How ‘Swept Away’ Writer John Logan Turned a Horrific Maritime Disaster Into an Unlikely Broadway Musical

variety.com:

Brent Lang Executive Editor “Swept Away,” a musical about four men stranded at sea, had a landlocked genesis. John Logan, the show’s Oscar-nominated and Tony-winning writer, started teasing out the idea for the musical during a hike through Malibu Canyon, listening to The Avett Brothers‘ folk and bluegrass hits.

It wasn’t his idea, exactly, to bring the saga of a maritime disaster to Broadway. It was the band who had first become fascinated with a historical survival story in the early aughts, releasing “Mignonette,” a hauntingly beautiful concept album that explored themes of sacrifice and forgiveness, in 2004.

That gave Matthew Masten, a producer whose credits include “Side Show” and “Of Mice and Men,” the idea to reach out to Logan with a pitch to turn those songs into a musical. “As I walked around, I listened to the album and then I put on a random Avett Brothers playlist,” Logan remembers. “I knew that there was something here, but I also knew I wanted access to their entire catalogue.

They are these great American songwriters with such complicated and interesting lyrics. That helped inspire me to think about plot and character and all of those different things.” And like the Avett Brothers, Logan felt there was something primal and arresting about the idea of being abandoned at sea without food or water, forced to make horrific decisions. “The concept of four men trapped together in a claustrophobic setting struck me as gripping and dramatic,” he says.