Two real-life tragedies, separated by decades, loom over The View UpStairs, a vibrant if overstuffed new Off Broadway musical with book, music, and lyrics by Max Vernon. It’s 1973 New Orleans ...

Max Vernon’s musical is an uneven effort that doesn’t fully give us a sense of who, and what, was lost in the 1973 inferno at a gay bar that killed 32 people.

Arson destroyed the UpStairs Lounge, a gay watering hole in New Orleans, resulting in 32 deaths in 1973. It was the most deadly attack on a gay bar in US history – until Orlando in 2016.