PREDICTING THE 2019 TONYS: My Final List

Who will win the 2019 Tony Awards?   

When it comes to Tony predictions, it is not necessarily advantageous to have seen every show and to have analyzed and critiqued most of them during the course of a season.  We all bring our personal preferences and prejudices to the task of judging how "good" a play or musical is, and these subjective perspectives undoubtedly color our predictions.

The same can be said of the Tony voters, who are not typical theatergoers any more than the critics are. They bring to the decision-making process factors such as how well they think a show will do outside of New York, either in an immediate follow-up tour or over the long run. In addition, most Tony voters have friends and colleagues in the business, and these connections also factor into their voting. And, of course, while they may not be typical theatergoers, they are still theatergoers. They have their likes and dislikes the same as everyone else.

So, assuming you've been following the Broadway theater scene, I can honestly say that your guess is as good as mine.    

Still, and for whatever it is worth, I am happy to share my own predictions with you.



Recapping

These are the categories I wrote about in previous blog entries.  The predictions I have already made are 

Best New Musical:  Hadestown

Best New Play:  The Ferryman

Best Musical Revival:  Oklahoma!

Best Play Revival:  All My Sons

Best Actor in a Musical:  Santino Fontana, Tootsie

Best Actress in a Musical:  Beth Leavel, The Prom

Best Featured Male Actor in a Musical:  André De Shields, Hadestown

Best Featured Actress in a Musical:  Ali Stroker, Oklahoma!

Best Actor in a Play:  Bryan Cranston, Network

Best Actress in a Play:  Elaine May, The Waverly Gallery

Best Featured Actor in a Play: Benjamin Walker, All My Sons

Best Featured Actress in a Play: Celia Kennan-Bolger, To Kill A Mockingbird

And here are my predictions for the rest of the categories

Best Director of a Musical:  Rachel Chavkin for Hadestown

Best Choreographer:  Warren Carlyle for Kiss Me, Kate!

Best Book of a Musical:  Robert Horn for Tootsie

Best Original Score: Anaïs Mitchell for Hadestown

Best Orchestrations: Daniel Kluger for Oklahoma!

Best Costume Design for a Musical:  Bob Mackie for The Cher Show

Best Lighting Design for a Musical:  Peter Mumford for King Kong

Best Scenic Design for a Musical:  Kenneth Posner for Beetlejuice

Best Sound Design for a Musical:  Peter Hylenski for King Kong

Best Director of a Play: Sam Mendes for The Ferryman

Best Costume Design for a Play:  Ann Roth for Gary

Best Lighting Design for a Play:  Peter Mumford for The Ferryman

Best Scenic Design for a Play:  Jan Verseyveld for Network

Best Sound Design for a Play:  Eric Sleichim for Network

How accurate are these predictions?  We will all find out together on June 9, when James Corden will host the 2019 Tony Awards show on CBS.  The envelope, please!

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Feel free to share this blog with your friends, and to offer up your own theater stories by posting a comment. I also invite you to check out the website Show-Score.Com, where you will find capsule reviews of current plays from Yours Truly and many other New York critics. I saw all and reviewed almost all of the Broadway plays identified here, so if you want more information, you know where to go.