Man of La Mancha

Man of La Mancha, by Dale Wasserman, Joe Darion, and Mitch Leigh, took the world of musical theater by storm when it premiered in 1965. This story of Miguel de Cervantes and his comic knight, Don Quixote, won five Tony Awards as well as the Drama Critics Circle Award, the Outer Critics Circle Award, the Variety Drama Critics Award, and the Saturday Review Award. The original production ran for over 2,000 performances and remains popular today. In this musical, Cervantes is in prison in late 16th-century Spain and must save his draft manuscript of Don Quixote from burning by putting on an impromptu performance of what will become his masterpiece. The resulting performance becomes a robust, emotional defense of idealism and imagination in the face of the suffering and degradation that the world inflicts.

This guide uses the 2002 reprinting of the 1966 book for the musical published by Random House Trade Paperbacks. The separation into musical numbers and analysis related to the music utilizes the 1965 vocal score published by Cherry Lane Music Company.

Content Warning: This play romanticizes mental health conditions and uses terminology that reinforces the stigma around them. The play also contains a scene of violence against a woman.