Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat was first written by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber at the request of a friend of Andrew's father, Colet Court School choirmaster Alan Doggett for the school's 1968 end of term concert. The children's concert proved so successful that the piece continued to expand until it became a full-length professional musical.
Told entirely through song with the help of a main character Narrator, Joseph retells the Biblical story of prophetic dreamer Joseph, his father Jacob and his twelve brothers. After favourite son Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers, his solution to Egypt's famine elevates him to Pharaoh's right hand man and reunites him with his family.
Joseph premiered at the Edinburgh Festival in 1972, and transferred to the West End at the Albery Theatre the following year. Since then, it has been staged numerous times and basically toured throughout the U.K. without interruption. The Broadway opening, with the late Laurie Beechman as the first female to take the Narrator role, was in 1982. The title role has been played by a succession of stars including Jason Donovan, Philip Schofield, Michael Damian, Donny Osmond, Patrick Cassidy, and late Boyzone singer Stephen Gately.