Theater
“Michael Biello and Dan Martin are fierce advocates for self-acceptance, tolerance and love. Their work synthesizes soaring contemporary melodies with quirky humor and buoyant fantasy. Their style is suffused with irrepressible heart and with personal candor.” ~American Theatre Magazine
Biello & Martin
Michael Biello (Lyricist) and Dan Martin (Composer) are longtime collaborators and life partners who have created a unique body of critically acclaimed work in musical theater.
Biello and Martin’s musicals include Marry Harry – produced Off-Broadway at The York Theatre in 2017 and released as a soundstage musical film on Amazon Prime in 2020; In My Body – produced at The Prince Theatre in Philadelphia in 2016; The Cousins Grimm – showcased in London in 2015, presented in Chicago in 2009, and workshopped in 2008 at The O’Neill; Q – the Songs of Martin & Biello – produced in Chicago in 2000, at the 2008 Philadelphia Gay & Lesbian Theatre Festival, and at the 2002 Philadelphia Fringe Festival; and Breathe – winner of Chicago’s 1999 After Dark Award for Outstanding New Work – also produced in Provincetown, Philadelphia, Dallas, Richmond, Omaha, and Orlando. Their ongoing musical memoir – Michael & Dan’s Amazing Queer Songbook – is a multi-arts celebration of their 40+ years together as life-partners, creative collaborators, and LGBTQ cultural activists.
Martin & Biello’s musical theater work has also been presented in New York at American Opera Projects, New Dramatists, Musical Theater Works, The Century Center, HERE, and PS 122, among others; in Philadelphia at Annenberg’s Harold Prince Theatre, The Painted Bride, and the Walnut Street Theatre 5, among others; in Miami at City Theatre, in Washington DC at DCAC, in Provincetown MA at the UU Church, and in San Francisco at the People’s Theater Coalition.
Their songs have been performed from LaMama to Lincoln Center, on ABC, PBS, and on a variety of recordings. They have garnered various honors and awards including: Table 3 – performed by Tony Award winner Karen Ziemba at Lincoln Center as part of the Bound for Broadway concert and You Do Not Know Me – nominated for a GLAMA Award for Best Theatre Song. A recording of Table 3 by Tony nominee Erin Dilly is featured as part of the BMI Workshop Podcast/Songbook.
Biello & Martin’s film and video work includes: Clones in Love – Best Short at the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Film Festival; The Dance – which has been screened worldwide and is in the permanent collection of MoMA; and A Circle of Diamonds – featuring marriage activist Edie Windsor which has been screened at film festivals throughout the US. Biello & Martin’s short musical film Cockroaches & Cologne was released in 2021 by Streaming Musicals and has been screened at film festivals worldwide.
Additional career highlights include their performance pieces of the late 1970s and early 1980s including Two Men Dancing and How I Spent My Summer Vacation; 1984’s musical X-posed; and a series of innovative performance-art musicals in the early and mid 1990’s including Homo Love Song and Human Being. Their avant-garde musical Claire (1996) enjoyed a sold out revival at the 2007 Philadelphia Fringe Festival (directed by Melanie Stewart). In 2010 Martin & Biello were commissioned by Philadelphia Dance Projects to re-envision and re-stage several of their pieces from the early 1980’s.
Biello and Martin are members of The Dramatists Guild and the BMI/Lehman Engel Advanced Musical Theater Workshop. In 2004 they were inducted into the GLBT Hall of Fame.
