The Secret Garden

About the show

This synopsis describes the original Broadway production; the reworked London production altered this sequence by moving or omitting several scenes and songs. Mary Lennox, a sickly 10-year-old English girl has mostly lived in isolation in India ("Opening"). Survivors of a cholera outbreak discover Mary alone, informing her that her parents and nearly everyone she knew have died ("There's a Girl"). Mary is sent to live in Yorkshire, England with her uncle Archibald Craven, a reclusive hunchback who has spent years grieving the death of his wife, Lily. The management of his manor house, Misselthwaite, is largely left to his manipulative brother, Dr. Neville Craven. The housekeeper, Mrs. Medlock, coldly welcomes Mary to Yorkshire ("The House Upon the Hill"). Due to Archibald and Mary's lingering grief, the house is haunted by ghosts from their pasts. Lonely and misbehaving, Mary hears echoes of crying voices during her first night at Misselthwaite ("I Heard Someone Crying"). The next morning, Martha, an inspiring young chambermaid, encourages Mary to go play outside by telling her about a hidden garden nearby ("If I Had a Fine White Horse"). Archibald remains submerged in his deathly memories of Lily ("A Girl In the Valley"). Mary explores the grounds' Victorian-style topiary maze, discovering the walled garden completely overgrown with ivy. She encounters an elderly gardener ("It's a Maze"), who says the garden has been locked since Lily's death, as it reminds Archibald too much of her. Martha's mystical brother Dickon invokes the spring ("Winter's On the Wing"), and he gives Mary some seeds, claiming that he can converse with animals, who guide Mary to the garden's long-lost key ("Show Me the Key"). Inside the manor, Neville and Archibald are discussing a bedridden boy when Mary suddenly enters. She asks Archibald for a bit of soil to plant a garden of her own. Archibald agrees and muses on Lily and Mary's shared interest in gardening ("A Bit of Earth"). During a fearsome storm ("Storm I"), Archibald and Neville grieve separately over Lily; thus, it is revealed that both brothers were in love with her ("Lily's Eyes"). Mary again hears crying ("Storm II"), but this time she uncovers its source: Colin, a secret cousin of hers who has been confined to bed since his birth, probably under Neville's deceptive advice that he would also become a hunchback. Colin recounts nightly dreams of a man who reads to him from a magical book ("Round-Shouldered Man"). However, just as Mary and Colin embrace each other's company, Neville and Mrs. Medlock burst in and angrily tell her she is never to see Colin again because of his fragile medical condition. A distraught Mary runs outside, where the spectre of Lily appears, revealing the location of the ivy-covered door to the garden ("Final Storm"). Mary dreamily desires the garden to offer her privacy and self-discovery ("The Girl I Mean to Be"). Meanwhile, Neville wants Archibald to leave Misselthwaite entirely to him. The two brothers' thoughts are interwoven with phantom-like old arguments between Lily and Mary's mother about Archibald's suitability as a husband and father ("Quartet"). The melancholy Archibald decides to slip away to Paris for a while, pausing only to read a fairy tale to Colin while the boy sleeps ("Race You To the Top of the Morning"). Thus, the "round-shouldered man" is not a dream at all but merely Colin's own father. Mary tells Dickon that she has now been inside the garden but the plants are all dead. Dickon explains that, with some assistance, it will grow back ("Wick"). Mary tells Colin about the garden, and a ghostly vision of his mother Lily encourages him to visit it ("Come to My Garden/Lift Me Up"). In the garden, exercise, fresh air, and Mary and Dickon's magical incantations strengthen Colin, allowing him to rise from his wheelchair for the first time ("Come Spirit, Come Charm"). Colin makes Mary and the staff promise not to tell Archibald about Colin's recovery until he is able to fully walk, while onlooking spirits sing praises of the renewed garden ("A Bit of Earth (Reprise)"). Back at Misselthwaite, Neville threatens to send Mary away to boarding school and slaps her ("Disappear"). Immediately after, Martha tells Mary to stay strong ("Hold On"), helping Mary write to Archibald in Paris, urging him to come home ("Letter Song"). Archibald initially disagrees ("Where In the World"); however, Lily's ghost gives him the courage to care for their child ("How Could I Ever Know"). Returning home, he enters the garden to find Colin completely healthy, running around with Mary. A changed man, Archibald sends Neville away and triumphantly embraces Mary and Colin back into his life. The spirits of Mary's parents join Lily, promising to keep the children safe in the years to come ("Finale"). Burnett's novel primarily focused on Mary and her interactions with Colin, Martha, and Dickon. The musical adds more emphasis on the adult characters by presenting (and to some extent, inventing) the shared history entwining the two families. Originally, Burnett stated that the name of Archibald's wife was Lilias, and that she was the sister of Mary Lennox's father; in the musical, Colin's and Mary's mothers are sisters named Lily and Rose respectively. In the book, Colin's private physician is an otherwise unnamed poor cousin of Archibald Craven; Colin privately remarks to Mary that Dr. Craven is the next heir to Misselthwaite and "always looks cheerful when [Colin's health] is worse", but Burnett also states that Dr. Craven is "not an unscrupulous man, though he was a weak one, and he did not intend to let [Colin] run into actual danger". The musical heightens the doctor's conflict of interest and makes him the primary antagonist as Archibald's brother, Dr. Neville Craven, who once hopelessly loved Lily. Mary expressly accuses of him of wanting Colin to die for the sake of his inheritance.