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What if the best musical trivia isn’t trivia at all, but a map to why stories outlive us? We bring Professor and Theatre History and Mysteries host Dr John Bruschke into the studio to trace the hidden corridors between myth, history, and the show tunes stuck in our heads. From a British military escort for the silent Phantom film to real bones beneath the Paris Opera House, John unpacks how scandal and serendipity shaped the legends behind the lights and why audiences keep coming back.

We dig into the craft of adaptation where “accuracy” isn’t a scoreboard but a set of choices. Jesus Christ Superstar becomes a masterclass here: four Gospels, four angles on Judas, and room for a rock opera to find a human centre without flattening the source. John shows how the strongest retellings earn relevance by aiming at core truths of loyalty, doubt and mercy while accepting that history is rarely a single-thread narrative. The result is permission for theatre to be bold, and a reminder that care with sources is an act of respect, not restraint.

The conversation stretches from Cats and T. S. Eliot’s occult footprints to Man of La Mancha’s hard-won wisdom through Cervantes’ failures, then forward to Hadestown, where Greek myth’s many versions mirror our present anxieties about power and climate. We also talk method: how debate forged research helps translate dense scholarship into stories listeners can actually feel, and how a debate kid became a playwright-producer shepherding a new musical with his family.

If you love musicals, crave the backstory, or just want sharper lenses for art and life, this one’s for you. Hit play, then tell us: which musical taught you something you still live by? And if this conversation resonates, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a quick review it helps more curious people find us.

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