among all the plays and musicals that papp produced, he is perhaps best known for four productions that later transferred to broadway runs: "hair", "the pirates of penzance", "for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow is enuf" and "a chorus line". the last of these originated with a series of taped interviews, at the public, of dancers' reminiscences, overseen by director/choreographer michael bennett. papp had not kept the rights to produce "hair", and he did not gain from its broadway transfer. but he kept the rights to "a chorus line", and the show's earnings became a continuous financial support for papp's work. it received 12 tony award nominations and won nine of them, including best musical, in addition to the 1976 pulitzer prize for drama. it ran for 6,137 performances, becoming the longest-running production in broadway history up to that time. the show pioneered the workshop system for developing musicals, revolutionizing the way broadway musicals were created thereafter, and many of the precedents for workshops' aesthetics and contract agreements were set by papp, bennett and "a chorus line".