The 2015 Broadway musical adaptation of Alison Bechdel’s graphic memoir about growing up with a closeted gay father, becoming the first musical with a lesbian protagonist to win Best Musical at the Tony Awards.
Ring of Keys Moment
“Fun Home” opened April 19, 2015, telling Bechdel’s story through three actresses playing Alison at different ages: Small Alison discovering her sexuality, Medium Alison coming out in college, and Adult Alison processing her father’s death and closeted life through memoir writing.
The show’s breakthrough moment was “Ring of Keys,” Small Alison’s song about seeing a butch delivery woman and recognizing something in herself she couldn’t yet name. The song became an anthem for LGBTQ+ youth navigating identity recognition before having vocabulary for it.
At the 2015 Tonys, “Fun Home” won 5 awards including Best Musical, defeating the crowd-pleaser “Something Rotten!” The win marked a watershed for LGBTQ+ representation on Broadway - not just tokenized gay characters, but a deeply personal queer coming-of-age story centered.
The musical’s frank discussions of sexuality, including a lesbian sex scene, made it groundbreaking but also limited its audience. Some regional theaters declined to produce it, citing conservative community pushback, revealing ongoing tensions between Broadway progressivism and American regional theater politics.