Sunday, June 10, 2012
BECAUSE MIKE NICHOLS NEEDS MORE HARDWARE FOR HIS MANTLE: We won't be liveblogging tonight's Tony Awards, but we will, as always, give you a thread to discuss. It's actually an unusually competitive year--even though it's all-but-certain Nichols will take home a few awards for his uber-faithful Death of A Salesman revival, and quite likely that Audra McDonald will take home her fifth Tony, most of the other races are at least somewhat competitive. Unlike recent years, there's no clear favorite going in--no Book of Mormon sucking all the commercial and critical air out of the room, so anything can happen.
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FWIW, early Tonys to Once (Book of a Musical, Orchestrations) and Newsies (Choreography). I'm shocked they pushed these awards rather than the tech awards to the preshow.
ReplyDeleteMaybe they wanted to let Spiderman be recognized during the Broadcast?
ReplyDeleteI had no interest in ever seeing Once, but that certainly changed tonight after that performance. And congrats to James Corden for his win! He was fantastic in his Doctor Who episodes tonight and his bit from Two Guvners tonight was fantastic.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I will say for the Tonys is that unlike the Oscars, they're much more willing to reward a comic performance in leading roles--both of the winners for lead in a play this year are comic performances.
ReplyDeleteAfter tonight, Once probably doesn't need more recommendations, but yes, it's wonderful. I had expected more of a Newsies blowout tonight, so that was quite a surprise.
ReplyDeleteOn the play side, I was happy for Judith Light for Other Desert Cities, which is a big fearless performance in a wonderful play.
So Hugh Jackman gets his honorary Tony during the live broadcast, and Bernadette Peters does not?
ReplyDeleteI think a factor may have been that Newsies is already a sell-out hit with massive demand for licensing/touring (though that number didn't sell it well). Once is doing well, but not spectacularly--it can use the help more, especially amongst the touring audience.
ReplyDeleteThat Leap of Faith number might actually have sold some tickets if the show was still running, and may get some interest for touring.
I thought the Leap of Faith number was dull as dirt, actually. I fast forwarded through the second half of it. And I'm speaking as someone who loves Raul Esparza.
ReplyDeleteI know, right? I was upset. And I love Hugh Jackman.
ReplyDeleteWe couldn't figure out why there was a distinction - both were humanitarian awards, so why would one be broadcast and the other not? (I was going to type "broadcast-worthy," but lots of awards like choreography that I think are worthy of broadcast time didn't get it.
ReplyDeleteThe Tonys are so much more watchable than the Oscars, for me at least. I love the play excerpts (I'd be happy for longer ones).
ReplyDeleteThe real indicator to me was that everytime I went to read comments on facebook or the NPR liveblog, I had to pause to stop from missing something I wanted to see. During the Oscars, there were tons of times that I was perfectly fine reading internet comments rather than watching.
When he was shown, I was shocked and delighted - Stormageddon's daddy! He's the Two Guv'nors guy? That's awesome! And then he won, over every big named and terrific actor out there. Wow.
ReplyDelete(JJF, I love that you know him from Doctor Who -- my household does, but none of my FB friends understood the Stormageddon reference.)
I just saw "One Man, Two Guvnors" on Saturday night. I haven't laughed that hard in years -- gasping-for-breath, wiping-tears-from-my-eyes laughter. Corden is brilliant, and I actually said to my friends when leaving the theater that it was a shame he was going to lose the Tony to one of the more serious dramatic performances. So happy to have been proven wrong.
ReplyDeleteI thought they did a great job of mixing the awards with performances. I watched the whole thing. It made me want to go see theater -- lots of theater. Isn't that the whole point of the Tonys?
ReplyDeleteSome thoughts: it was weird that the Evita number didn't feature any singing from Evita herself! She just stalked around and looked imperious. I loved the Newsies number, and I bet it's twice as good in stage. The Once performance was beautiful -- but it was so much more powerful in the theater. Go see it, y'all! It's great. Jesus Christ Superstar: okay, I'm sure this show is a little cheesy -- but the music is so familiar and so BIG that it gave me chills.
Agreed. It was frantic without actually being exciting.
ReplyDelete