Tony Award Nominations
Tuesday, April 30, 2013 at 1:38PM
NATHANIEL R in Broadway and Stage, Kinky Boots, Sutton Foster, Tony Awards, musicals

Another year, another set of Tony nominations. I was surprised to note how many theatrical experiences we covered this year here at The Film Experience. As a proudly NYC based site, we have to get our theater on even if the focus is the movies. But hey, a little television and theater coverage mixed in with a whole lot of movies and Oscar gives us a fuller more rounded persona as a blog, don’t you think? I wasn’t able to watch the actual announcement this morning but my darling Sutton Foster – who is between seasons (hopefully) of the ever-more interesting Bunheads on ABC Family – announced them despite a couple of seasons off the boards now. You know I highly recommend a TV show when I’m okay with it usurping all of a beloved stage star’s time.

In some ways the Tonys are more equivalent to the Golden Globes than the Oscar in that they divvy things up between Plays and Musicals. That doesn’t quite equate to the Globes Drama vs Musical since the theatrical community often respects and embraces comedy in a way that the movie community won’t, but it’s close. So the marquee contests are BEST PLAY and BEST MUSICAL. And these are your nominees…

Best Play

Best Musical

But before we list all of the nominees I want to demonstrate visually, after the jump, why I find the Tony nominating system so problematic in comparison to the other awards shows.

You’ll note that there are 4 nominations in the Best Picture equivalent Tony categories rather than Oscars once-traditional 5. But the Tony system doesn’t account for how healthy any particular season is for these categories so if there are only 4 musicals produced, bingo, you’re a nominee! So look at the disparity here in this visual of what happened with the other two marquee categories BEST REVIVAL OF A PLAY and BEST REVIVAL OF A MUSICAL.

What you see in the visuals is every eligible production for each category with the non-nominees crudely crossed out. It was certainly no shame to be left out of the “Revival of a Play” category this year because your chances weren’t so great to begin with. Healthy competitors have been opening since the season began. Over in the parallel musical category, however, if you are the sole snubbee Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde wouldn’t you be a little embarrassed this morning? Shouldn’t the number of nominees adjust to the size of the competitive slate the way the Best Animated Oscar does? Fewer than the full set if it’s a sparse year?

Best Revival of a Play

Best Revival of a Musical

Pippin will prove impossible to beat in the Revival Musical category but I'm less sure of which Play Revival has the heat. Woolf won great reviews but it's revived often. Will it be Trip to Bountiful?

MORE NOMINATIONS IN “PLAY”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play


One of these things is not like the other! Tom Sturridge is giving an awards-grabby performance in Orphans and the film did well at the Tony Awards despite its troubled history but it's still something of a shock to see such a young actor bump out such a Tony regular like Alan Cumming who returned to the boards with a one man Macbeth. 

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play

Dancin Dan just reviewed The Trip to Bountiful for us and was mightily moved by Cicely Tyson's work. I haven't seen that one yet but I reviewed both Vanya and The Other Place and Tyson has some fierce competition in this category. 

Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play

I don't imagine he has a prayer in hell against stage vets like Burstein or an awards magnet like Shalhoub but I completely loved Billy Magnussen in Vanya and Sonia... he plays Spike, an excessively dumb exhibitionist actor. Really funny performance and works well off all the other far more cerebral characters. Review here.

Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Play

Best Direction of a Play

Best Scenic Design of a Play

Best Costume Design of a Play

Best Lighting Design of a Play

Best Sound Design of a Play

MORE NOMINATIONS IN "MUSICAL"

Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella won 9 nominations (!) That's Victoria Clark above (from The Light in the Piazza) cradling the future princess

Best Book of a Musical

Best Original Score (Music and/or Lyrics) Written for the Theatre

Hands on a Hardbody was a critical hit and did well in nominations but they unceremoniously dumped it for Bring It On in the big category. Wonder why? 

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical

You may recall that Michael wrote about Chaplin here some time ago and also had high praise for Rob McClure in the title role. 

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical 

Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Musical

Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical


 

Though I felt like I'd seen a lot this year, I've only seen one of these performances. Annaleigh Ashford was just hilarious in Kinky Boots in a role that I don't even remember from the film (though I'm sure it was there) and who completely sells her big comic-lovestruck number in the first act. 

Best Direction of a Musical

Best Choreography

Best Orchestrations 

Best Scenic Design of a Musical

Best Costume Design of a Musical

Best Lighting Design of a Musical

Someone has basically cornered this market on Broadway, eh?

Best Sound Design of a Musical

Special Tony Award® for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre
Bernard Gersten Paul Libin Ming Cho Lee

Regional Theatre Award
Huntington Theatre Company

Isabelle Stevenson Award
 Larry Kramer

Tony Honors for Excellence in the Theatre

I'm unclear as to why the four actresses who played Matilda weren't eligible but the Billy Elliott boys were. Hmmmm.

THOUGHTS ON THE NOMINATIONS, THEATER BUFFS?

 

Article originally appeared on The Film Experience (http://thefilmexperience.net/).
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