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The Annual Tony Awards - General Discussion


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I saw Some Like It Hot as my girlfriends Christmas outing. Ton of fun.

Saw Camelot, mostly because I love the music and really love going to Vivian Beaumont theater ( full orchestra, great seating, cheap ticket). It was only ok, I was yawning at some parts. I'd skip.

Saw Into the Woods. wonderful, of course. But it's closed. 

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2 minutes ago, Demian said:

I'm not mad about Some Like It Hot (though I think any adaptation will do a grave disservice to the original movie, which is one of my longtime all-time faves, so I'm totally biased), but the lack of precision in that tap-dance kickline did make my eye twitch a little.

(Not that I'd ever be able to do what those performers were doing at all, of course, but still...)

The movie is in my top 5 favorite films of all time.  I will go into this looking for a totally different experience. 

I was reading on BroadwayWorld that the people onstage may be having trouble hearing the music which is why the dancing looks a bit off.  I choose to believe that so I don't have to think badly of the dancers. 

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10 minutes ago, Kimmmmmm said:
1 hour ago, ebk57 said:

This confirms that I don't want to see NY, NY.  Not one bit.  

I do.

I've read that Colton Ryan has an amazing tap number on top of a skyscraper, and I wish they'd have highlighted that tonight.  But I guess that would be giving away the best number for free on broadcast television.

It's weird, because he gave the most charming performance in that awful Dear Evan Hansen movie, but in tonight's performance, he embodied, like, the exact opposite of charm.  Which is strange for a lead in a Broadway musical.

Edited by Demian
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4 minutes ago, statsgirl said:

A couple of people I know saw it in the pre-Broadway run and loved it, seeing it twice. From one of the Schitt's Creek writers.

Totally fair, and I totally get the premise, but a jukebox musical? Why?

Another Why?:  Neil Diamond.  I think I'm closer to his demographic than a lot of you lovely people are, but still:  Why?

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38 minutes ago, Crs97 said:

Victoria was a witch; not only did she make me think she was 16, she made me think I was 16 again, too.  Well deserved!

And she ate those children on the stage with her.

Now that it's over, I get why they don't do their best numbers on the broadcast, but for Christ's sake:  DO YOUR BEST NUMBERS ON THE BROADCAST.  It's the only time you have a national audience on a major network!  Give 'em your absolute best!

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13 minutes ago, Demian said:

Too bad the show's already closed, right?

It closes Sept 2 (or sometime near that date).  And I'm probably the only one who thinks this, but Lea was awful. 

Bought my tickets to Some Like it Hot.  Probably going to see Sweeney and maybe Shucked.  And maybe either Kimberly Akimbo or Goodnight Oscar.  We'll see. 

Edited by ebk57
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1 hour ago, Demian said:

Another Why?:  Neil Diamond.  I think I'm closer to his demographic than a lot of you lovely people are, but still:  Why?

Because it's easier to sell tickets to a lot of people if they already know the music. I imagine these tickets sell well on tour. 

2 hours ago, ebk57 said:

The movie is in my top 5 favorite films of all time.  I will go into this looking for a totally different experience.

I'd like to see Some Like It Hot because Amber Ruffin co-wrote the book (she has her own talk show and is a long time writer/sometimes on screen performer for Seth Meyers) and they've update it for modern times.

51 minutes ago, lovett1979 said:

"singing along" is not a goal of musical theatre

No but having an engaged audience at an awards show is a goal which is why they brought it out.

7 minutes ago, Demian said:

Too bad the show's already closed, right?

Funny Girl?  It closes in September, I believe.

But overall, it was a fun show even if the shows didn't bring out their best songs.  People on Twitter were complaining about that.  I don't get not showing the best.  People won't know it's the best until they actually see the show.

Umm---Aaron Rodgers looked to be very confused.  I know he has gone to NY theater but maybe he should have skipped the Tonys until he has seen something newer than Wicked.

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5 minutes ago, ebk57 said:

Bought my tickets to Some Like it Hot.  Probably going to see Sweeney and maybe Shucked.

My sister is desperate for tickets to Sweeney Todd that offer a great sight-line at less than $500 per seat.  If you've got a strategy, I'd love to hear it -- it'd be her kids' first Broadway show.

Also:  If you want to know why Alex Newell won, here's "Independently Owned."

