Posted August 15, 2025
By Sarah LaDuke
Eight Internet addicts gather in a support group called “Friends of Saul” in a church basement and share their stories. Dave Malloy’s Lucille Lortel Award winning musical “Octet” is running at Hudson Valley Shakespeare in Garrison, New York through September 7.
Malloy is a composer/writer/performer/orchestrator whose works include “Moby-Dick,” a four-part musical inspired by Melville’s classic novel; and “Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812,” an electropop opera based on a slice of Tolstoy’s “War & Peace” – which earned 12 Tony nominations. He has won two Obie Awards, a Smithsonian Ingenuity Award, a Theater World Award, the Richard Rodgers Award, an ASCAP New Horizons Award and a Jonathan Larson Grant, and has been a MacDowell fellow and Composer-in-Residence at Ars Nova and the Signature Theatre.
For “Octet,” Malloy created the music, lyrics, book, and a cappella vocal arrangements. He drew inspiration from internet comment boards, scientific debates, religious texts, and Sufi poetry.
Hudson Valley Shakespeare’s mounting of “Octet” is the first since its premiere off-Broadway run. Music Director Simone Allen worked on both productions. Esteemed theatrical director Amanda Dehnert heads the show and joins Sarah LaDuke on WAMC’s The Roundtable for an interview.
Listen to Amanda Dehnert's Interview on WAMC's The Roundtable