Last Updated on December 2, 2025 by Angel Melanson
The 2004 film Saw has famously spawned an enormous franchise. The initial installment introduces us to John Kramer (Tobin Bell), aka the Jigsaw Killer, who sets up torturous tests for individuals who he deems ought to have to fight for their lives. To this end, he chains up Dr. Lawrence Gordon (Cary Elwes) and photographer Adam Faulkner-Stanheight (Leigh Whannell, who co-wrote Saw with director James Wan) in an abandoned industrial basement. The only way for Gordon to escape is to have him saw through his own leg, which he finally does.
Saw provoked a wide variety of reactions upon its release. Some people thought it was brilliant, some found it terrifying, some were disgusted.
But it’s a safe bet nobody initially said, “Wow, this would make a great comedy stage musical.”
And yet, as of April 2025, Saw: The Musical is entering its third year off-Broadway, has returned to Los Angeles for a run at least through December 31, and has a road company touring the U.S. (For a full list of venues, cities and dates, visit the offical Saw the Musical site).
The cast of three actors, two men and a woman, play all the characters, singing songs about how great it is to give people terrible news (Gordon’s “Oncolololology”), the romantic possibilities of Applebee’s (Adam’s romantic ballad) and the spiritually healing powers of an encounter with a reverse bear trap (Amanda’s “I’ve Never Smiled So Wide”). And, of course, there is leg-sawing, which requires a first-row splash zone.
Created by producer Cooper Jordan, with a script by his sister Zoe Ann Jordan and directed by Stephanie Rosenberg, the “unauthorized parody” Saw: The Musical has music and lyrics by Patrick Spencer & Anthony de Angelis.
The Jordan siblings joined us on a Zoom call to talk about their creation. Since the two share a surname, they are referred to here by their first names.
The idea of a musical Saw first occurred to Cooper when Silence of the Lambs: The Musical came to the theatre he was managing in 2012. “I was very inspired by that.”
However, the time to do Saw: The Musical never seemed right. In the interim, Cooper produced Dexter: The Musical, but the combination of a large cast and the lack of summer air conditioning doomed it to a short run. The experience, Zoe Ann notes, “taught you what to do and what not to do in theatre and horror parody.”
In 2022, Cooper was managing Philadelphia’s Adrienne Theatre. The COVID pandemic was still hitting live theatre hard, and so, Cooper says, he was given a fall slot to put up a show “to get any business going.”
Cooper met with the songwriters after hearing the score for their horror Christmas musical. I thought it was a natural fit.”
After that, “It was June. I called my sister, and said, ‘Hey, could you write this script in two weeks?’ She said, ‘Three weeks,’ and then she did it in two weeks anyway,” Cooper laughs.
Each Saw: The Musical company has a rotating cast of approximately 15 actors on call. Figuring out which actor needed to play who in what scene (different cast members at different times play Zepp under the pig mask) was, Zoe Ann relates, “not as much of a struggle as one might think. I knew budgetarily I couldn’t go over three actors. So, it was actually good to have that constraint. ‘I know I have to have a blow-up sex doll play Carla [Gordon’s nurse paramour], because I don’t have another actor for that.’”
“My sister tied a masterful bow with that,” Cooper observes. “I was hesitant to hear that at the beginning. I was like, ‘Oh, God, we’re going to have a blow-up doll on stage …’”
The blow-up doll also works symbolically, Zoe Ann points out. “The fact that she’s so bendable and portable, that sounds silly, but she’s not really a personality to Dr. Gordon, she’s just this prop in his life.”
If one is looking for a gay subtext in the original Saw, it can be found. There is nothing subtextual about the gay aspect of Saw: The Musical, in which Gordon and Adam are desperate for each other.
In writing the script, Zoe Ann says, “Every parody has to have an emotional core to it, and I believe very strongly that the emotional core of the first film was the relationship between Lawrence and Adam. And so, I [said], ‘If we’re going to make this a funny show, we’re going to make that the emotional core, and we’re going to make that ten times what it was in the movie.’ So, I went to the extremes.”
There was never an “Aha!” moment of how to do the foot sawing, Zoe Ann reveals. “There was just, ‘Oh, God, oh, God, we’re screwed. How do we get rid of this person’s leg?’ [The detached foot] started as a Lay’s Stacks can, and then we were like, ‘Oh, we have more of a budget, let’s call an FX person.’ We got Steve Tolin, who did Evil Dead: The Musical, who had Ash’s wrist chopped off with a chainsaw.”
Tolin suggested that the foot be made out of gelatin, and Zoe Ann wound up being the person combining the mixture, pouring it into the foot mold, and making one for every performance. “We’ve been doing that on the tour for a year, it’s been great, although very laborious. It causes its own issues every week, but so do most FX, I’ve heard.”
Cooper recalls, “There were just so many things with this show that I was like, ‘This is not going to go anywhere. And thank goodness it’s not, because we don’t have to kill ourselves forever if this doesn’t go anywhere.’ I really didn’t think we’d be getting past the out-of-town tryout.”
The tryout opened in Philadelphia in October 2022. To the Jordans’ astonishment, Cooper says, “It was a big word of mouth hit, and we were shocked anybody was coming.”
The show moved off-Broadway. Cooper explains, “It was such a hit, there just was too much demand. It was very clear that it needed that, leaving a standing company there and then going on tour.”
The relationship with Lionsgate, the studio that makes the Saw films, Cooper says, has been “complex and long.” The laws protecting parody (the same ones that allow, for example, Weird Al Yankovic to sing “Eat It” to the tune of Michael Jackson’s “Beat It”) allow the musical to proceed, although Lionsgate has imposed certain conditions.
Zoe Ann states that she and her brother are very gratified that “We have the support of [Saw VI, Saw 3D, and Saw X director, who also edited the first five Saw movies] Kevin Greutert and [Saw II writer/director, Saw III and Spiral director] Darren Lynn Bousman, people who just came to see it again recently, which was very humbling and sweet.”
With Saw: The Musical perhaps coming soon to a city near FANGORIA readers (if it’s not there already), what would the Jordans most like people to know about it?
Zoe Ann says, “Thank you to the people who are showing support. I can’t believe we’ve been able to go for this long, and to make this more than what I ever expected it would be. I feel very connected to them, because those are my people.”
For those yet to see Saw: The Musical, she adds, “I hope that they can take those two hours to laugh and have a good time and forget about all the pain and misunderstanding in this world. Honestly, that’s the biggest goal for me, to have people who are queer or otherwise just enjoy something so free and accepting and fun and not too serious at all.”
Cooper agrees. “I hope the same thing. This has really taught me a lot. My sister has taught me a lot. It’s been a blessing.”
Read more about some of our favorite horror musicals.
