The play follows the story of Sal Paradise, a young man living with his Aunt in the post-WWII East Coast, whose curiosity and fateful meeting of Dean Moriarty, another young man from the West, will open and change his life, as it will ultimately open and change the cultural life of the Western world. On The Road is based on the book by Jack Kerouac. The novel, first created in a three-week act of writing in 1951, took six years to be published by Viking Press and in it, the protagonist, Sal, becomes the alter-ego of the author Jack Kerouac, whose life was equally changed by overnight fame upon publication of On The Road, only his second published book.

 

On The Road marks the first ever recorded stage adaptation of Jack Kerouac’s epoch-defining 1957 book. In it, Kerouac’s confessional, lyrical, and poetical prose is intact, as the text takes the audience through the non-stop story of Sal Paradise wandering across exhilarating late-1940s America in search of wild and true life, real belief, and the final cause pursued by bebop musicians and beat generation alike. This new adaptation presents this essential 20th Century American Classic onstage for the first time. On The Road is played by Andrew Nance, who “delivers a tour de force performance in this one-man show, capturing the essence of Kerouac’s stream-of-consciousness narrative”, and directed by Stella Abel, whose “minimalist staging becomes a powerful storytelling tool” (The Reviews Hub). Stella Abel previously adapted Psyche by the Hungarian 20th Century author Sandor Weores, The Broadcast Studios’ previous production, which will play at The Rehearsal For Truth Festival in New York, and Voices International, JCTC in New Jersey, in 2025.

 

The Broadcast Studios production team are an internationally-minded group of artists committed to traditional disciplined theatre practice, and traditional limitless artistic choice. For Jack Kerouac fans, and UK audiences interested in the history of America, and a watershed moment for literature, culture, and spirituality, On The Road invites you to feel the ecstasy of 1940’s jazz America lived over seven years, written in twenty-one days, and performed in seventy minutes.