To celebrate the 10-year anniversary of the Broadway opening of American Idiot, the stage musical based on Green Day‘s 2004 punk opera, the original Broadway cast performed a virtual rendition of the song “21 Guns” from their homes.
Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong shared the clip on Instagram, writing, “Broadway Idiots. I have so much love for all of these people. Here’s a special rendition of 21 Guns.” While Armstrong appeared several times in the Broadway run as St. Jimmy, he doesn’t appear in this 10-year anniversary performance
The song first appeared on Green Day's 2009 album 21st Century Breakdown, but was used in the American Idiot musical. The Grammy and Tony-winning show opened on Broadway on April 20, 2010 and ran for just over a year, after an initial workshop production ran in Berkeley, California in fall 2009.
The original American Idiot album came out in 2004 and revived Green Day's career, selling six million copies in the U.S. alone. Bassist Mike Dirnt told us a while back that Green Day knew they had something unique with American Idiot: “I think if you've done your job right on a record you have a certain amount of confidence in it in general, with any record. But with this one, it definitely, it felt special.”
Armstrong later added in a separate post celebrating the musical’s anniversary, “It’s hard to believe that 10 years ago American Idiot musical debuted on Broadway. Not in my wildest imagination . . . to all the cast and crew!! All my rage and love.”
The video also encourages donations to the Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS COVID-19 Emergency Assistance Fund.