And here's "Better" from Kimberly Akimbo, to give you a taste of Bonnie Milligan.

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4 minutes ago, Demian said:

My sister is desperate for tickets to Sweeney Todd that offer a great sight-line at less than $500 per seat.  If you've got a strategy, I'd love to hear it -- it'd be her kids' first Broadway show.

Also:  If you want to know why Alex Newell won, here's "Independently Owned."

And here's "Better" from Kimberly Akimbo, to give you a taste of Bonnie Milligan.

I'll be in NY in August.  There are orchestra seats on the center aisle towards the back for Sweeney available for $213 the second weekend through regular channels (meaning Ticketmaster).

Love Alex Newell.

I think Bonnie Milligan is wonderful, and parts of the show sound quite affecting, but I'm not sure yet if I'm interested.  We'll see how the schedule plays out. Have to save an evening to have dinner at Keens. 😄

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Why did we even hear a scene from Funny Girl when it wasn’t nominated?

They paid to perform. It still has months to go and I'm sure they'd like to pick up the advance before the panicked "show closing" buyers sell out the last few months. They're going on tour. Weird that she performed the same song again though. 

Alex and Bonnie are fun wins. Scene-stealing performances are a good use of the supporting awards. I still don't want to see Shucked though. I was less impressed by Victoria Clark than other audience members have been when I saw the show off-Broadway. Maybe it's just because I'm just over 30 and I also taught actual teenagers not that long ago who even made me feel old. I didn't buy her as a teen for a moment, but it was a fine performance and I'm certainly not mad about her win. I do hope Sara Bareilles keeps coming back to Broadway.

Looking over the wins, there aren't any big surprises. I feel like all the jukebox shows and star casting and shows I'm generally "meh" about have me lukewarm about the wins. Like, what would I even be mad about? Solid performers like Bonnie Milligan took home trophies. Nothing I adored was snubbed. I don't follow plays as much but I didn't feel Topdog/Underdog or Sean Hayes in Good Night, Oscar were dominating the conversation so that's a mild surprise, but not super upsetting. I do remember people mentioning Miriam Silverman and of course there was a lot of love for Leopoldstadt. I didn't see any of the revivals besides Into the Woods so I didn't have much of an opinion of the field. Parade winning is fine. Arden is a good director. Overall, good job, Tony voters. 

I'll eventually go back to doing the Funny Girl lottery. But & Juliet and Once Upon a One More Time and Shucked and New York, New York (and whatever else I might be forgetting) all make me think "Oh, that could be fun." But not enough to pay those ticket prices and get all dolled up and deal with public transportation. I'm waiting for some more MUST SEE shows. I'm hopeful but not necessarily optimistic about Here Lies Love. But maybe I'll break and see something from this season over the summer. And I do still have to past-date Camelot.

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1 hour ago, ebk57 said:

I'll be in NY in August.  There are orchestra seats on the center aisle towards the back for Sweeney available for $213 the second weekend through regular channels (meaning Ticketmaster).

Unbelievable.  My first Broadway show was Evita, when Patti LuPone was still singing the lead -- and I saw that as part of a south-central Pennsylvania bus-into-town group of idiot teenagers.  At these current prices, who the hell can see these shows, anyway?

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5 minutes ago, Demian said:

Unbelievable.  My first Broadway show was Evita, when Patti LuPone was still singing the lead -- and I saw that as part of a south-central Pennsylvania bus-into-town group of idiot teenagers.  At these current prices, who the hell can see these shows, anyway?

It is rather amazing.  My first Broadway show was Chicago with the original cast (my second was The Wiz and third was A Chorus Line - it was a great trip!) and front row mezz tickets were $15.50. I spent my 20s buying standing room and half-price tickets because even $15.50 was a lot.  But that was a different world.  I'm just glad there are people out there now making the effort to find ways to afford to go.  It's so worth it and I don't know what my life would be like without theatre!

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9 hours ago, Demian said:

Now that it's over, I get why they don't do their best numbers on the broadcast, but for Christ's sake:  DO YOUR BEST NUMBERS ON THE BROADCAST

Totally agree. My partner and I were saying this. I get wanting to highlight the whole cast, but why the opening of Sweeny Todd and not one of the other numbers? And Kimberly Akimbo and & Juliet's choices were not the highlight of those shows.

