Upstage-Downstage : THE TONYS: Monday Morning Quarterbacking

Danny Burstein, Tony Winner for Moulin Rouge

Photo by Matthew Murphy

It has been a confusing and anxious time for everyone involved in the theater, and the very fact that the Tonys for 2019-2020 were presented last night marks an important milestone in terms of Broadway's return.

So no recriminations or second-guessing here. Just some observations.

To begin with, I successfully predicted 15 of the 25 winners, largely owing to my thinking that Moulin Rouge would walk away with a Tony in pretty much every category for which it was nominated. Since the show picked up 10 Tonys, you can see that my crystal ball did me a service.

Regarding musicals, it does seem a shame that all three shows that were up for awards in that category were what we call "jukebox musicals," including the winner. The others were Jagged Little Pill, and Tina -- a show whose star, Adrienne Warren, gave an extraordinarily powerful Tony-garnering performance.

Unfortunately, with no original musicals in the mix, all of the shows that were nominated for Best Original Score were actually non-musicals (though, of course, with supporting music). My thinking is that the category itself should be confined to actual musicals with original scores. Since there were none this go-round, that category should have been eliminated.

And speaking of categories with too few nominees, there was the case of Best Lead Actor in a Musical, in which Aaron Tveit (Moulin Rouge) was the only nominee. The Tony voters were directed to vote yea or nay. Fortunately, enough of them voted yea, so that Mr. Tveit picked up his award, but, really, this category should have been eliminated.

By the way, for the record and from my perspective, the actual best performance in this category was given by Isaac Powell in West Side Story, a show that -- while it did open in February of 2020, prior to the Covid shutdown -- unfortunately did not make the cutoff date for the Tonys.

Overall, there were few surprises, even among those categories where I failed to successfully predict the winner.

I did wonder that the highly touted Slave Play, which garnered a dozen nominations and is returning for another run on Broadway, failed to win any Tonys. I especially admired the performance in that play of Joaquina Kalukango, but I will say that Mary-Louise Parker's performance in The Sound Inside (itself a small, esoteric play) was stunning and deserving of the Tony she won for Best Lead Actress in a Play.

I was also very happy to have erred in the category of Best Revival of a Play, since the winner, A Soldier's Play, was my favorite for the season. In that, I especially admired the performance by David Alan Grier, and I was delighted that he, too, won a Tony (for Best Featured Actor). I did have a difficult time choosing between A Soldier's Play and Betrayal, which was given a truly stellar production.

Apart from the awards themselves, I was somewhat puzzled by the televised two-hour "Celebration of Broadway" show, which seemed geared toward the in-crowd of the industry rather than an audience of potential Broadway theater-goers. There were very few performances from the 2019-2020 season and none from the current season (other than that of David Byrne's American Utopia, which is returning to Broadway for another run).

I have the fondest memories of growing up, watching the performances on the Tony show each year, looking forward to the day when I could get to New York and take in a Broadway show myself. Who knew that someday I would live here and be able to attend Broadway and Off Broadway shows to my heart's content!

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Here are links to my reviews of all the shows I have mentioned above:

Jagged Little Pill

https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/world/JaggedLittlePill2019.html

Moulin Rouge

https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/world/MoulinRouge2019.html

Tina

https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/world/Tina2019.html

Slave Play

https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/world/SlavePlay2019.html

West Side Story

https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/world/WestSideStory.html