2020 Tony Nominations Thread - Page 7

[JBroadway]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 9:27am

Jordan Catalano said: "JSquared2 said: "Jordan Catalano said: "Whatever does win Best Score, I hope they release it for sale. "

The Inheritance is already available on Spotify. I don’t know about the others."

I had no idea! Thank you!!!!!!"

 

 

Unfortunately, the US is not in the habit releasing incidental music for plays. The UK is very good about it, but I can’t think of a single US-produced play that received an album for its music, except for Cambodian Rock Band (and even that has been considered a musical by some). I’m sure there are a few that I just can’t think of offhand, but if so, then it’s still a very rare practice. But maybe it will happen now, because of the circumstances! Would love a recording of The Rose Tattoo music.

 

[NOWaWarning]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 9:37am

PatrickDC said: "I still feel bummed for Rob McClure. I've always found him an engaging performer, particularly Beetlejuice, Chaplin and Vegas (loved the two former, hated the latter) and on the SR tour ... even if he did (understandably) trash San Francisco when he was here...OMG I shudder to think what he would say today, as SF is a complete cesspool today with a worthless mayor who is way over her head. But I digress.

Full disclosure, I only saw the Seattle out-of-town of Doubtfire, not the NYC version, but the show sure seemed tight and Broadway ready so I don't know if any changes were made. I thought Rob was finally going to get his well-deserved Tony recognition. I thought Aaron was 'meh' though that could be clouded by my 'meh' opinion of MR as a whole. Happy for Danny ... he poked my chest with his cane and called me "Filth!" so he would get my vote anyway. LOL

Though I suspect Broadway casts and crews would rather be working on the boards than getting awards. Still ..."

 

Mrs. Doubtfire hadn’t opened yet, so McClure and co were not eligible. Hopefully the show will still open when Broadway is safe to reopen and he will get some Tony love then. 

 

[BCfitasafiddle]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 9:43am

I cried for Robyn Hurder. She deserves this. Her broadway.com interview and instagram post... so sweet. 

[persephone88]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 9:59am

JDonaghy4 said: "Really happy for Burnap. He was the absolute standout in that cast, and I remember him being overlooked in London, I think. Great news.

(Also happy for Hilton, but think he was more of a lock)."

Yes, delighted for Andrew Burnap. He was indeed terrific. I knew Paul Hilton would be nominated, but I'm happy to see John Benjamin Hickey recognized. I thought he did a great job at adding depth to a very unsympathetic role. Hope those two don't cancel each other out!

Also hope The Sound Inside is recognized for the lighting work. I really disliked the play, but recall noting that the lighting designer did a beautiful job.

 

[JBroadway]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 10:19am

After some reflection, I actually agree the total snub of Lightning Thief does seem kind of in poor taste.

I hated Lightning Theif, but as I’ve said before, I think it’s largely because Brackett’s influence completely ruined it and made it unbearable to watch. When the show didn’t get any nominations, my first reaction was “good, that show was awful.” But when you look at individual categories: was Tina’s set design really any better than the set for LT? Was Jagged Little Pill’s costume design really any better than the costumes in LT? Plus, speaking as someone who despised Jagged Little Pill, I actually think Joe Trasz’s work was more cohesive than Diablo Cody’s. Also, while I think the music was mostly pretty grating within the context of the production, I do remember finding it enjoyable it back when I first heard the album.

So yeah, it does seem a bit nasty the way it was systematically excluded from every individual category just because the show as a whole was bad.

However, I also think it’s worth noting that the other 3 musicals are slated to re-open after the pandemic, while TLT was already closed. So if the purpose of these bizarro awards is to give Broadway a boost, then in the grand scheme of things, that energy is better spent on the other 3 shows. In fact, even Chris Mccarrell himself basically said as much on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/ChrisMzCarrell/status/1316885952963481601?s=20

Updated On: 10/16/20 at 10:19 AM

[Wayman_Wong]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 10:33am

''I'm thinking Tveit has a better brag to be able to say that he was the only man worthy of a nomination in the year he won, instead of winning over the most ridiculed show if the season.''

''I can't imagine Tveit bragging that. I actually thought his response was very classy of him.''

