Audiovisual Synopsis With Complete Songs
(Dances are in italics)
Act I (1 hour, 14 minutes)
Note: The recordings include numerous “placeholder” vocals as a “first cut” before the cast album is recorded by more-appropriate singers.
Scene 1: Commuters’ homes, the train platform, and aboard the train at a commuter train station in Prince Georges County, Maryland
(late 2020, morning)
After a musical overture, the curtain rises to reveal the train platform of the most distant stop of Metro’s new light-rail Purple Line, and behind it, a community of apartments and houses. When an alarm clock signals the start of a new day, the riders in their homes hurry to prepare (“Morning Rush”) and assemble on the platform.
complete song, iOS) 
The regulars are joined by a new face, DURAN. A black professional, Duran is newly divorced, bereft of his Lexus, and bitter to bepre using public transit. This stop is different, explain the riders: A common goal—provide 18 riders a day so the train will continue serving their town—has spawned a rare camaraderie (“With Friends Like These”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
As they sing, we meet PETER, a Korean-American mathematician; DAVID, a Jewish songwriter; CARLA, a sexy, mature Latina; SAM, a black inventor; LORNA, a Chinese-American physicist; MIKE, a white engineer; his childhood friend MELANIE; BEA, an outspoken white retiree; and homeless RUDY and WANDA. Enter HELINA, a pretty black flower vendor. She offers Duran a flower; he grumbles that there’s little reason to be happy. But he warms to her spirited daughter, ROSIE.
The train arrives; the riders board. When Duran innocently takes Peter’s customary seat, the girl-watching mathematician explains why his seat is ideal (“Third Car, Seventh Row”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
When Carla eyes Duran, the women urge her to make a play. She declines: A considerate, well-adjusted man is “Not My Type”.
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Scene 2: The platform
(morning, two weeks later)
As the riders board, Helina tries making conversation. But they remain aloof from the lowly flower woman. After they depart, Helina explains to Rosie that many find it difficult to love those who are “beneath” them. She hums a little-known Negro spiritual; if 100 people would sing it together, prejudice would end. After sending Rosie to school, Helina cleans up while singing
the spiritual (“There Will Come a Day”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Scene 3: The platform; about the train
(morning)
Mike and Melanie arrive. Oblivious she loves him, Mike assures her her knight will come (“Hey, Pretty Girl”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
They exit. When Celia struggles to clutch her art portfolio, Sam presents her a holding gadget. Joined by other black riders and black homeless, Sam explains that he and she are part of a long tradition of black inventors (“That’s What We Do”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Celia assents to meet Sam Saturday for a picnic, double-datingjavascript:noop() with David and Iranian banker SHOLEH.
Scene 4: Aboard the train
(evening)
On the crowded train home, riders jockey for seats (“Waiting for a Seat”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Various riders from our stop explain how and why they use portable electronic devices (“Tapping on a Laptop”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Scene 5: A park
(Saturday afternoon)
Sam and Celia are finishing their picnic with David and Sholeh. When Sam and Celia go for a stroll, David and Sholeh try to get acquainted. The task proves difficult, for in Muslim culture, fraternizing with an “infidel” is taboo. But this is America, protests the songwriter; in our show tunes, when a man and woman meet, anything is possible (“Always a Doorway”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Scene 6: The platform
(Week 3, next morning)
The women ask Celia and Sholeh about their dates. It was nothing, they insist; but extraordinary things can happen when you open your heart on an “Ordinary Day”.
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Duran now regards the riders as “My Kind of People”. But the homeless know that his goodwill does not extend to them; and as the curtain closes, conflict looms between the haves and have-nots.
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Act II (59 minutes)
Scene 1: The platform
(morning)
After an instrumental Entre’ Act, Rosie frolics as the ensemble toasts her mischievousness and charm in a production number (“Rosie”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Duran awakens to feelings for Helina (“Helina”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Melanie asks Mike how his date went. Splendidly: she’s “Rather Like You”.
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
The men depart for coffee. Melanie frets that she’s no match for Mike’s hottie. Nonsense, assure the women of color and Pierre as they doll her up; he’ll take notice if you “Use What Ya Got.”
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
A stunned Mike returns to a sultry new Melanie. Giving up on Mike, Melanie turns to her smartphone in the hope of finding a secret admirer in the Missed Connections postings“On Craigslist”.
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Scene 2: The platform
(next morning)
The riders’ noses are buried in newspapers. As they read, they reveal diverse political viewpoints (“Paper Roulette”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
The riders learn they’ve failed to meet their ridership quota; hence, the Purple Line will soon stop serving their town. All riders but Duran board the train, which departs. In soliloquies, Duran and Helina express their yearnings (“Helina / He Needs Me”).
(tune sample, Windows/Mac/Android)
(tune sample, iOS)
She tells him she cannot love a man who disdains “her people.” Rudy loses consciousness; But when Rudy loses consciousness; Helina begs Duran to save the homeless man. Heedless of warnings that Rudy is HIV-positive, Duran saves him with mouth-to-mouth.
Scene 3: The platform
(final evening of train service)
After riding home for the last time, the riders bid farewell, exchange e-contacts, and arrange to car pool. Suddenly, a sequence of honking horns is heard. David recognizes it as a tune he long-ago let slip away. He enlists the riders to help him record it into his answering machine (“We’ll Remember”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
The men depart, but the women linger to spy on Melanie’s Craigslist rendezvous. When the mystery man fails to show, the women leave, and Melanie ponders whether any man will love her. As she reprises “Hey, Pretty Girl,” her mystery man arrives: Mike.
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
They exit. Duran steps off the train, met by Helina. Both have expanded their circle of love, and they decide to wed the next day, on the train platform (“Family Tree”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
Scene 4: The platform
(the next morning)
On the platform stand Helina, Duran, Rosie, and Lorna, who, we learn, is an ordained minister. But without witnesses, there can be no wedding. Suddenly their trackmates enter, joined, moments later, by a cadre of New Carrollton riders who are switching to save their train stop. Duran introduces his “family”: the riders and the homeless. All hum “There Will Come a Day” and join hands in solidarity in this world and the next (“End of the Line”).
(complete song, Windows/Mac/Android)
(complete song, iOS)
