Costume designs for Roxie Hart in the original production of Chicago

In 1973 the director-choreographer Bob Fosse (1927–1987) picked up a project that his wife, Gwen Verdon (1925–2000), had been interested in for decades: a musical adaptation of a 1926 play about two murders committed two years earlier by women. The couple had acquired the rights in 1969, but it wasn’t until 1973 that Fosse began to work actively to bring Chicago to the stage. Although the couple was separated at the time, Verdon was cast to play the lead, Roxie Hart, in Fosse’s production. The original musical closed after two years, with a revival in 1996 for New York City Center’s Encores! concert series. The production moved to Broadway and is now the longest-running musical that originated in New York in Broadway history. The only Broadway show that has played more performances is the transfer of the West End musical, The Phantom of the Opera. This rendering of the costume that Verdon wore in the final sequence of the musical was designed by Patricia Zipprodt for the original 1975 production.