Christina Applegate's Best Actress nomination- Page 2

[#1Elphie]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 11:46am

Cathy, you should see her performance before you judge. She had to audition and earned the part, beating out a few other big contenders. She's been incredibly dedicated to the show and her love for Broadway is evident. I thought she gave a wonderful performance, and there are people who agree. I think she's a great addition to Broadway.

[JakeB]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 12:02pm

Your points about her recovering and going on in the face of all the criticisms may be valid, but they are not the criteria for nominations, you are nominated for your performance, not the story of how you got there. If there were only 8 women elegible then they should only have nominated those who they truly felt were worthy of nominations, not just fill a quota of 5. To be nominated is a *big* achievement, you don't just give it out for fun, aka, The Boy From Oz Best Musical nominee, Best Book nominee.

Anyway, perhaps she was justified in her nomination, but it just makes good sense for the producers of the awards to nominate a high-profile star who'll get her name in the papers on their behalf.

[smartpenguin78]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 12:11pm

Again I believe many peopel believe Christina is worthy of nomination, she really carried the show.

[bunchamuncha]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 12:25pm

I haven't seen it (yet) but I think you can't ignore the backstory if you will. The role isn't exactly a walk in the park and she's not a proven talent in the forums of singing and dancing and without Christina Applegate, is there a Sweet Charity revival?
In some ways, she doesn't even need to win the Tony, the recognition was well earned.

[JakeB]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 12:57pm

Of *course* she carried the show, she is the title character, but size, importance or worthiness of role does not amount to Tony nomination.

[smartpenguin78]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 1:02pm

No that is not what "carried the show" means at all JakeB. She took what would have been an extremely dull evening and made it enjoyable. In the same role, someone who didn't "carry the show" would have killed it. Carring a show, in a difficult part, and doing a wonderful job acting and a nice singing and dancing job as well DOES amount to a Tony nomination.

[WickedBoy1011]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 1:11pm

OK, look, I know there is always this haze of negativity around "stunt" casting or putting a star in a show that isn't known for starring in shows. Now, with that said I also don't think we need to rip apart every movie, TV, or music star that gets put into a broadway show. Maybe they are genuinely interested in expanding their skills as stage performers. I saw Brooke Shields in "Wonderful Town", and she was great. Not the best singer, but she was great. John Lithgow isn't the best singer either, but he has a persona that would be attractive to the audience. I have yet to see "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" (I'm going in August), but I've seen performances on TV, and he does just fine. I think we should think about the fact that these stars are people. Real people. Maybe they had aspriations of being on Broadway when they were growing up like some of us do now, and maybe they are getting to fulfill those aspirations. I say good for them.

[smartpenguin78]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 1:20pm

Litgow is great in DRS, he does not have the best singing voice but he is a fantastic actor, and was a stage actor before getting big on TV.
I feel that Christina is really very similar, she has never been that big of a star, if she didn't have presence she would not be in this show. Neither of them is a David Hassalhoff in Jekyl and Hyde type of disaster.

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 1:30pm

Pengy! HAsselhoff would so have been nominated if he had originated Jekyll!
*Stifles laughter*

I agree about Lithgow...and even extend it to Azaria. I was upset with Lithgow's accolades overshadowing Brian D'Arcy James in "Sweet Smell..." but I think Butz has righted that wrong with DRS. And Azaria is performing with absolute glee in Spamalot. If he were an amazing singer, we'd have a bona-fide musical theatre STAR on our hands.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 1:54pm

Uh-oh...what if Vicky Clark goes the way of Tonya Pinkins and loses to Christina...?

[Glebb]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 4:02pm

Then we'll know we are in the Twilight Zone for sure.

[stylinbohemian]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 4:51pm

Im happy about her nomination! ROck On!

[PalJoey]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 4:58pm

All I'm sayin' is...it's happened before.

[Joshua488]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 5:01pm

I'm so happy for Christina Applegate! I'll admit, I was surprised to see that she actually received a nomination, but I was rooting for her the whole way! I just didn't think it would actually happen!

And you're right, it might happen again. The voters might decide to "vote their hearts," i.e. the Avenue Q upset. Updated On: 5/10/05 at 05:01 PM

[BwayBaby18]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 5:07pm

So Happy for her..... she totally deserves it..... This girl has been through a lot and watchign her on stage i was just amazed .... I went to the show to see Christina Applegat play Charity...but when i was sittign there i saw Charity it wasn't untill after the show when i was liek omg that was christina applegate and she was Amazing.....
*Christina for Leading Actress*


"Baby dream your dream"

Posted: 5/10/05 at 5:14pm

Most of you people are really crazy!! Isn't the purpose of this award supposed to be based on the merit of her performance in the show she's been nominated in? Her off-stage tenacity is wonderful, but should be unrelated. Does her performance really warrant a nom? And the same goes for John Lithgow, yikes, this just proves the point, that if you give an OK performance and you are a TV actor you're immediately considered a TONY contender.

[allofmylife]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 10:19pm

Again, I will drop in my few pennies worth. We have to remember that nobody of Christina's stature is a lone performer. I'm a Hollywood producer, and I can assure you she has numerous agents and managers, lawyers and all sorts of other advisers and/or hangers-on, probably many of whom were worried about her agreeing to do a Broadway musical. If it was a disaster, it could have affected her film career (weird, but a flop is a flop and she would have gotten most of the blame. It's not as if you can blame the composer or book author, who seem to have had some success...)

