DANA H. Previews — Page 2

Hnath was not the interviewer. The interviewer, Steve Cossan, is credited in the program.

As I've said in some other recent threads: I don't object to Hnath being eligible for a Tony for his work (which he will be). I just think it's a different kind of work than actually writing the text of a play, and I think that reflects on the limitations of the Tony categories as they exist. Again, I said this in the recent thread about the Best Play category - the Tony categories are only designed to recognize theatrical art within a very narrow, constricted box of what theatre can actually be.

Regarding Grey Gardens: I don't think that's an apt comparison, considering the entire 1st act of the show was original text. But I do think you're right to point out that many musical books stick very closely to their source material, and yet are put in the same category as completely original works. Again, one isn't better than the other, but it just feels like a different kind of work.

In theory, I think the Tonys would benefit from having separate categories for original vs. adapated scripts like the Oscars, but there probably aren't enough shows to fill those categories - especially on the musical side. Which opens up a whole other can of worms about how the elitism surrounding Broadway actually renders the awards LESS meaningful, because it makes the pool of contenders so small compared to every other major awards show.

JBroadway said: "Regarding Grey Gardens: I don't think that's an apt comparison, considering the entire 1st act of the show was original text.But I do think you're right to point out that many musical books stick very closely to their source material, and yet are put in the same category as completely original works. Again, one isn't better than the other, but it just feels like a different kind of work."

Yes but the writer had much of their work done even in the first act. He used expressions and language he took from the women and used that to fill in the narrative. He peppered the new dialogue with things that came directly from the women's mouths to lend it authenticity. The second act is essentially a staging of the doc.

for those who has seen Dana H, how would front row be? Is the stage high?

I just saw this last night and I felt that I was much more interested in the concept/presentation of the piece rather than the content. Like the words aren't crafted to necessarily keep your attention like they would usually be for a monologue and my attention wandered a bit at times, but it was the reminder that this was all a true story and that these were the actual words of a person who had survived this incident that kept drawing me back into it. It's horrifying to think of someone going through this experience, whereas if this were fiction I probably wouldn't be very interested at all. I do like that it draws attention to things like who tells the story and how it gets told, so many years later. Like you know that the actor you're watching on stage can only approximate the feelings and emotions that someone would be going through talking about this, but the audio you're listening to really is imbued by those same feelings and emotions because the person speaking really did go through this. I'm talking in circles a bit, but the concept of the play really does fascinate me.

That said, this is definitely a play to watch closer up. I was third row center mezz and that's probably about as far as you'd want to be.

I did TodayTix and (stupidly) picked the balcony. I enjoyed it, but I couldn't see any of her facial expressions. That far away, the show was basically reduced to watching her gesture along to the recording. Infuriating, but I'm still glad I went.

Hoping this comes to LA at some point. She won the TONY! Let us see her performance.

I wonder if the script will be released or if by chance the audio of Dana will be released on audible or something?