Here's Greg Evans' take at Deadline.com:  ''On the musical side, no snub was harsher than the one Tony nominators gave young Chris McCarrell, whose performance in the title role of the otherwise so-so The Lightning Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical was outstanding.

''Would McCarrell have stood a chance against the always-stellar Aaron Tveit of Moulin Rouge!, the sole nominee in the Lead Actor/Musical category? Doubtful, but it’s hard to imagine who – least of all Tveit – could have begrudged the deserving McCarrell the opportunity.''

Speaking of classy, here's McCarrell's reaction on his Twitter:

''The 2019-2020 season had a spot for us. A limited engagement run. Which closed according to schedule a month ahead of pandemic. So out of respect for the actors who have sets collecting dust on broadway right now, don’t @ me that the Lightning Thief family got snubbed. The shows that were running got snubbed. Celebrate them now, and remind them what’s waiting. And buy tickets for when they come back. And scream your faces off like you did for us. We are fine. But also I defaulted a Tony today. And somehow that feels important. Like what a tumultuous introduction.''

Updated On: 10/16/20 at 10:33 AM

[SouthernCakes]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 11:01am

Very classy of him!

I thought the JLP set was the worst I’ve seen in years. I saw an early preview and you could hear it moving and bumping into place.

[Philly Theater Girl]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 11:15am

BCfitasafiddle said: "I cried for Robyn Hurder. She deserves this. Her broadway.com interview and instagram post... so sweet."

I was surprised to see that she got nominated. Not that it isn't deserved - her dancing is phenomenal but I don't think she had more than a handful of lines in the entire show. 

[ACL2006]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 11:38am

Robyn Hurder is so underrated, I'm thrilled for her Tony nomination. Her Cassie at City Center was one of the best I've ever witnessed. 

[dramamama611]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 2:02pm

Wayman_Wong said: "''I'm thinking Tveit has a better brag to be able to say that he was the only man worthy of a nomination in the year he won, instead of winning over the most ridiculed show if the season.''

''I can't imagine Tveit bragging that. I actually thought his response was very classy of him.''

Here's Greg Evans' take at Deadline.com:''On the musical side, no snub was harsher than the one Tony nominators gave young Chris McCarrell, whose performance in the title role of the otherwise so-soThe Lightning Thief: The Percy Jackson Musicalwas outstanding.

''Would McCarrell have stood a chance against the always-stellar Aaron Tveit ofMoulin Rouge!,the sole nominee in the Lead Actor/Musical category? Doubtful, but it’s hard to imagine who – least of all Tveit – could have begrudged the deserving McCarrell the opportunity.''

Speaking of classy, here's McCarrell's reaction on his Twitter:

''The 2019-2020 season had a spot for us. A limited engagement run. Which closed according to schedule a month ahead of pandemic. So out of respect for the actors who have sets collecting dust on broadway right now, don’t @ me that the Lightning Thief family got snubbed.The shows that were running got snubbed. Celebrate them now, and remind them what’s waiting. And buy tickets for when they come back. And scream your faces off like you did for us. We are fine. But also I defaulted a Tony today. And somehow that feels important. Like what a tumultuous introduction.''"

I hope you realize I didn't mean he would LITERALLY brag.

[Wayman_Wong]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 2:05pm

''I do wonder if any of the nominators have written scores before. Writing lyrics/music for a musical is not easy and I agree with others that Lightning Thief's score wasn't terrible.''

There were 41 theater professionals who worked on the Tony nominating committee. It looks like only 2 of them have written scores: Scott Frankel (''Grey Gardens'' ) and Benj Pasek (''Dear Evan Hansen'' ).

''If they wanted awards, they should have created a better show.''

What constitutes a ''better show'' or an award-worthy one is always a subjective call. I'm sure we can all name past Tony nominees/performances that we don't think deserved to be nominated, and conversely can cite underrated shows/artists that should've been nominated but weren't.

It all comes down to the tastes of the nominators. The same ''Lightning Thief'' that played Broadway and was snubbed by Tony nominators is the same show that played Off-Broadway and was chosen by Drama Desk nominators to compete for Best Musical, alongside ''The Band's Visit'' and ''Hadestown.''

