The Scarlet Pimpernel (musical) The Scarlet Pimpernel (musical) The Scarlet Pimpernel is a musical with music by Frank Wildhorn and lyrics and book by Nan Knighton, based on the novel of the same name by Baroness Orczy. The show is set in England and France during the Reign of Terror of the French Revolution. The story is a precursor to the spy fiction and the superhero genres, where a hero hides under a mild-mannered alias. The musical ran on Broadway from 1997 through January 2000 in several theatres, in several revised versions. It also had a US National tour. "The Scarlet Pimpernel" started as
A Son of the People A Son of the People A Son of the People, a book by Baroness Orczy, is 'a romance of the plains', set in her native Hungary. Orczy used scenes from her own childhood when writing, describing the house in Tarna-Örs in which she born and the life of the territorial magnates of Hungary with which she had been familiar. Orczy claims in her autobiography that the love story woven into the plot actually occurred in the next village to Tarna-Örs, and the daughter of the territorial noble who owned that property did actually marry a highly educated and rich peasant