Inclusivity
West Side Story en español. A production of Spring Awakening featuring deaf, hard-of-hearing and hearing actors and musicians (courtesy of Deaf West, the company that also gifted Broadway its production of Big River). Ali Stroker becoming the first actor who uses a wheelchair to win a Tony Award. J. Harrison Ghee and Alex Newell becoming the first out nonbinary actors to win Tony Awards (both in 2023). Martyna Majok's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Cost of Living led by a pair of actors with disabilities. Right now, every show in every theater on 44th Street is led by a Black, Asian, Latino or multiracial star. There is always more that can be done, but Broadway continues to set an example in its efforts at diversity and inclusivity.

22. The Evolution of Andew Lloyd Webber
Since before Broadway.com was born, Andrew Lloyd Webber has been a constant force with The Phantom of the Opera, Cats and Evita anchoring his legacy. Recent reimaginings like off-Broadway's Cats: The Jellicle Ball and Sunset Boulevard, bold and experimental, demonstrate his flexibility. School of Rock added a comedic, energetic twist to his repertoire. His openness to reinterpretations proves his adaptability and enduring relevance.

23. American Drama for the 21st Century
In the past 25 years, Broadway has continued to embrace a taste for serious subjects with plays that tackle race, identity and family, proving there’s still a strong appetite for thought-provoking theater. Works like Topdog/Underdog, August: Osage County, Clybourne Park and Appropriate explore these complex themes, while Pulitzer winners like Lynn Nottage and Stephen Karam continue to push boundaries with their intimate yet socially relevant stories. This new wave of drama sits alongside the rise of jukebox musicals and baby boomer nostalgia, demonstrating that Broadway remains a space for both deep reflection and appropriate entertainment.

24. Broadway to Off-Broadway... and Vice Versa
Off-Broadway has long launched bold new work, but with the founding of the Off-Broadway complex New World Stages, it also became a home for Broadway shows to have second lives. Avenue Q made the full loop, starting off-Broadway, moving to Broadway, then returning after closing. Jersey Boys, Peter and the Starcatcher and The Play That Goes Wrong also made the leap. Meanwhile, Tony-winning shows like In the Heights, Spring Awakening, Hamilton, Proof, Hadestown, Doubt and more all began off-Broadway before transferring. This season, Oh, Mary!, JOB and Dead Outlaw. continue the tradition.

25. Wicked Defies...Everything
In one of the big surprises in the history of the Tony Awards, Avenue Q, a riotously self-aware Sesame Street spoof featuring rude puppets, bagged the 2004 Tony Award for Best Musical over the Stephen Schwartz-scored, female friendship-centering prequel to The Wizard of Oz. But the world would more than hold space for Wicked. In 2016, the show surpassed $1 billion in total Broadway revenue (to say nothing of revenue from international productions). In 2024, the first part of Jon M. Chu’s two-part blockbuster cinematic adaptation, starring Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, turned the franchise into a global, generation-defying phenomenon.