Maybe Happy Ending
Maybe Happy Ending is a South Korean musical with lyrics written by Hue Park, music composed by Will Aronson, and book written by both Park and Aronson. The musical, which is performed without intermission, follows two human-like helper-bots, Oliver and Claire, who discover each other in Seoul later in the 21st century and develop a connection that challenges what they believe is possible for themselves, exploring relationships, love and mortality.
Directed by Kim Dong-yeon, Maybe Happy Ending had its premiere in Seoul at Lifeway Hall in DCF Daemyung Cultural Factory in 2016 to positive critical reviews. At the Korea Musical Awards, it was nominated for, and won, six awards, including Best Musical: Small Theatre, Music, Lyrics and Book. The musical also won four awards at the Yegreen Musical Awards including Musical of the Year and Music. Maybe Happy Ending has been revived several times in Korea and internationally, including a Broadway production that opened in 2024 with another positive critical reception. It tied for a leading ten nominations at the 78th Tony Awards and won six, including Best Musical, Best Book and Best Score. It also won six Drama Desk Awards.
Inception and development
In 2014, Hue Park was sitting in a coffee shop in Brooklyn, New York, when he heard the song "Everyday Robots" by Damon Albarn playing. Park was familiar with Blur, as it had been popular in South Korea while he was growing up there in the 1990s. Part of the song lyrics caught his attention: "We are everyday robots in the process of getting home." Park imagined a world inhabited by 'robots that look just like humans', eventually thinking up a scene where 'robots with human-like appearances and emotions are abandoned and live lonely lives alone'. Park had recently ended a long-term relationship, so he thought about the closing of a chapter in his life. "I experienced some losses with people around me – parting and death – when I was writing the play," he said. "I realized that love is an act to open your heart even though you expect to feel the pain of loss one day."Park sent an email to his friend Will Aronson. Aronson was intrigued by Park's ideas, and they eventually started to write the story together. They started the story planning in February 2014. They pitched Maybe Happy Ending to a producer at the Wooran Cultural Foundation, a nonprofit foundation in Seoul that supports young artists in Korea, which has supported Seeya Stage programs. The musical was accepted into one of these programs, and by fall of 2014, it was developed further. Kim Dong-yeon, who worked together with Park and Aronson on the musical Carmen, joined the project as director. Jeon Mi-do and Jeon Uk-jin starred in a workshop performance. Maybe Happy Ending had a three-night tryout engagement at Project Box Seeya in Wooran Cultural Foundation in September 2015. Tickets were sold out within 3 minutes of opening.
The show was written in both Korean and English, with Aronson writing the initial draft in English and Park translating it into Korean. Both versions were performed at an industry workshop in New York City in 2016, as the first overseas development project supported by the Wooran Cultural Foundation. The English-language version of Maybe Happy Ending, then titled What I Learned from People, was awarded the 2017 Richard Rodgers Award by the American Academy of Arts and Letters. As the full English production was developed with a different team, Aronson and Park used the initial English script as the starting point rather than re-translating the finished Korean version. As a result, the final Broadway version has some noticeable differences from the version performed in Korea.
The musical's ending leaves it ambiguous as to whether Claire kept her memories like Oliver did. In the earliest draft of the musical, both characters kept their memories. The writers have said that as Claire is a more advanced model than Oliver, she would be better at lying if she kept them. In the Korean version, the actresses playing Claire are allowed to decide for themselves, with some changing their choice each night. For the Broadway version, the writers left it up to director Michael Arden and Claire actress Helen J. Shen to decide: Arden believes she erased her memories as he prefers a tragic interpretation, while Shen has declined to tell anyone her opinion.