Updated On: 10/16/20 at 02:05 PM

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 5:50pm

ACL2006 said: "Robyn Hurder is so underrated, I'm thrilled for her Tony nomination. Her Cassie at City Center was one of the best I've ever witnessed."

Agreed, she was a phenomenal Cassie. Don't know if I'll ever see a better one unless I were to travel back in time to witness the original cast. I'm happy to Robyn Hurder included among the nominees; she was certainly a standout featured (if not supporting) performer in her show.

History will be made with a play winning Best Original Score, and I'm all about it. Composers for plays don't get enough credit. When it's good, it's really good.

A Christmas Carol should have been included in the Best Orchestrations category. The orchestration was essential to the show and was utterly beautiful. When was the last time a hand bell choir made you cry at a Broadway show?

Some odd choices and omissions, but what else is new from the Tony Awards. I'm glad these are happening. The ceremony, winners, and nominations may forever have an invisible asterisk attached, but if we're recognizing the best work in a given year, these were the options. We've had some terrible seasons in Tony history, but at least there's not a a flat-out bad nominee in this list. Congrats to all, and I'll heartily celebrate the eventual winners.

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 6:00pm

I bought the score for “The Inheritance” yesterday and I’m surprised with as many times as I saw the show, I never realized just how beautiful the music was.

[JBroadway]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 6:16pm

I'm glad I'm not the only one who loved Hurder as Cassie. I'm not as familiar with A Chorus Line as many others are, so I didn't really have anyone to compare her with, but I thought she was excellent. When she sang "God I'm a dancer, a dancer dances" you really felt like the was going to burst if she didn't start dancing. Musical theatre at its best. 

[Bettyboy72]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 6:25pm

Were there any more new plays slated to open this season that never did? Did this aid Inheritance and Slave Play in any way? I recall many people, including critics feeling Inheritance was simply fair. And while I thought Slave Play was very good, I’m not sure it ranks as being so good to be the most Tony nominated play of all time.

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 6:33pm

The Minutes and The Lehman Trilogy were supposed to open. I suspect it might have always come down to The Inheritance v Slave Play though.

[JBroadway]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 6:37pm

Bettyboy72 said: "Were there any more new plays slated to open this season that never did?"

 

Not only were there more plays that were set to open, but several of them were heavily in contention for Best Play. Lehman Trilogy, Hangmen, and The Minutes were all serious contenders for nominations, if not the win. There was also Birthday Candles, which nobody got to see, so we don't know if was good. 

Hard to say if Slave Play or Inheritance benefitted from it in terms of getting nominated for Best Play: I'd wager that both of them would have gotten nominated anyway. But it has definitely helped cleared the field for the win. And it helped them get more nominations for acting and other awards. 

The other silver lining is that, with all the competition, it's possible that The Sound Inside would have been left out of the Best Play category, which would have been a real shame. 

Updated On: 10/16/20 at 06:37 PM

[MadsonMelo]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 7:37pm

MrJNLong said: "Kyle Soller's non-nomination was the only huge surprise for me from these announcements.

So looks like there's a decent chance (even likely?) that Moulin Rouge walks away from this winning all of the awards they are nominated for except 2 (Lead and Featured Actress).

Which means Moulin Rouge could end up being an 11-time Tony winning musical. Same as Hamilton.

That is...uh...kind of inappropriate in my opinion...haha...

To slightly pivot and change topics, does anyone have any thoughts on who will/should win the Best Director in a Play category? That one seems like the most difficult to predict right now for me."

Do you really think MR! will get this many awards? Right now I have Directing, Actor, Featured Actor, Lighting, Costumes, Scenic, Choreography and Sound.

But I have JLP taking Musical, Book, Featured Actress and Orchestrations.

Also, Tina takes Actress.

[Bettyboy72]

Posted: 10/16/20 at 9:37pm

JBroadway said: "Bettyboy72 said: "Were there any more new plays slated to open this season that never did?"



Not only were there more plays that were set to open, but several of them were heavily in contention for Best Play. Lehman Trilogy, Hangmen, and The Minutes were all serious contenders for nominations, if not the win. There was also Birthday Candles, which nobody got to see, so we don't know if was good.

Hard to say if Slave Play or Inheritance benefitted from it in terms of getting nominated for Best Play: I'd wager that both of them would have gotten nominated anyway. But it has definitely helped cleared the field for the win. And it helped them get more nominations for acting and other awards.

