Something Rotten! (Original Broadway Cast Recording)

Showstopper follows hard upon showstopper in Wayne and Karey Kirkpatrick's endlessly witty and boisterous Broadway hit about the "invention" of musical theater during the Renaissance. "Welcome to the Renaissance" and "The Black Death" are Monty Python-esque history lessons delivered with sassy glee; a surly Shakespeare (Christian Borle) rocks out to his sonnets in "Will Power"; and "A Musical"—"a puffy piece releasing all your bluesicals"—looks ahead to theater's giddy Broadway future. "To Thine Own Self" supplies a whistle-worthy moral to the story.