Dramaturgical Resources
2025
Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812
By Dave Malloy
Over the course of the season, our assistant directors and student dramaturgs will be compiling dramaturgical resources relating to each production as it develops. Below are some links to websites which relate to the history of the play, the biography of the playwright, and sites that contextualize and, we hope, shed light on the directorial approach to the dramatic material.
We hope you find these resources of interest.
Dave Malloy (b. 1976)
Dave Malloy is a New York-based American composer, performer, and playwright. He was born on January 4, 1976 in Cleveland, Ohio. Malloy spent his college years at Ohio University, studying Music Composition and English Literature. Natasha, Pierre and The Great Comet of 1812 is one of Malloy's most well-known works. It received numerous awards and nominations, including two 2017 Tony Awards for Best Scenic Design in a Musical and Best Lighting Design in a Musical for the original Broadway production, while being nominated for a total 12 categories--the highest number of nominations in the season.
Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 is a musical adaptation of a 70-page segment from the great Russian novel, War and Peace (Volume II, Part V), written by Leo Tolstoy in 1869. The segment explores a young, impressionable and vivacious young woman, Natasha and her secret romance with Anatole--a well-born, seductive hedonist--and an older, wealthy man, Pierre’s search for the meaning of life. Originally, the musical ran at an Off-Broadway theatre in the Hell’s Kitchen neighbourhood, Ars Nova, in 2012. A critical and commercial success, the musical ran in New York's Meatpacking District and the Theater District of Manhattan in 2012, and even had a Spanish-language adaptation in 2014 in Quito, Ecuador. Finally, The Great Comet premiered on Broadway in 2016 at the Imperial Theatre. Once the show was taken to Broadway, Denée Benton and Josh Groban made their Broadway debuts in the roles of Natasha and Pierre.
The score, written and orchestrated by Malloy, merges Russian folk and classical music with indie rock and EDM influences. The piece, described by Malloy as an "electropop opera," consists of 27 songs and is sung-through, with just one line of spoken dialogue coming in Pierre and Natasha's only scene together. The number of musical numbers varies depending on the need for a specific production and resources available. For example, an aria for Natasha, "Natasha Lost", was cut during the Broadway production but is included on the original cast recording between number 8 ("Natasha & Anatole") and number 9 ("The Duel"). It could be suggested that the reason for this is the addition of “Dust and Ashes” for the Broadway version of the show, which resulted in Act 1 being noticeably longer. In 2020, Dave Malloy also released a solo for Pierre titled “Epilogue”, which was not a part of the original musical.
Additionally, nearly all of the actors on stage play musical instruments augmenting the show's orchestra.