At least NY NY knew to play their finale in their performance as it's the best part of the show. Probably won't help it extend its run though. 

11 hours ago, Demian said:

Did we need a jukebox musical version of Romeo and Juliet? 

I know it's been discussed but this is a cute show. And the plot is post-R&J if Juliet had lived (and stuff involving Shakespeare and his wife). But, this and Beautiful will tour well which I think is the goal. It's almost like Broadway is becoming the launching pad of national tours. There used to be some breathing room between the show and tour, but Funny Girl is heading out already.

Oh and yay! on Alex and J Harris winning. And so many queer winners overall.  I wish we had seen Lea's face when Alex won.

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This is the first time I've watched the entire Tony's broadcast. I loved the venue and hope they consider using it again for future shows. I definitely want to see Some Like it Hot now. One of my coworkers has seen Shucked twice and raves about it. I was really bummed that Fat Ham got no recognition. I saw it a few weeks ago and it was fantastic, highly recommend. Also bummed for Stephen McKinley Henderson and Wendell Pierce. Between Riverside and Crazy was so good and Henderson was the absolute stand out. Death of Salesman was great and Pierce really gave his all. I was on the edge of my seat in the second act. A black man hasn't won lead actor in a play since Denzel won for Fences in 2010. In that stacked category it was disappointing to see the only white man who was nominated win. 

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10 hours ago, Irlandesa said:

Umm---Aaron Rodgers looked to be very confused.  I know he has gone to NY theater but maybe he should have skipped the Tonys until he has seen something newer than Wicked.

Maybe he just couldn't figure out whom to step away from to avoid suspicion with that many LGBTQ people in the room? He's used to it just being one personal assistant or somesuch and having an attention-hungry D-list starlet ready at his side to clutch. This time it was half the attendees and his date was apparently CJ Uzomah.

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Ugh, I took a Benadryl last night and fell asleep so no live posting for me.

After watching today I want to see Sweeney and Parade.  I do highly recommend Into the Woods if you can see it on tour and Kimberly Akimbo (if you want to laugh and cry in equal measure). 

I love Tom Stoppard and will see everything he has and will ever do.

ETA:  For the sake of consistency & for the 150th consecutive year, Judy Kuhn was robbed!!!!!!!

Edited by bosawks
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16 hours ago, statsgirl said:

A couple of people I know saw it in the pre-Broadway run and loved it, seeing it twice. From one of the Schitt's Creek writers.

I saw Prima Facie and &Juliet in April.

Fully expected to love PF as I love Jodie and I knew what a tour de force it was for her. And it was phenomenal and Jodie was phenomenal and fully deserved the Tony for her one-woman effort.

Went to &Juliet as it was what my companions wanted to see and thought I'd enjoy it, sure, but not much more than that. I loved it. It was exuberant and funny and energetic and moving, etc. And all that with music of the late 90s, early 2000s, which are not my era of pop music. 

I wasn't surprised it didn't win the main categories, but it deserved the nominations as far as I'm concerned.

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2 hours ago, Pop Tart said:

Went to &Juliet as it was what my companions wanted to see and thought I'd enjoy it, sure, but not much more than that. I loved it. It was exuberant and funny and energetic and moving, etc.

I saw it too and it's just a completely insane show in a good way. Where else are you going to see a professional operatic baritone sing Backstreet Boys? That being said, I know why they chose Roar figuring the actress was nominated but it is definitely not the best sing in the production. 

Saw Shucked and Kimberly Akimbo too and I think they could have done better with the Shucked number. Haven't seen SLIH. There was so much controversy and backlash when it first came out regarding the plot and its like all that has disappeared. 

 

Leopoldstadt is a very hard show to watch. It made me cry. 

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On 6/12/2023 at 7:17 PM, Snow Apple said:

I was thinking the same thing when Alex won. I've been wondering her thoughts on the Glee alums who went on to be nominated or won awards.

Ali Stroker was the first Glee alum (at least among the younger actors) to win the first Tony, right? I thought Alex was nominated for "Once on This Island," but I was wrong.

The older actors ("adults" in Glee) have been nominated/won Tony Awards, pre and probably post Glee.

I finally got around to watching the show in its entirety. I really wish they'd put Best Original Score and the John Kander/Joel Grey tributes on the actual broadcast. This also left KPOP off the main broadcast entirely.

