Andrea McArdle's 1977 Tony loss...

[Lughnasa123]

Posted: 7/12/11 at 9:21pm

I didn't see the original Annie, but I know everyone says that Dorothy Loudon was outstanding and deserved every bit of that Tony. However, I think Dorothy should have been put in the Featured Actress category that year so that Andrea McArdle could have won an equally deserving Tony in the Leading Actress category; Loudon would have won the Featured Tony.

[blaxx]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 1:56am

Thank you.

[Kalimba]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 6:38am

Andrea, honey, that was 34 years ago. Let it go.

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 6:45am

The reality is that Andrea's lucky they didn't put HER in the featured category, since she was a child. That was the trend back then. Just look at Tatum O'Neal, who practically never left the screen in Paper Moon, but won Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars.

Initially child actors were given "special" awards. They weren't even competing in the major categories (see Judy Garland in Wizard of Oz, Shirley Temple, and Margaret O'Brien in Meet Me in St. Louis). Then they stopped giving the special awards, and child actors basically ended up with nothing. Then along came Patty Duke, who at 14 was the youngest Oscar-winner in a competitive category ever in 1962. Patty wasn't even nominated for a Tony Award at 12 for the same role (Helen Keller in Miracle Worker).

When Andrea McArdle got a Best Actress nomination, she was the youngest performer ever nominated in a leading category. I think she still holds the title (as far as leads go). So she was a "first." The typical situation would have been either not to nominate her at all, or push her into the featured category.

The other criteria with Tonys is billing. It still is. If you're given "star billing," you're in the leading category. If not, no matter how big the role, you're in the featured category. That's why people like Yul Brynner in the King & I, Barbara Cook in Music Man, and Isabel Bigley in Guys & Dolls all won "featured" awards for leading roles.

Producers have to petition a committee if they want actors to be considered in a different category, and they may or may not be accepted as such. Both McArdle and Loudon had star billing in Annie (so did Reid Shelton). So they were considered in the leading categories by default.

I also think the role of Miss Hannigan is pretty large for "featured." She has almost as much stage time as Annie. They did the right thing with leaving it all alone. And as a result, McArdle became the youngest ever nominated in a leading category. Still a great honor to this day.

[After Eight]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 7:12am

"The other criteria with Tonys is billing. It still is. If you're given "star billing," you're in the leading category. If not, no matter how big the role, you're in the featured category. That's why people like Yul Brynner in the King & I, Barbara Cook in Music Man, and Isabel Bigley in Guys & Dolls all won "featured" awards for leading roles. "

The thing about the Tonys is they've always been capricious, and rhyme and reason, more often than not, go by the wayside. And the rules have never been hard and fast. Like this quetion about star billing. Back in the day, they said that if you were billed above the title, you were in the leading category, and if below, you were featured, as indicated in the examples you cite. But Elaine Stritch was below the title in Sail Away and she was placed in the lead category, and I don't believe there was petitioning back then.

[theatreguy]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 10:31am

Miss Hannigan has nowhere near the amount of stage time that Annie does. While she's a big presence in the first act, she hardly appears in act two except for the Easy Street reprise and when she brings the orphans to the mansion at the end.

No one had star billing for Annie. They were all below the title.

And After Eight is correct, there was no official petitioning back then for category placement. Producers just had to encourage voters to put certain actors in certain categories. Which is how Jerry Orbach and Jill O'Hara were in the leading category for Promises Promises while in the same year William Daniels was infamously left in the featured group.

[North2009]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 10:52am

And in one of the most bizarre cases: Tammy Grimes winning Best Featured for playing Molly Brown in THE UNSINKABLE MOLLY BROWN.

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 11:38am

"No one had star billing for Annie. They were all below the title."

Wrong. They were star-billed regardless of their position on various advertising posters. Sometimes it was above, sometimes it was below. But it always said "starring Andrea McArdle, Dorothy Loudon, and Reid Shelton."

That's star billing.

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 11:40am

"And After Eight is correct, there was no official petitioning back then for category placement. Producers just had to encourage voters to put certain actors in certain categories. Which is how Jerry Orbach and Jill O'Hara were in the leading category for Promises Promises while in the same year William Daniels was infamously left in the featured group."

Also wrong. The system changed not long after William Daniels created a stink by withdrawing his name from consideration when he was nominated as "featured actor" for his leading role in 1776. That was in 1969. And that's why Donna McKechnie was allowed to compete in the leading category as Best Actress, the year before Annie opened. The cast of Chorus Line and 1776 both had what was called by Equity "Favored Nations" billing. Everyone in the cast, regardless of the role, was listed together alphabetically.

Updated On: 7/13/11 at 11:40 AM

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 11:48am

Updated On: 7/13/11 at 11:48 AM

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 11:57am

I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about children competing against adults for acting awards. I've certainly seen children give good and great performances, but I often think back to something I remember Rob Reiner saying re: casting Stand By Me. While the four actors were obviously talented and gave great performances, he said that he tried to cast actors that already had the same spirit as the characters. I could be totally wrong, but I tend to think the best children's performances come from a more natural place.

