imeldasturn said: "And here's how Bernie can still win:"
Exactly. (I'm sorry to say) The reasons why there won't be a Tony awards, at least in 2020, have been rehashed so many times it's almost exhausting.
1) There's no place to hold them in person (and more than TV or movies, an awards show celebrating theater really should be held, you know, LIVE.) 2) Even if they found a way of doing them virtually, CBS has indicated they have no interest in broadcasting such a ceremony - and seeing as how they have a contract with the Broadway League, they presumably have some say in whether it could even be HELD, let alone broadcast elsewhere, without them. 3) Many, if not most, in the theater community simply don't feel the time is right for celebration at all - whether because of the pandemic, the protests, or the mass unemployment that will be particularly affecting this industry for the next year, year and a half or so. (The only people I encounter even discussing frustration with the lack of an awards show are theater fans on boards like this who seem to want something to watch; but personally I don't know of anyone in the business, including those involved with shows from this season, who's impatient to get on with a party that wouldn't feel like a party.) 4) As proof of the above, even the two "theater celebrations" formerly scheduled to be held on what would ordinarily be the week of the Tonys - one produced by Broadway.com, the other by the new Broadway On Demand - were permanently canceled, for various reasons (chief of all the George Floyd protests and the Black Lives Matter movement that's affecting the entire country, including the theater community), but to put it generally, due to lack of enthusiasm because the time wasn't right.
The main reason though is one you answered yourself: a majority of voters and nominators were not able to see all the qualifying shows. This is not an issue for movies or TV, where voters can see all the contenders at their leisure, via screeners and streamers. But that is why, no matter how frustrating you find it, "Emmy Awards and other awards programming are continuing to move forward despite the pandemic." Whenever Broadway is back, the rules will certainly have to change somewhat to accommodate, consider and include shows from this past season that not everyone saw, that closed, that don't re-open, or that re-open with different casts, etc. But whether that's 10 months or 20 months from now, and however confusing and complicated that will be, it will not be half as complicated as holding an awards show now for shows that many never saw, to celebrate a Broadway that currently isn't running, with a television partner that won't broadcast it, for producers that can't benefit from it, for a theater season that barely felt like half a season, at a time when almost no one feels like it.
Updated On: 8/4/20 at 02:08 PM
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