The Dramatic True Story of the World’s Most Famous Obscure Band

The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World

As part of the New York Musical Theatre Festival

Los Angeles Times Critics’ Choice
“Joy Gregory and Gunnar Madsen’s terrific new musical captures the damaged, resilient voices of these New Hampshire teen girls, forced to become a rock band. It’s a birth-of-a-band back-stager with unsettling overtones of abuse and small-town horror – ‘School of Rock’ as conceived by David Lynch.”

LA Stage Alliance Ovation Awards
WORLD PREMIERE MUSICAL

2003 Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards
MUSICAL SCORE
BEST PRODUCTION Nominee

The 25th Annual LA Weekly Theater Awards
MUSICAL OF THE YEAR

2003 Backstage West Awards
BEST DIRECTION OF A MUSICAL

Taking place between 1969 and 1973,The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World is an earnest look at one of the oddest and most unlikely bands to achieve rock cult status. Forced by a demanding father, the three very awkward sisters of the Wiggin family of Fremont, New Hampshire were prepped to play in a band based on a prophecy laid out by their grandmother. Taken out of school and away from all outside influences, the Wiggin family patriarch pushed the girls to practice non-stop until he thought they were ready to record an album and perform concerts. They were not. They never were, but they did, and this wholly original musical chronicles their beginnings while incorporating songs influenced by The Shaggs’ canon, as well as a re-imagining of their “hit single” Philosophy of the World.