NEW YORK (AP) — The most infectiously joyous of awards shows, the Tonys often feel like a summer camp reunion — make that a theater camp reunion — except with tuxedoes and gowns replacing the shorts and tees.
That was certainly the vibe on Sunday night, where the crowd delighted in familiar Broadway heroes finally winning their Tonys, and where the biggest award went to a Broadway musical that celebrates, well, Broadway musicals: “Schmigadoon!”
“Schmigadoon!,” an adaptation of an Apple TV series that gently mocks big, brassy Broadway shows, won the best new musical and actor John Lithgow, 80, became the oldest man ever to win a competitive acting Tony. (June 8)
There were reunions within the reunion, too. For example, the original cast of “The Book of Mormon,” including Josh Gad, Nikki M. James and Andrew Rannells, was on hand to perform a number marking the show’s 15th anniversary — a definite highlight of the night, especially seeing Gad move to the song “Man Up.”
As for the acceptance speeches, many moms and dads and spouses and kids were thanked, of course. But one winner refreshingly thanked all the babysitters that made their career possible.
Some highlights of the night:
In the show’s first bit, new host Pink, who has not performed on Broadway, pretended she didn’t know what she was doing, and dangled uncomfortably from a wire, trying to be Peter Pan. Then Neil Patrick Harris, who’s hosted multiple times, came out and told her she just needed to be herself: “You’re Pink! You can do anything,”
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Of course he was right. The consensus was that Pink killed it, starting with the opening number, where she led an enormous ensemble of some 170 Broadway performers in a version of “Lady Marmalade” that was a love letter to this season’s shows, with current casts performing onstage and lots of actors name-checked in the audience, too. As in: “Gitchie Gitchie Lesley Manville, Gitchie Gitchie Carrie Coon.”
The number was written by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (the duo behind “Dear Evan Hansen” and “The Greatest Showman”) and Mark Sonnenblick (who co-wrote “Golden” in “Kpop Demon Hunters”), and the reaction in the theater was ecstatic.
This was a new kind of thank-you. When “Schmigadoon!” won best musical, producer (and “Saturday Night Live” creator) Lorne Michaels spoke first, saying “Sometimes singing, dancing, jokes and a happy ending are all you need.”
Then producer Christine Schwarzman spoke and thanked Apple TV for canceling the third season of the TV show it was adapted from.
“Without them dropping it, we couldn’t have picked it up and ran with it. So, thanks Apple TV,” she said, to laughs.
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There was no award that had the audience cheering louder and longer than when Joshua Henry finally won a Tony, after four nominations during a stellar Broadway career.
Henry won best actor in a musical for his career-topping turn as Coalhouse Walker Jr., a Black pianist who suffers the horrors of racism in the current revival of “Ragtime,” an adaptation of E.L. Doctorow’s novel.
In addition to his wife and kids, Henry thanked his first voice teacher, which got huge applause from the crowd. He also thanked Audra McDonald and Brian Stokes Mitchell, legendary Broadway actors who preceded him in the 1998 run of “Ragtime.”
Henry’s “Ragtime” co-star, Caissie Levy, was waiting for him for a long hug backstage. Levy, who was the original Elsa in the Broadway version of “Frozen,” had just won her own first Tony, for leading actress in a musical. In her own speech, Levy thanked a lot of people, but one unusual shoutout was to her family’s babysitters: “Thank you to … every babysitter who’s made it possible for me to be both a Broadway actor and a mother.”
Levy, a mother of two, plays the character called Mother.
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The winner for best play, “Liberation” by Bess Wohl, toggles between the present time and the ’70s, exploring the roots of second-wave feminism through a consciousness-raising group that meets in an Ohio gym.
But it was a different kind of history that playwright Wohl addressed in her acceptance speech — the fact that she was the first American woman to win the category since Wendy Wasserstein won for “The Heidi Chronicles” in 1989.
She told women and girls who were listening; “May you speak your truth and may the world be wise enough to listen.”
“Liberation” also won the Pulitzer Prize this year.
There is literally not one single thing that is funny about the story of Oedipus, the Sophocles classic tragedy with a shocking ending.
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But Cole Escola, the mastermind behind the hit comedy “Oh Mary,” found a way. Presenting along with Maya Rudolph, who is now playing Mary Todd Lincoln in Escola’s play, the writer-actor noted of Oedipus:
“(It’s) a play that asks the question: Can women really have it all?”
If you don’t get the reference, ask Manville. The veteran British actor won for leading actress in a play for her devastating turn as Jocasta in Robert Icke’s modern retelling of the tragedy — her Broadway debut. As she noted in her own speech, she plays Oedipus’ wife and, also, it turns out, his mother.
To which someone in the audience called out: “Spoiler!”
When actor John Leguizamo introduced a segment on the show, he couldn’t resist ending his remarks with “Knicks in four!”
The crowd at Radio City Music Hall gave a huge cheer. You thought they were going to root for the other guys?
The Knicks lead the San Antonio Spurs by 2-0 in the NBA Finals.
The audience at Radio City Music Hall doesn’t just sit there in silence when the Tony telecast goes to commercials. There’s usually something happening, and this time, there were opportunities to learn some moves.
During one break, the audience was instructed on how to use the paper fans that many found under their seats, meant for the number featuring “Cats: The Jellicle Ball,” which reimagines the 1980s feline musical as a celebration of queer ballroom culture.
And during another break, the crowd was shown how to dance to the upcoming “Time Warp” number from “The Rocky Horror Show.”