The other silver lining is that, with all the competition, it's possible that The Sound Inside would have been left out of the Best Play category, which would have been a real shame."

I think The Sound Inside was the best play I saw last season, so I am glad it was included. 

[chrishuyen]

Posted: 10/17/20 at 12:27am

Somewhat facetious but also semi-serious question: for the best score Tony, do they put "Best Score (music and lyrics)" and thus have to change it to just "Best Score (music)" for this year?

Also, I'm curious about the best book of a musical category.  I'm in the minority that thought Jagged Little Pill flowed quite well and did a fairly good job tying together the different storylines.  Moulin Rouge, on the other hand, I felt was somewhat clunky (especially for an adaptation) and didn't really seem to care about character work or anything besides going from mega mashup to mega mashup (I get that it's a melodrama, but I don't think they handled the emotional arc well at all).  I haven't seen Tina, but heard the book was somewhat muddled there as well.

I was surprised Derek Klena received a nomination over Antonio Cipriano, as I thought his character was fairly useless for the most part and didn't really give him a lot to do.

Love that two out of three nominated musical directors are female!

[JBroadway]

Posted: 10/17/20 at 1:14am

@chrishuyen

Technically, the category is called "Best Score (Music and/or Lyrics Written for the Theatre)" - emphasis on the "OR" 

It's hard to make predictions about the "Best Book" or "Best Musical" categories without getting caught up in individual tastes. Personally, while I think the book for JLP was certainly more ambitious than the other 2, I found it to be infuriatingly inept in so many ways. A part of me would be extremely irritated if it won, because I hated it with such a passion, but another part of me would rather see the award go to someone who was actually trying to tell a story, and not just stringing a bunch of songs together while adapting from other sources (in the case of MR, the film, and in the case of Tina, the real events of her life). Plus, many people also love the book of JLP, and that's fair. But it's hard to predict where the Tony Voters will land. 

Even before COVID, this year's Best Musical race was extremely difficult to predict, because almost all of the eligible shows were highly divisive in some sense or another. Even Girl From the North Country (which many predicted as the potential winner) had a lot of dissenters. And Six, while generally enjoyed by most, was not necessarily seen as serious enough to take home the top prize. And while the field has cleared somewhat, I think the same holds true of these last remaining shows. Awards are always subject to the taste of the voters, but in this year in particular, I think it's really tough to predict what those tastes will be. Jagged Little Pill is closer in style to the kinds of shows that have recently won Best Musical (in the sense that it's more dramatic and story-driven, and not adapted from a blockbuster film), but if the voters don't like it, they don't like it. Moulin Rouge, while filled with flaws, and devoid of any soul, MIGHT be more widely liked on the whole than JLP, which seems to have a smaller, but louder, group of supporters. But it's really tough to say. 

Updated On: 10/17/20 at 01:14 AM

[VintageSnarker]

Posted: 10/17/20 at 4:40am

bdn223 said: "I honestly wonder if voters will solely consider Aaron Tveit’s Performance in Moulin Rougue, or more consider this does he deserve a career achievement award based on his path past performances."

I hope so because, as bland as Aaron was, I want Danny Burstein rewarded for the entirety of his career. I don't think anyone came out looking that great in MR because the book was just so bad.

Also, I'm already preparing myself for Jeremy O. Harris and Diablo Cody to win because only infuriating, depressing things happen in 2020.

[imeldasturn]

Posted: 10/17/20 at 6:32am

HeyMrMusic said: "The Minutes and The Lehman Trilogy were supposed to open. I suspect it might have always come down to The Inheritance v Slave Play though."

Hangmen too, I think

[inception]

Posted: 10/17/20 at 7:25am

I am curious as to why nothing from West Side Story was considered for nomination? Did the show not officially open? Or not run long enough?

[BCfitasafiddle]

Posted: 10/17/20 at 7:55am

inception said: "I am curious as to why nothing from West Side Story was considered for nomination? Did the show not officially open? Or not run long enough?"

I think people forget what an excruciatingly long preview period that show had. It didn't officially open until the second to last week of February. Not enough nominators or voters got the chance to see it. Same goes for Girl From the North Country.