Hot Spot (musical)

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Hot Spot is a musical with book by Jack Weinstock and Willie Gilbert, lyrics by Martin Charnin, and music by Mary Rodgers. Additional lyrics and music by Stephen Sondheim. It ran at the Majestic Theater in April and May, 1963.

The cast starred Judy Holliday and included Conrad Bain, Joe Bova, Joseph Campanella, Mary Louise Wilson, Carmen De Lavallade, and George Furth.

One of Broadway's "fabulous flops", it previewed for 58 performances (a record: the show cancelled its opening four times) and ran for 43. It marked Judy Holliday's final stage performance (she had been quoted as saying "You can only live through one or two Hot Spots in your life."

At least five directors worked on the show (Morton Da Costa, Martin Charnin, Robert Fryer, Richard Quine, Arthur Laurents, Herbert Ross); Stephen Sondheim was brought in on the creative team, resulting in the show's opening and closing number, "Don't Laugh".

The show was inspired by the furor which erupted over comments made by a Peace Corps volunteer, Marjorie Michelmore, on a postcard she had written in Nigeria on 13 October 1961, describing the primitive living conditions there. Nigerians were indignant, and some accused the volunteers of being American spies. This led to the first public relations crisis for the Peace Corps.

Marjorie Michelmore was fictionalized as Peace Corps hygeiene teacher "Sally Hopwinder" stationed in a fictional nation, "D'hum" with decent living conditions. She concocts a plan to obtain U.S. aid for D'hum by convincing the Pentagon that Russia is about to invade it.