Anyway, maybe I'm biased by knowing that Dorothy Loudon won a Tony for Best Leading Actress, but I definitely think Miss Hannigan is a lead role.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 12:16pm

Another example of strange tony category placement (and, arguably, theft): The great Blair Brown's win as a featured actress in Copenhagen, a highly intense two men/one woman hit play in which all three actors are continually on stage. You do the math. Brown's being in competition with, among others, Helen Stenborg's brief, charming turn in Waiting in the Wings was a joke.

And who can forget Rita Moreno's featured tony acceptance speech where she announced to the crowd, "Thank you but I am the leading lady of The Ritz."

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 12:44pm

They were still dealing with "favored nations" billing in 1986, too, when Daniel Jenkins, who was the lead in "Big River" was left (intentionally) in the Featured Actor category, because the Tony committee had announced that there weren't enough "leading actors" to have a competitive award that year, so they cancelled it. Dan got nominated as featured, and Ron Richardson, also featured, won the award for playing Jim in the same show.

Another example where it was left alone was 1979 and "Best Little Whorehouse." Again, it was "favored nations" billing, and they left it as-is, without petitioning Miss Mona and the Sheriff as leading roles. So Carlin Glynn and Henderson Forsythe won the featured awards that year (in very obviously leading roles). This was to keep them out of the "guaranteed loss" scenario against Len Cariou and Angela Lansbury in Sweeney Todd. And the strategy paid off, too.

But clearly there was a big change in nominating rules from 1776 (in 1969) to A Chorus Line (in 1976). And Annie was the following year, which brings me back to my original point that they could have submitted actors in different categories for consideration in Annie, if they had wanted to. Just like Donna McKechnie in A Chorus Line, the year before.

Updated On: 7/13/11 at 12:44 PM

[theatreguy]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 6:24pm

When you say the system changed after 1969, how so? There was still no official system for petitioning by 1976 - Donna Mckechnie discusses in her book Michael Bennett's "political machinations" (her term) to have her put in the lead category. Updated On: 7/13/11 at 06:24 PM

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 6:55pm

I didn't say they "petitioned" for Donna like they do today, I said the rules had changed significantly to allow her to be considered and submitted in a leading category, which is true. And she was granted that permission to compete in a leading category from a "favored nations" (alphabetical ensemble) billing.

That was very different than 1969 and earlier, when it wasn't allowed or considered. As was the case with William Daniels.

Also, have you ever seen the "Ragtime" billing for the OBC? Nine times out of ten, they're listed below the title of the show, but as "starring." Audra had to be submitted as a featured actress, because she was "starred" in the show. The rest were left as-is, but in most of the ads, they are BELOW the title.

It's about star billing, not about the geography of the text. Although if they are listed above the title, that automatically is considered star billing, whether it says "starring" or not.

Updated On: 7/13/11 at 06:55 PM

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 7:06pm

Ragtime billing. "Starring" roles being billed below the title. A petition was needed for Audra.

[theatreguy]

Posted: 7/13/11 at 8:13pm

That's from the Toronto run, specifically the picture is from the "concept" recording. My Playbill from the Broadway run has Mitchell, Mazzie, Friedman, McDonald and Jacoby above the title - the Broadway cast recording has them billed this way as well.

I've never heard of someone being in the lead category just because they had the word "starring" before their name. I've only ever read that it had to do with being above or below the title. But clearly you have information that I don't.

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 7/14/11 at 11:31am

That's from the Toronto run, specifically the picture is from the "concept" recording.

Why is it that this CD is never referred t as the Toronto cast recording? It was recorded a few month ahead of the official opening (so the CD release and opening would happen the same week) but does that make it just a "concept recording?" When I hear that phrase I think of albums like the original CHESS that went through many changes on the way to the stage. The Toronto RAGTIME disc has pretty much the score as heard on opening night. (One song was replaced by opening.)

As for using billing to determine Tony nominations, one more recent glaring example of this inequity was when Daisy Egan was nominated for THE SECRET GARDEN in the supporting role category. Her character is the show's leading role, yet she competed against and won over many fine performers who were truly in supporting roles. That caused quite a bit of comment at the time.

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/14/11 at 11:45am

I agree about Daisy Eagan, but it's because she didn't have star billing. They didn't petition for her to change categories, which I'm sure was a carefully calculated decision.

I really wish they would do away with the manipulation of the categories. With the Oscars, they just "suggest" to the voters (with a whole lotta money thrown at it) as to what category to nominate a performer in. The voters in the Actors Branch are given five blank lines to fill in as they see fit for each of the acting categories. With the Tonys, they are playing an even more "forced" game of chess between the producers and the nominating committee.

Part of the problem is the word "featured" has come to mean "supporting." It really was all about "featured billing" meaning non-star billing, initially. A featured performer wasn't necessarily a supporting performer. But it has come to mean that over the years.

I think they should change the name to "supporting," and let the Tony voters decide themselves (a subjective decision anyway) as to leading and supporting.