Productions1 on Broadway
| 1954 | Mark Hellinger Theatre Original. December 2, 1954 · Charles W. Christenberry Jr., and Byrle Cass | 4 performances |
Every Broadway staging held in broadway-data, sourced to IBDB. West End runs are not yet held.
Licensing not confirmed
| Rights | — We have not been able to confirm the publisher. |
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In the literature23 passages
Most shows were lighhearted in nature, and it’s notable the critics often used such words as carnival, jubilee, fandango, hoedown, haymaker, and festival to describe not just a particular song or dance sequence but also to characterize their take-away, overall impressions of the musicals they reviewed. But if fun was t… book:complete-book-of-1950s-broadway-musicals-the-dan-dietz#p2
And six book musicals weren’t for the record: it appears that Happy as Larry, The Liar, Jotham Valley, Hit the Trail, Portofino, and Happy Town went commercially unrecorded. book:complete-book-of-1950s-broadway-musicals-the-dan-dietz#p5
The Broadway dancer was seen in a number of the era’s musicals, including the notorious Buttrio Square and Hit the Trail, and in 1968 made his mark as the author of the book Your Own Thing, which won the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Musical of the 1967–1968 season and played for 933 performances. book:complete-book-of-1950s-broadway-musicals-the-dan-dietz#p154
When it comes to the hallowed flops of the 1950s, Buttrio Square is spoken of in the same hushed and solemn tones as Hit the Trail and Portofino. book:complete-book-of-1950s-broadway-musicals-the-dan-dietz#p282
Hit the Trail quickly found its special niche in the history of Broadway musicals because critics and connoisseurs of really bad musicals realized that here was one for the record books. It may not quite have matched the deliriously demented Hairpin Harmony (1943), but it certainly rivaled The Duchess Misbehaves (1946)… book:complete-book-of-1950s-broadway-musicals-the-dan-dietz#p430
He also mentioned that after this scene, there was no stopping My Fair Lady , even if the authors of Buttrio Square , Hit the Trail , and Carnival in Flanders had been invited to “work over” the second act. book:complete-book-of-1950s-broadway-musicals-the-dan-dietz#p524
Passages naming this show, found by keyword across 178 books. Where this show turns up in the literature, not curated trivia about it.