Best Actress and Featured Actress

Typically I think it is easy to distinguish between a lead actor and supporting actor. However, I am struggling with Phillipa Soo qualifying as lead actress compared to the other nominees. The other nominees carried their respective shows. Phillipa's role didn't.

While Phillipa may have the most lines as an actress, her role is really a supporting role. I would have been much happier with her competing for Best Featured Actress. I tried to find a definition for Best Actress and Best Featured, but I couldn't find one off hand. Is it a requirement to have a "lead actor" for each gender for a show? It seems this rule should be looked at. Another could be said for Wicked? Is Fiyero really a lead actor in Wicked? I don't think so.

I agree with the decision to put her in leading. Her character is one of the three most important in the story.

While clearly the men are the leading characters of the piece and Eliza is "supporting" them, she is the leading actress in that specific show. She had a longer arc than the other women in the show, and I believe she's more important to the plot on the whole. Sure, she doesn't carry the plot. It's also not Eliza or Phillipa's fault that Lin simply wrote Angelica to be more interesting (and/or Renee is more interesting). If anything it's one of the few detriments in the writing of the piece (I also kind of don't like that Angelica disappears, never to be heard from again except as the narrator of Quiet Uptown).

What makes you think Fiyero is the lead of Wicked? Was Norbert Leo Butz nominated for any awards in that category? (I know he wasn't nominated for the Tony that year)

srg129 said: "The only reason she got the nomination was so that Hamilton could break the record. She shouldn't have even been nominated. "

She gives a nomination-worthy performance in a role with a powerful emotional arc in the show.