After a strange year on Broadway, it looks like it could be a “strange” night at the Tony Awards.
Our annual survey of Tony voters was conducted annually until the coronavirus pandemic confused everything, with Michael R. Jackson’s meta-musical “Strange Loop” being the best new musical of the year. The Tony Awards will be held on Sunday night, suggesting that they are endorsed to win important races. If there is upset, it will come from the biographical musical “MJ” about Michael Jackson.
Over the past few days, I have contacted 181 of the approximately 650 Tony voters and talked about their choices in eight major categories. This is not a scientific poll — voting will continue until Friday. The cancellation of the coronavirus has distorted and reduced the voting pool, making it impossible for many to vote in some categories. And many voters are scrambling to catch up with missed shows while hoping to vote at the last minute. To see the actual statues distributed, you need to pay attention to Sunday’s award show. The show begins with a 1-hour streaming segment on Paramount + at 7 pm east, and a 3-hour segment airs at 8 pm. Stream on CBS and Paramount +.
However, interviews with the majority of voters reveal which races are locked and which are insanely close.
All races for the best play are sewn.
The Tony Award for Best Play is sure to go to “Lehman Trilogy,” a fascinating history lesson that records the rise and fall of the Lehman Brothers financial empire. This play was originally written by the Italian playwright Stefano Massini and later adapted by the English playwright Ben Power.
Studies show that “Lehman” can easily win. The majority of voters believe it was the best play of the season, and those who don’t support it split the vote into four other candidates, so no other results are possible. Hmm.
Voters also endorse the great British actor Simon Russell Beer, one of the “Lehman” stars, in a rare seven-person nomination race for the play’s best starring actors. Beer’s career is spent primarily on the British stage, which is his first Tony Award.
Why does “Lehman” win? The show is a showcase of three major actors, each playing many roles, on a fleshy subject that describes and implicitly criticizes New York City’s most important financial industry, Es Devlin. There was a showpiece set designed by. The action was contained in a rotating glass box.
Directed by Sam Mendes, he arrived on Broadway in a fuss. After production in Europe, it was staged at Park Avenue Armory on Broadway in 2019, making it a hot topic in the town, a nonprofit bestseller, and some seats costing thousands of dollars.
The road to Broadway was bumpy. Lehman Trilogy began previewing at the Nederlander Theater less than a week after the theater closed in March 2020. Then, 18 months later, the preview resumed and finally opened in October last year. The run sold well, especially given the pandemic surge associated with the Omicron variant, which ended on January 2nd and then moved to Los Angeles for another short run.
The play faced some Criticism From those who felt it undermined the relationship between Lehman’s early business practices and slavery. With script revisions made during the theater’s closure, production sharpened the reference to racing.
Among the new musicals, I like the “strange loop”.
“Strange Loop” also arrived on Broadway with great momentum. During the pandemic Received the Pulitzer Prize for the dramaBased on Off-Broadway productions, staged by Playwrights Holidays and Page73 Productions in 2019.
The musical is about a young aspiring musical theatrical writer who is black and gay and suffers from an almost self-critical inner dialogue that flourishes at the show.
Written by Michael R. Jackson and directed by Stephen Bracket, the musical has won the strongest reviews of the season, more than any other show, and has been nominated for 11 Tony Awards.
Voters praised the show’s originality and its raw honesty. As with all shows, there is also skepticism about this. Some voters find the song unpleasant or unpleasant, but Tony Race benefits from the fact that there is no consensus on any other show. candidate.
Veterans in some industries may hesitate to support Tony’s voters living in the suburbs of New York in favor of a “strange loop” because their sexual content can make it difficult to produce on tour. It suggests that it may not be. But that doesn’t seem to be the decisive factor. The “strange loop” is endorsed by half of the voters I spoke to. Approximately one-fifth support the musical “MJ” about Michael Jackson, they praise it uniformly as interesting, and other candidates do not support it much.
Fans’ favorite “Six”, which appeared within hours of opening before the theater closed and was a pandemic in 2020, is a hot topic among voters who are no longer considered a new show because of its performance. Seems to have lost it started before the pandemic. But don’t shed tears on “Six”. Strong box office revenues and a thriving tour market prove to be a huge success.
