Speakeasy: A New Musical
A Queer, Jazz-Infused Broadway Tale of Love, Defiance, and Dangerous Secrets
A bold, Broadway-ready musical set in a 1920s underground Queer club where love is forbidden, identities are hidden, and the music never stops.
Big band sound. Queer defiance. Secrets worth singing about.
What is Speakeasy?
Set in 1920s Prohibition-era Chicago, Speakeasy is a bold, Broadway-sized, queer reimagining of Romeo & Juliet — where forbidden love blooms between sworn enemies in the shadows of a secret nightclub. With a jazz-fueled original score, unforgettable characters, and urgent political resonance, Speakeasy fuses show-stopping spectacle with radical heart.
Inside the Velvet Boot, a speakeasy run by queer outlaws, people come to drink, dance, and finally be seen. But when Jules — the daughter of a fire-and-brimstone moral crusader and a rigid police sergeant — falls for Rome, the poetic son of a violent bootlegging kingpin, sparks a firestorm threatening the fragile world they’ve only just begun to claim.
But this isn’t just their story.
It’s also the story of Merc — Rome’s queer best friend, secretly in love and fiercely loyal — and Miss Addie — the Black, queer housekeeper who raised Jules and hides a legacy of love lost behind quiet strength. Together, they are the soul of Speakeasy, watching, mentoring, and ultimately sacrificing so the next generation might live free.
With themes of chosen family, rebellion, memory, and the price of truth, Speakeasy crescendos into a final act of radical defiance — where music becomes resistance, and love is worth the risk.
🎵 Listen to the Music
Big Band. Big Feelings. Big Broadway Energy.
From sultry swing to torchy confessionals, the original score of Speakeasy blends 1920s jazz with modern soul — creating a sound that’s lush, rebellious, and alive with emotion.
This isn’t pastiche. It’s protest with a pulse.
With influences ranging from Cabaret to Hadestown to Spring Awakening, Speakeasy brings classic jazz vocabulary into a bold, contemporary musical theater language — weaving ensemble showstoppers, raw character duets, and powerful anthems into a score that swings hard and hits deep.
🔥 Featured Tracks
🎭 “Come to the Speakeasy”
The curtain rises. The doors creak open. This thrilling ensemble number explodes with syncopation, secrets, and swagger — ushering the audience into the Velvet Boot.
☕ “Something’s Brewing”
Jules doesn’t quite know what she wants — but she knows she wants more. In this sly, smoky “I Want” song, she flirts with possibility, danger, and the first sparks of rebellion. The melody simmers as her curiosity collides with desire.
💼 “Family Business”
Marco delivers a thunderous anthem of legacy, violence, and control — demanding Rome fall in line. But Merc pushes back, trying to protect Rome from the path laid before him. A volatile power show down driven by jazz-funk rhythms and emotional landmines.
🌙 “Girl in the Margins”
A quiet rooftop. A new kind of intimacy. Rome sees Jules in full color — not as someone to save, but someone who already burns bright. A soft, poetic anthem of tenderness.
💥 “I Choose This”
Jules breaks free in this Act II showstopper. A soaring belt anthem of resistance and joyful autonomy. It’s the moment the girl on the edge becomes the woman who walks through fire. It’s the kind of number that stops a show — and earns standing ovations.
🎶 Listen to the featured demo tracks from Speakeasy: A New Musical — now streaming below.
Jazz, queerness, rebellion, and joy await!
“They didn’t just die for who they loved.
They died because they dared to love out loud.”
Why Now: A Musical for This Moment
Big band brass meets protest poetry. Because joy is political.
In a world where drag is under attack, books are being banned, and queer lives are on the line, Speakeasy doesn’t whisper. It belts.
Set in a 1920s underground queer speakeasy but rooted in today’s fight for visibility and justice, Speakeasy reclaims one of the world’s most iconic love stories — and gives it back to the people who’ve too often been erased from it. This isn’t just a reimagining. It’s a rebellion in four-part harmony.
At its heart, Speakeasy is about love that refuses to hide. It’s about found family, intergenerational resistance, and queer joy as defiance. The characters in this show don’t just fall in love — they fight for it. And their fight echoes through history into now.
This musical insists:
We were always here. Singing. Loving. Surviving.
