How the Tale of a Brutal Shipwreck Became a Broadway Musical

In the early days of the 21st century, before the Top 5 albums and the three Grammy nominations, the Avett Brothers were a band of three young guys, relentlessly touring their blend of folk-rock-country, sprinting from show to show in their van. Between gigs, Scott Avett’s father gave him a copy of “The Custom of the Sea,” Neil Hanson’s book chronicling the 19th-century wreck of the Mignonette, a British yacht, and its tragic aftermath.

On the road, Scott would recap the pages he had read, to his brother Seth and their bandmate Bob Crawford. They eventually decided that the harrowing survival story of these crewmen, stranded off the Cape of Good Hope on the South African coast, would be the foundation for their second studio album. It was released in 2004, and they titled it “Mignonette.”

Over the next few years, the Avett Brothers were selling out arenas, their style of Americana, including emotionally probing lyrics, establishing them as stars in the genre. And then, one day about a decade after “Mignonette” came out, they received a curious call: A young theater producer named Matthew Masten asked if they would be interested in having the album adapted for a stage musical.

“It sounded like a good idea,” said Scott Avett, who sings and plays guitar and banjo in the group. “But ideas are a dime a dozen, and a very small percentage of them seem to happen.”

It took another decade, numerous stops and starts, and several regional productions of this unlikely story, but the new musical “Swept Away” has finally reached Broadway. It opens on Nov. 19 at the Longacre Theater.