Some acting races are down to the wire.
Voters are significantly divided in the race of the best musical performers.
In the musical lead actor race, voters are evenly divided into two young actors, Myles Frost (22) and Jaquel Spivey (23), each making their professional stage debut this season. Frost was nominated for a compelling portrayal of Michael Jackson driven in “MJ,” and Spivey was nominated for a performance that exposed his soul as the protagonist of self-suspicion in “Strange Loop.” Both surprised the audience in very different ways. Each has the support of about one-third of the voters.
Voters between Sharon D. Clark, who played a painful but powerful maid at the heart of the resurrection of “Caroline, or Change,” and Hoakina Whiskas, who played the owner of a determined tavern, in the musical’s leading actress race. Will be torn apart in the new musical “Paradise Square”.
Deddle O’Connell, who mysteriously lip-synched a recorded interview with a victim kidnapped in “Dana H.” in a race for the best actress in the play, was modest among the voters I spoke to. Has an advantage. But the margin wasn’t big enough for her to confidently predict what would happen. Other major candidates are La Chanze, who played her truth-telling actress in “Trouble in Mind,” and Mary-Louise Parker, who played as a woman abused by her uncle in “How I Learned to Drive.”
“Company” leads in the category of music revival, but it is difficult to predict the best theater revival.
The death of composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim, one of the most important writers in the history of the musical theater, was one of the greatest theatrical stories of the season, and Tony’s voters now do it. There seems to be a tendency to respect Broadway’s final work. Won the best music revival award.
Approximately half of voters say they are opting for a gender-reversed resurrection of the “company” that Sondheim strongly supported before his death. First produced in 1970, the show was previously centered around men thinking of their single life at the age of 35. This version of Marianne Elliott puts women in the same predicament.
“Company” seems to have twice as much support as the resurgence of its closest competitor, “Caroline, or Change.”
The competition for the best play of revival with a particularly strong field is too close to call. Among the voters I spoke to, about a quarter of the interviewees supported “Take Me Out” about the reaction of the baseball team when the player came out as gay. .. However, there is also support for each of the other four candidates. “For voters thinking about suicide / when the rainbow is Enf”, “how to drive”, “mental trouble”, “American Buffalo”, one of which is that a small number of ballots can make a difference You can win in fierce competition between a small group of voters.
Many voters will not be able to vote this year.
Worth to consider: This was a very rare theater season, involved in a pandemic, rich in black artists’ work, and challenged tourists to return slowly to New York City. This year’s voting pool has become smaller, with nearly 200 fewer voters than in 2019, yet many of the voters are still unable to fully participate in voting.
why? The rules for Tony voting set by the Broadway League and the American Theater Wing have become more stringent. Voters can now vote only in categories that see all candidates, and attendance at the show is now tracked on the digital portal. .. The attendance is self-reported, but the production general manager can ask questions.
Also, all voters this year had to complete an unconscious bias training program before receiving ballots.
Many voters contacted about this story said that this was the most difficult year to date, especially for those who do not live in New York, due to the complications of Covid-19. There were an unusual number of nights when too many office workers were infected and even when the show was taking place, Tony’s qualified performers were out due to illness or injury. As a result, voting pools of producers, artists, and other theater people in other roles are more likely to be more concentrated in the New York area than usual.
“It was a tough year for voters outside the city,” said actress Alianne Dolan, a Chicago-based Tony Awards voter. “Early closing, understudy, and canceled shows made it impossible for me to see everything.”
Kendra Whitlock Ingram, President and Chief Executive Officer of Miller Walkie’s Marcus Performing Arts Center, had a similar experience. “I couldn’t see everything because of the eccentricity of the season,” she said. “In some cases, I saw the show, but I couldn’t see it again because I didn’t have a lead.”
For others, traveling to New York just felt sick when there was a crisis at home.
“We fired 95% of our staff, went bankrupt, and I wasn’t spending money,” he said. Portland ‘5 Arts Center In Oregon. “I didn’t have the bandwidth to think about going to New York and watching the show. It was an impossible situation for voters.”