Speakeasy bridges eras — connecting the roaring twenties to today’s frontlines, where joy, drag, rebellion, and queer lives are still radical acts. From glitter to grief, every note insists on truth. Every lyric fights for freedom.
It’s not just a show.
It’s a glitter-drenched uprising.
🔥 For Producers, Festivals & Presenters
Audiences are hungry for timely, emotionally resonant, and unapologetically bold work. Speakeasy brings all the spectacle of a Broadway musical —
with the soul of a protest movement.
From the Creator
Hi, I’m Waymon. And yes — I’m a deaf guy writing a musical.
It’s not lost on me how wild that sounds.
But Speakeasy was never meant to play by the rules.
I’m a queer writer, activist, and lifelong lover of musical theatre. I came to this project not just to remix a classic love story — but to reclaim it. To write something that defies silence. That dances in the ruins. That sings truth to power.
As someone who lost their hearing later in life, I’ve spent years navigating a world built for people who listen — not just literally, but socially. Speakeasy became my way of reclaiming sound on my own terms. Every lyric, every scene, every chord is tuned to something deeper: a pulse of joy, defiance, and radical belonging.
This show is for the kid who snuck into a drag bar and saw someone like them sing for the first time. For the elder who survived when others didn’t. For anyone who’s ever had to build a sanctuary from scratch because the world left them outside.
It’s not just about forbidden love — it’s about chosen family, generational defiance, and the sacred act of choosing joy when the world tries to silence it.
I may not hear the music anymore.
But I can still feel it.
And I promise — you will too.
Waymon Hudson
Book, Music & Lyrics – SPEAKEASY
🎭 Meet the Characters
In a world where secrets can get you killed, these characters refuse to stay silent.
They love too loudly. Dream too dangerously. And fight for joy — even when the price is everything.
Every one of them is a thread in Speakeasy’s rich, queer tapestry — tangled in love, rebellion, and identity. Some are born to burn it down. Others are trying not to disappear. All of them are unforgettable.
Rome Moretti
A soft-hearted poet raised in a world of fists and liquor. Rome dreams of beauty beyond bloodlines – but must choose which to truth to fight for before it’s too late.
Jules Delaney
The daughter of a cop and a crusader — born into silence, but born for more. Jules is fierce, questioning, and ready to burn it all down for a taste of the truth.
Merc DeLuca
Rome’s best friend, the Velvet Boot’s heart, and the love that never got said. Merc is queer, funny, protective — and burning with more courage than the world deserved.
Miss Addie
A Black, queer woman who survived by staying quiet — until now. Addie raised Jules like her own, and in the end, she becomes the voice that refuses to be silenced.
Marco Moretti
Rome’s father and a ruthless bootlegging king. He rules through fear and sees love as weakness — but power can’t save what he’s already lost.
Miriam Delaney
Jules’s mother — sharp-tongued, God-fearing, and cold as crystal. She believes she’s saving her daughter, even as she breaks her.
Sgt. Delaney
A cop who sees law as love and obedience as virtue. Jules is his pride — and his undoing. Beneath the badge, he clings to control as the world shifts beneath him.
Officer Ty O'Hara
A closeted young officer caught between desire and duty. His secret almost costs him everything. His silence does.
The Velvet Boot & Patrons
Drag queens. Butch bartenders. Queer musicians, flappers, and found family.
The Velvet Boot is a sanctuary for the misfits, outcasts, and dreamers the world tried to erase.
Together, they sing louder. Dance harder. And refuse to hide.
Speakeasy offers powerful roles for BIPOC, queer, gender-expansive, and Deaf/disabled performers.
🎭 Bring Speakeasy to Your Stage
A Broadway-sized musical with soul, spectacle, and something to say.
Whether you're a theater looking for your next groundbreaking production, a festival programming bold new work, or a producer seeking a show that sings to the moment— Speakeasy is ready.
With a full libretto, original score, sheet music, pitch packet, and demo tracks, this show is performance-ready and emotionally unforgettable.
Queer. Jazz-infused. Timely. Lush. Visceral.
And most of all — Speakeasy is a revolution with a rhythm.
📥 Submission Materials Available:
• Full Libretto
• Professional Demos
• Sheet Music Samples
• Pitch & Visual Packet
• Creator’s Statement + Team Bios
🎟️ Invite for Consideration or Book a Private Reading
