Waissman's first Broadway credit was the 1971 Paul Zindel play And Miss Reardon Drinks a Little with Estelle Parsons and Julie Harris.
The following year, while he and partner Maxine Fox were in Chicago, they attended Grease, a popular local play about high school life in the 1950s being performed at the Kingston Mines Theater in the Old Town section of the city.
[2][1] The two thought it would work better as a musical and encouraged its writers, Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey, to relocate to New York City and embellish it with a score.
The result was Grease, which Waissman and Fox mounted off-Broadway before transferring it uptown.
; the third time proved to be the charm when he won not only a Tony but a Drama Desk Award as well for Torch Song Trilogy.