Act-1

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ORIGINS

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Chicago is a 1975 American musical with music by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb, and book by Ebb and Bob Fosse. Bob Fosse directed and choreographed the original production, and his style is strongly identified with the show.

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Set in Chicago in the Jazz Age, the musical is based on a 1926 play of the same title​ by Maurine Dallas Watkins​, about actual criminals and crimes on which she reported. Chicago Tribune​ reporter and playwright Maurine Dallas Watkins​ was assigned to cover the 1924 trials of accused murderers Beulah Annan and Belva Gaertner. In the early 1920s, Chicago's press and public became riveted by the subject of homicides committed by women. Several high-profile cases arose, which generally involved women killing their lovers or husbands. These cases were tried against a backdrop of changing views of women in the Jazz Age, and a long string of acquittals by Cook County juries of female murderers (juries at the time were all male, and convicted murderers generally faced death by hanging). A lore arose that, in Chicago, feminine or attractive women could not be convicted. The Chicago Tribune generally favored the prosecution's case, while still presenting the details of these women's lives. Its rivals at the Hearst papers were more pro-defendant, and employed what were derisively called "sob-sisters" – women reporters who focused on the plight, attractiveness, redemption, or grace of the female defendants. Regardless of stance, the press covered several of these women as celebrities.

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Annan, the model for the character of Roxie Hart, was 23 when she was accused of the 1924 murder of Harry Kalstedt​ (the basis for the Fred Casely character​). Her husband Albert Annan inspired the character Amos Hart. Albert was an auto mechanic who bankrupted himself to defend his wife, only for her to publicly dump him the day after she was acquitted. Velma Kelly is based on Gaertner, who was a cabaret singer and society divorcée. The body of Walter Law was discovered slumped over the steering wheel of Gaertner's abandoned car​ in 1924. Two police officers testified that they had seen a woman getting into the car and shortly thereafter heard gunshots. A bottle of gin and an automatic pistol were found on the floor of the car. Lawyers William Scott Stewart and W. W. O'Brien were models for a composite character in Chicago, Billy Flynn. Just days apart, separate juries at the Criminal Courts building acquitted both women.

Watkins' sensational columns documenting these trials proved so popular that she wrote a play based on them. The show received both good box-office sales and newspaper notices and was mounted on Broadway in 1926, running 172 performances. Cecil B. DeMille produced a silent film version, Chicago (1927)​. It was later remade as Roxie Hart (1942) starring Ginger Rogers, but in this version, Roxie was accused of murder without having really committed it, due to content restrictions on Hollywood films of the era.

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In the 1960s, Gwen Verdon read the play and asked her husband, Bob Fosse, about the possibility of creating a musical adaptation. Fosse approached playwright Watkins numerous times to buy the rights, but she repeatedly declined; Watkins may have regretted Annan and Gaertner's acquittals, and felt that her treatment of them should not be glamorized.​ Nonetheless, upon her death in 1969, her estate sold the rights to producer Richard Fryer, Verdon, and Fosse. John Kander and Fred Ebb began work on the musical score, modeling each number on a traditional vaudeville number or a vaudeville performer. This format made explicit the show's comparison between "justice​," "show business​," and contemporary society. 

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BROADWAY 

Chicago: A Musical Vaudeville opened ​in 1975 at the 46th Street Theatre​, and starred Chita Rivera as Velma Kelly, Gwen Verdon as Roxie Hart, Jerry Orbach as Billy Flynn, and Barney Martin as Amos Hart. ​ The musical received mixed reviews. The Brechtian style of the show, which frequently dropped the fourth wall, made audiences uncomfortable.​ The show opened the same year as Michael Bennett's highly successful A Chorus Line, which beat out Chicago in both ticket sales and at the Tony Awards​.The show was on the verge of closing when it ran into another setback: Verdon had to have surgery on nodes in her throat after inhaling a feather during the show's finale.​ The producers contemplated closing the show, but Liza Minnelli stepped in and offered to play the role of Roxie Hart in place of Verdon.​ Her run lasted slightly over a month,​ boosting the show's popularity, until Verdon recuperated and returned to the show. ​

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The 1996 Broadway revival production of Chicago was directed by Walter Bobbie with choreography "in the style of Bob Fosse" by Ann Reinking, who also ​p​layed Roxie Hart.​ Bebe Neuwirth ​was Velma Kelly, Joel Grey as Amos Hart and James Naughton as Billy Flynn.​ The show was well-received​.

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​The production tetain​ed the spare and minimalist style in costumes and set. The set design includes the presence of the band center stage in an evocation of a jury box, around and upon which the actors play some scenes. There are also chairs along the sides of this central piece, in which the actors at times sit or lounge, when not directly involved in the action. ​ Unlike the original production, the revival was met with praise from critics.

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On November 23, 2014, Chicago became the second longest-running Broadway show, surpassing Cats.

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Original Broadway Play: 1926

Silent Film: 1927

Original Film: 1942

Musical World premiere​:​ 1975 at the Forrest Theatre in Philadelphia.

Musical Original Broadway Production​:​ 1975​-1977 at the 46th Street Theatre

Musical Broadway ​Revival: 1996-present. The ongoing 1996 revival of Chicago is the longest-running show currently on Broadway. It is the second longest-running show ever to run on Broadway, behind only The Phantom of the Opera​, and holds the record as the longest-running musical revival and the longest-running American musical in Broadway history. 

Film Adaptation of the Musical: 2002. Won the Academy Award for Best Picture.