Okay, so the show's playing out of town she's not getting "wow, she's the new Sutton Foster" reviews and then the foot and Ms. D'amboise and the show closes. And STILL, after all that, this woman says "wait a minute..." And they re-open the show.

I'm trying really hard to remember when THAT happened before.

The other thing is that some of us seem to forget that Broadway stars used to go to Hollywood, make films and come back again to do a show the next season. It was only when we in the film industry started offering utterly astronomical fees to actors that they stopped coming back to New York. Actually, Fred Astaire left for Hollywood after "Gay Divorce" and never looked back, but he was the exception. If you began on Broadway, you returned to Broadway.

If you began in Hollywood, you hoped to get to Broadway. Too bad that's not the situation nowadays.

Finally, about what makes a star. My parents, who were regional theater producers, brought me to New York every summer to see all the shows when I was a kid in the 1960's. This was when the shows were much simpler, the stars weren't ALL miked, the sets were not co-stars and some of the great personalities of the 1930's and 40's and 50's were still alive. I saw Phil Silver (man, he croaked), Lucielle Ball (couldn't really sing) Gwen Verdon (what a dancer, singer? well...) and even Ethel Merman, who at the age of totally ancient could be heard out on the street with no amplification. Ros Russell? Judy Holiday? Did you know Vinien Leigh won for best actress in a musical forgawdsake? Anyway, these were stars. Not because they could sing AND dance (most usually did only one well and even then, there's a long history of non-singers winning) but because you couldn't take your eyes off of them.

It's funny, but I've been to a few tapings of "Married With Children" at the Sunset-Gower studios and Christina Applegate had that effect on the audience even then.

Will, determination, some talent and charisma. That was the old-fashioned way to do things. That's what they awarded the Tony for. Nowadays that's be Nathan Lane or Matthew Broderick (who let's face it, is no Fred Astaire but he's a STAR).

Whenever I come to New York these days and see a show with a set that costs more than it took to produce Oklahoma, I kinda miss that...

Hope I haven't taken up too much of your time and thanks for keeping the bright lights lit...

[Whiteguy2088]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 10:31pm

I hope she gets it....However I do feel Eden was snubbed...so since it is just Christina now...shes got my vote

[Jwei123]

Posted: 5/10/05 at 10:41pm

Christina deserves that nomination over any of the other women who could have possibly been nominated. ALl the other ones who were nominated, however, I feel deserve it as well.

[pennywise-poundfoolish]

Posted: 5/11/05 at 1:03pm

This is not a big star. No offense but she was Kelly Bundy for God's sake. That's her major claim to fame. Why are people thinking she was merely nominated for her star power?

If you read June's Vanity Fair, there are many, MANY screen actors on Broadway. Most of them more 'famous' than Ms. Applegate.

Congrats to her on her nomination.

[Glebb]

Posted: 5/11/05 at 1:25pm

The stars (Ball, Leigh, Verdon) mentioned earlier in this thread were huge personalities who took over any and every situation. They could blast all others off the stage, chew up and spit out the scenery.
How much could Applegate have improved since Chicago?
She was the weakest peformer in the entire cast. If she had not had a recognizable name from a tv show she would have hardly been noticed.

Updated On: 5/11/05 at 01:25 PM

[shira467]

Posted: 5/11/05 at 1:31pm

I saw her today show performance -- her acting improved a bit, her singing got stronger (in volume, but nothing else).

So I don't think she deserves nom -- but I'm glad she got one anyway, though I don't believe we should have nominations based on effort, as this one appears to be.

[bunchamuncha]

Posted: 5/11/05 at 1:58pm

I think more people know her for her Emmy winning guest appearances on "Friends" than for "Married with Children"

She may not be a *big* star but there are so few of them anyway.
If you look at that Vanity Fair shoot most of those "stars" aren't exactly clanging up the popularity chain.
What Applegate brings in is a younger audience, but not necessarily the tweens.

"If you began in Hollywood, you hoped to get to Broadway. Too bad that's not the situation nowadays."
I thought that still was the case. People who want to be known as "actors" rather than celebrities that come to the Broadway stage.

[uncageg]

Posted: 5/11/05 at 2:03pm

Maybe she is not a "Big" star. But half of the United states tuned in to see her every week on MWC. I have one of the promo cards hanging in my cubicle at work and people in my company that don't do theatre much, walk past and say "Oh, Christina Applegate"! So a lot of people know who she is. I am happy that she was nominated. I will see the show in 2 weeks and can't wait. I was not a fan of MWC but she has impressed me with how she has handled herself through all of this with the show.

[TGIF]

Posted: 5/11/05 at 2:45pm

I have seen all the ladies who were eligible for Leading Actress Tony's. (Errico, Espinosa, Scott, Foster, Clark, Gambtese - sp? - Dilly, and Applegate).

Frankly, Applegate earned her spot.

It was pretty much a given that three of the nods would go to Clark, Scott, and Foster. The other two were unsure (the uncertainty of Charity reaching Broadway). Dracula closed ages ago, and was extremely unlikely for Errico to get a nod, and Brooklyn was panned across the boards. Neither of them would get recognition. So it was between Gambetese, Dilly, and Applegate. From rumors and the Variety article, ASU was purposefully shut out cancelling out Gambetese. Leaving Dilly and Applegate.

Not to mention, what others have already stated. I find it refreshing that they found a person who can act and dance and can carry a tune. Lately it seems like all you have to do is belt the sh!t out of something and you can get on Broadway and not have to dance or act at all. Its nice to see the other elements acknowledged.

All that being said, I am very happy for Christina but I am rooting for Clark.