Setting
The musical is set in the near future in the Seoul Metropolitan Area. Oliver and Claire are robots that look human, created to help people. They reside in an apartment for helper bots abandoned by their owners. Oliver is an earlier model Helperbot that lacks some functions and social ability but is durable, while Claire is a newer model but consumes a lot of battery power, among other issues, despite its many functions. Aronson has said:Plot
Oliver, a male Helperbot-3 model, powers on in his apartment in Helperbot Yards, a living facility in Seoul for retired Helperbots. He initiates his daily routine while listening to a song by jazz singer Gil Brentley. Oliver goes through the cycle of listening to music, caring for his potted plant HwaBoon, and receiving his regular Jazz Monthly magazine and replacement parts, while awaiting the return of his owner James from a long trip to Jeju Island. Years go by, and Helperbot Inc. discontinues manufacturing his replacement parts, but he has faith that James will return. One day Claire, a female Helperbot-5 and one of his neighbors, knocks on his door to ask for help as her charger is broken. Oliver reluctantly gives her his charger, but insults her by bragging about the superior durability of the Helperbot-3s compared to the newer Helperbot-5s. Offended, Claire returns to her room to try to fix her charger herself, with little success. She reaches out to her friends, but they are unable to help due to their own maintenance issues. Eventually, Oliver offers to let her use his charger if she sticks to a fixed schedule of picking it up and returning it. Claire agrees, and the exchange becomes a routine for the two of them. One day, Claire does not show up, and Oliver checks on her. Claire has managed to jerry-rig an external power supply and no longer needs the charger. Oliver denies that he was concerned about her and claims that he is glad he will not have to deal with her anymore. Claire runs a diagnostic and learns that her battery life is failing. Later, she visits Oliver's place to thank him and discovers he has been collecting money through bottle deposits so that he can travel with HwaBoon to Jeju Island to reunite with James. Claire expresses interest in also going to Jeju Island, as it is the only place left in the world to see fireflies. She proposes they go together using her car. Oliver accepts, and they prepare for their trip. As it is illegal for retired Helperbots to go out in public on their own, they plan to pretend they are a human couple on holiday and come up with a believable story of how they first met. Claire makes Oliver promise they will not fall in love, recalling the relationship between her married former owners, Jiyeon and Suhan.Claire starts to run out of battery as they drive to the ferry, so they stop to charge at a motel that turns out to be a love hotel. The pair book a room for the night without being discovered, despite awkward conversations with the motel owner and another guest. While in the room they bond over watching the movie Terminator 2: Judgment Day and mocking its depiction of robots; Claire begins to think that being with Oliver is not so bad. While Oliver is powered down, Claire accesses his memories, learning that James had lied to protect Oliver's feelings, and his move to Jeju Island was to be permanent, as was Oliver's retirement. On the road the next day, Claire frets over whether to tell Oliver the truth. When they arrive at James's house on Jeju Island, Claire attempts to warn Oliver that James will break his heart. She shows Oliver her own memories of Jiyeon leaving her. Jiyeon had given Claire her administrative password so that she could access a deleted memory of Suhan making a pass at Claire: he was insecure about his lower social status than Jiyeon's, leading to the breakdown of their marriage. As Oliver protests that James is different, they are interrupted by the arrival of James's son, Junseo. Junseo reveals that James had died some years before, having moved to Jeju to be taken care of after he got sick, and that Junseo resented Oliver for replacing him as James's son after his parents separated, and so he forced James to leave Oliver behind. Junseo bitterly gives Oliver a Gil Brentley record that James left for him. Oliver despondently tells Claire she was right, but she notes that James proved her wrong by leaving a gift for Oliver, showing he truly cared about him. Though upset, Oliver suggests they go see the fireflies as Claire had wanted. As they walk into the forest, the lightning bugs slowly appear. The two excitedly take in the sight and even manage to catch one, which they put into a jar.
They return to Seoul but feel their dynamic has changed. Realizing that they've fallen in love with each other, they admit their feelings and share a kiss. They realize their relationship has a time limit, but they continually put off ending it to do the things they think a human couple would do, even attempting to have a fight. Eventually, Claire's body starts to fail her more, with her battery life continuing to diminish. Claire has at most a year of functionality left, while the durable Oliver has much longer. Hoping to spare each other pain, they try to end their relationship but cannot stop thinking of each other. One day, Junseo visits Oliver, requesting some good memories of his father. While loading the memories onto a drive, the two talk about the importance of sharing happy memories with loved ones even if they feel painful, which causes Oliver to realize he cannot simply forget Claire. Before leaving, Junseo gives Oliver his administrative password as a peace offering. As both of them have their passwords, Oliver and Claire are able to erase their memories of each other. They decide this would be the best path for both of them; they agree that it is not a tragic ending but a kind of happy ending as their experiences still occurred. They both get rid of objects that would remind them of their past, including the firefly they caught together, and seemingly erase their memories.
Sometime later, Oliver powers on in his apartment and greets HwaBoon as usual before initiating his daily routine. He is interrupted when Claire knocks on his door asking to borrow his charger. He hesitantly lets her in and gives her the charger before whispering to HwaBoon, "Don't tell her." While Claire charges she makes conversation, repeating some of the prior things she had initially said to Oliver. He responds with his prior bragging about the superiority of Helperbot-3s to Helperbot-5s. After a moment, however, he admits to some advantages of the newer model by listing things Claire helped him with before. Touched, Claire asks, "Do you think it'll be okay?" Oliver responds that he hopes so.