Critical Reaction

"On the face of it, few historical incidents seem more unlikely to spawn a Broadway musical than that solemn moment in the history of mankind, the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Yet, 1776, which opened last night at the 46th Street Theater, most handsomely demonstrated that people who merely go on the face of it are occasionally outrageously wrong. Come to think of it, that was also what the Declaration of Independence demonstrated, so there is a ready precedent at hand. 1776, which I saw at one of its critics' previews on Saturday afternoon, is a most striking, most gripping musical. I recommend it without reservation. It makes even an Englishman's heart beat a little bit faster. This is a musical with style, humanity, wit and passion. The credit for the idea of the musical belongs to Sherman Edwards, who has also contributed the music and lyrics. The book is by Peter Stone, best known as a Hollywood screenwriter. The two of them have done a fine job. The authors have really captured the Spirit of '76. The characterizations are most unusually full for a musical, and even though the outcome is never in any very serious doubt, 1776 is consistently exciting and entertaining, for Mr. Stone's book is literate, urbane and, on occasion, very amusing. The music is absolutely modern in its sound, and it is apt, convincing and enjoyable."
– Clive Barnes, The New York Times, March 17, 1969  

"A magnificently staged and stunningly original musical was presented last evening at the 46th St. Theater. It is far, far off the Broadway path and far away in time. Its simple title is 1776 and its story concerns the writing of our Declaration of Independence. This is by no means a historical tract or a sermon on the birth of this nation. It is warm with life of its own; it is funny, it is moving. It plays without intermission, because an intermission would break its spell. It is an artistic creation such as we do not often find in our theater. Often, as I sat enchanted in my seat, it reminded me of Gilbert and Sullivan in its amused regard of human frailties; again, in its music, it struck me as a new opera. And the men who, after months of debate-some of it silly and petty-finally put their John Hancocks on our Document became miraculously human. The author of music and lyrics is Sherman Edwards, a onetime history professor who became a popular song writer. Edwards has worked on his conception for a decade, and now Peter Stone, known mostly as a scenarist, has made this idea into a libretto which works perfectly on a musical stage."
– John Chapman, Daily News, March 17, 1969  

"The United States has become the well-spring of successful musical comedies of the English-speaking world in the past quarter century, but no one had written about that most American of events, the signing of the Declaration of Independence. This omission has now been corrected with the appearance at the Forty-Sixth Street Theater of 1776 (that's all there is to the title), presented by Stuart Ostrow with music and lyrics by Sherman Edwards and book by Peter Stone. We now really have our own thing in a musical, and it is pleasant to report that it is first-rate both as musical entertainment and as a semi-documentary. It is absorbing and exciting, and if history has been manipulated a bit here and there for dramatic purposes, the character of the men and the events of those remarkable months in Philadelphia come through admirably."
– Richard P. Cooke, The Wall Street Journal, March 18, 1969  

"In this cynical age, it required courage as well as enterprise to do a musical play that simply deals with the events leading up to the signing of the Declaration of Independence. And 1776, which opened last night at the 46th St. Theater, makes no attempt to be satirical or wander off into modern by-paths. But the rewards of the confidence reposed in the bold conception were abundant. The result is a brilliant and remarkably moving work of theatrical art. 1776 has no plot in a conventional sense, and it makes no attempt to romanticize the Founding Fathers. It shows the delegates to the Continental Congress who met in Philadelphia that hot summer as a group of highly fallible, quarrelsome and sometimes pig-headed men, who dawdled away their days in bickerings and doubts, much to the indignation of John Adams, who wanted to get ahead with the business in hand. Yet they did somehow arise to the greatness of the momentous occasion. The attractive song numbers by Sherman Edwards are imaginatively brought in, Peter Stone's book is always skillful, and it handles the lighter moments, such as the brief romantic interludes for Jefferson and Adams, with sense and deftness. 1776 is a most exhilarating accomplishment."
– Richard Watts, New York Post, March 17, 1969