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Forbidden Broadway is a parody revue show written and directed by Gerard Alessandrini that ran off-Broadway from 1982 to 2009. The early incarnations of the show spoofed musicals from the Golden Age and iconic performers like Ethel Merman and Carol Channing, but the format was quickly adapted to Pastiche works in the current Broadway season. As the revue gained reputation, it became a point of honor in the theatre community to have one's work parodied by Forbidden Broadway.
Forbidden Broadway is typically performed by a cast of two men and two women, with piano accompaniment. The show closed in 2009, although Alessandrini has not ruled out returning for the occasional special edition.
- Affectionate Parody
- Better Than a Bare Bulb: As always, but in particular the act of hanging a lampshade on the lampshading in "The Song That Goes Like This" from Spamalot.
- City Shout Outs: In "Ambition", there's a line that on the cast album that goes, "But here in our little village of Manhattan, there are over 50,000 actors, all trying their best not to end up in Baltimore." When on tour, "Baltimore" usually gets changed to the town they are in.
- Musical Pastiche
- Painted-On Pants: The Rent parody includes a song called "Ouch, They're Tight!"
- Sincerest Form of Flattery: The real Carol Channing appears on Volume 3 to get a little advice on her Carol Channing impersonation.
- Spin-Off: Forbidden Hollywood in The Nineties and Forbidden Vegas at the Turn of the Millennium.
- Strange Syntax Speaker: Mag in "How Are Things In Irish Drama?", the parody of Martin McDonagh's The Beauty Queen of Leenan.
- Suspiciously Similar Song: Alessandrini has occasionally written ersatz versions of songs he couldn't get permission to parody.
- That's All Folks: Every version of the show has ended with one of these, some longer than others.
- Truck Driver's Gear Change: Inverted in "I Couldn't Hit The Note". Spoofing how Julie Andrews can't hit high notes anymore, the song keeps modulating down. This became Harsher in Hindsight when Forbidden Broadway continued to perform the number after Andrews lost most of her range in a botched throat surgery.