Maybe Happy Ending on Broadway Tickets

By: Will Aronson and Hue Park
Songs by: Will Aronson (music) and Hue Park (lyrics)
Director: Michael Arden
Cast list: Darren Criss (as Oliver), Helen J. Shen (as Claire), Dez Duron (as Gil Brentley)
Sets: Dane Laffrey Costumes: Clint Ramos
Lighting: Ben Stanton Sound: Peter Hylenski
Other info: Video design by George Reeve and Dane Laffrey, music supervision by Deborah Abramson, music direction by John Yun

Oliver (Darren Criss) lives a tidy and quiet life in Seoul. He’s got his jazz records and beloved plant to keep him company, and what else is there to do, especially when you’re just a HelperBot 3, a robot that has been discontinued and considered obsolete?

Soon, however, his world will be turned upside down. A neighbor HelperBot named Claire (Helen J Shen) asks to borrow Oliver’s charger, igniting a unique friendship, a surprising adventure, and maybe even something like love. Maybe Happy Ending won the Richard Rodgers Award and is an offbeat and compelling story of two outcasts near the end of their warranty who get a new lease on life. Even robots can be swept off their feet, and audiences will be too: with a dazzling scenic design, moving book, and infectious songs, Maybe Happy Ending is a fresh, original musical about how connection batteries our life. Prepare to be charged to the max.

What to watch for

• Audiences may know of Darren Criss’s credits, given his renowned turn on Glee and on the New York stages in Little Shop of Horrors and Hedwig and the Angry Inch, but Helen J Shen is a star in her own right and has had a hang-up year appearing in new musicals including Teeth and The Lonely Few off Broadway.
• Criss said he has long wanted to work with director “Michael Arden, a visionary I’ve been wanting to work with for longer than I care to admit,” he said in a press statement. “I can’t wait for audiences to take part in this wonderfully original theatrical experience.”
• Maybe Happy Ending will also feature Dez Duron (The Voice), who makes his Broadway debut along with Shen.
• Reviews for the Alliance production were glowing; Broadway World noted the show is “marvelous…the story is interesting and beautifully realized, and it’ll leave you both eager and afraid to access your own relationship to love.”