Are you an educator and want to show your students the magic of Audra McDonald's performance in Gypsy for a musical theatre history course? Or how about the original 1988 Broadway production of The Phantom of the Opera for a French-themed course? Well you're in luck, because the Theatre on Film and Tape Archive at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts is now allowing teachers to do just that.

The archives, which includes over 4,000 filmed recordings of Broadway and Off-Broadway shows since 1970, is now opening itself up to New York City schools. Teachers across NYC's five boroughs can now apply to have any of the archive's films screened in their classrooms. Prior to this, anyone who wanted to watch any TOFT recordings had to do so in the library in a special screening room.

There is a caveat: you have to contact [email protected] at least three weeks prior with the request, and an NYPL staff member must be present at the screening. 

The TOFT archives only contains shows that have closed, so anything currently running on Broadway is unavailable. Now, you might be wondering: If you can view these recordings in a classroom, why can't you also view them in your home? The answer is union restrictions.

As a non-profit and educational resource, the library is allowed to film Broadway shows without paying any of the artists involved. If they were to provide the archives as a paid streaming service available to anyone anywhere, they would have to negotiate residuals for every artist (on stage and backstage) whose work is in the archives—a mammoth task considering the size of the catalogue. And such negotiations would be extensive and would take many titles out of the archives.

The library had to negotiate a special agreement with the various stage unions in order to make their offerings available to classrooms. So for now, if you want to celebrate the 50th anniversary of A Chorus Line by watching the original production directed by Michael Bennett, you'll have to make a special trip to the library or request it for your classroom. 

Other newly added titles to the TOFT archives include the Merrily We Roll Along revival starring Daniel Radcliffe, Lindsay Mendez, and Jonathan Groff; the short-lived musicals Lempicka and How to Dance in Ohio; the Tony-winning Appropriate starring Sarah Paulson; and the recent Broadway revival of The Wiz starring Wayne Brady.

Visit NYPL.org for more info.