I liked the revival performances best. Into the Woods, Camelot, Sweeney Todd. There was nothing I could do about Camelot aside from buying another ticket but the size of the Sweeney cast was a selling point. Interested in seeing Groban develop his lower register. He could become a compelling baritone over time. I had the same quibbles about Brian d'Arcy James, Jordan Donica, and Ben Platt as I've had seeing their other performances and nothing changed for the Tonys.

Kimberly Akimbo came across as much more annoying than it was in person. I'm not sure if that was the size of the theater or a sound issue. &Juliet also sounded kind of bad. I hated Shucked. At this point, I really appreciate shows like Shucked and Once Upon a One More Time filming high quality versions of their best numbers so they're preserved for posterity even if there isn't a pro-shot and any press performances don't go the way they might like. I can just watch Alex's solo and skip the show. I was sold on Some Like It Hot. Hopefully I'll get a chance to see it when Ghee returns.

Happy for the acting winners though there was a slight sense of diminishing returns hearing the same message three times. I didn't miss the writers at all and I would have been fine if they'd cut even more of Ariana DeBose's random (apparently unscripted) banter. It felt like there was more of a focus on plays since they were showing so many clips. The show was solidly fine. B/B+

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This article will update live as the nominations are announced this morning...

The 2024 Tony Award Nominations
By Jason P. Frank  April 30, 2024
https://www.vulture.com/article/tony-awards-2024-nominations.html

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... The first batch of nominations will be revealed on CBS at 8:30 a.m. ET, with the rest coming on the Tony Awards’ YouTube channel at 9:00 a.m. ... The award ceremony will be held on June 16 at Lincoln Center with host Ariana DeBose returning for her third year in a row. 

Edited by tv echo
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TVLine Items: Grant Gustin at Tonys, So Help Me Todd Vet Joins Watson and More
BY VLADA GELMAN   JUNE 6, 2024 
https://tvline.com/news/tony-awards-2024-grant-gustin-water-for-elephants-performance-1235254809/ 

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Grant Gustin and an acrobatic cast are swinging into the Tony Awards to perform a number from the nominated Broadway musical Water for Elephants.

The ceremony will also feature performances from: Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club with nominees Gayle Rankin and Eddie Redmayne; Hell’s Kitchen, featuring the music of producer Alicia Keys, with nominees Shoshana Bean, Brandon Victor Dixon, Kecia Lewis and Maleah Joi Moon; Illinoise, featuring the music of Sufjan Stevens, directed and choreographed by Justin Peck; Merrily We Roll Along, a Stephen Sondheim classic with nominees Jonathan Groff, Lindsay Mendez and Daniel Radcliffe; Suffs, a new musical whose producers include Hillary Clinton, with nominees Nikki M. James and Shaina Taub; The Outsiders, based on the book and the film, whose producers include Angelina Jolie, with nominees Joshua Boone, Brody Grant and Sky Lakota-Lynch; and The Who’s Tommy featuring the music of Pete Townsend and The Who.

The 77th Annual Tony Awards, hosted by Ariana DeBose, will air live on Sunday, June 16 at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT on CBS and stream on Paramount+.

Edited by tv echo
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Get Ready for the 2024 Tony Awards on The Broadway Show!
Broadwaycom   Jun 12, 2024


Tony Award host Ariana DeBose says viewers should expect a ‘full Broadway experience’
BY MARK KENNEDY   June 13, 2024
https://apnews.com/article/ariana-debose-tony-awards-host-2024-c2472b731b01104dcb1861fe19a52a32 

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NEW YORK (AP) — Ariana DeBose promises Sunday’s Tony Awards will move “like a Broadway show.”

“This is Broadway’s biggest night. Why not give the people at home even more of a Broadway experience?” the Academy Award winner and Tony nominee told The Associated Press on Thursday. “Our show is going to move like a Broadway show. We want to give you a full Broadway experience.”

That means viewers will see transitions between scenes, with cast members coming on stage to help move items and sets changing in front of the audience. In the past, a wall came down between production numbers and awards, hiding the changes.
*  *  *
DeBose is a producer this year and is choreographing her opening number with her creative partner, Julius Anthony Rubio.

Edited by tv echo

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