Did Jessie Mueller deserve the Tony?

I previously wrote a whole piece looking back at the 2014 Tony race for Best Lead Actress in a Musical. In it, I made some points I'd like to mention here:

As someone who is also invested in the Oscar race, I've seen countless people on Twitter complain about voters going for biopic performances over portrayals of fictional characters, arguing that it's even harder to pull off the latter as opposed to the former. Common examples they've used are Eddie Redmayne winning for The Theory of Everything over Michael Keaton in Birdman, Gary Oldman winning for Darkest Hour over Timothée Chalamet in Call Me By Your Name, Rami Malek winning for Bohemian Rhapsody over Bradley Cooper in A Star is Born, Renée Zellweger winning for Judy over Saoirse Ronan in Little Women, and Jessica Chastain winning for The Eyes of Tammy Faye over Penélope Cruz in Parallel Mothers. A great name I'd like to use for this scenario is "artistry vs. mimicry."

Playing a real-life person can usually be an advantage to winning an award. Voters who aren't as intimately familiar with the craft of acting tend to find it easier to recognize how a performer is nailing the real-life person they're portraying. Legendary actor Humphrey Bogart once said "How in the hell can you judge one actor over another? The only way to judge fairly is let each nominee do Hamlet." Which I can see his point there. Any acting race will always have different actors facing different challenges, resulting in different kinds of performances. Come to think of it, maybe all five of these nominees should've played the exact same character. Thus, they all at least would've had the same challenges.

I will say that had Kelli O'Hara won for The Bridges of Madison County, then it's likely that Kristin Chenoweth would've beaten her the following year for On the Twentieth Century. Although the latter at least has a Tony for You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown back in 1999, so she's taken care of. Meanwhile, Jessie Mueller would eventually become overdue herself at this point. There was no way she was ever gonna win for Waitress up against Cynthia Erivo in The Color Purple. I don't think she would've prevailed for Carousel up against Katrina Lenk given how strong The Band's Visit was with Tony voters. So in the end, be glad things worked out the way they did.

You can read more about it in the link below.
https://www.karereviews.net/tonys-flashback-best-lead-actress-in-a-musical-2014.html

For the record, I thought Jessie definitely deserved the win.

Updated On: 7/6/24 at 11:40 AM

I think she won because of how hard she worked. She was able to spin straw into gold. She elevated the very weak material and made it seem better than it was. The book has a Lifetime movie quality to it and only someone as skilled as Mueller can come off as earnest saying those words. She is excellent.


I would have loved to see her take on Mary in Merrily. And her Fanny Brice. And her Lovett.

If Bridges were a hit and remained open Kelli could potentially have won. 

To speak back to the original point (which may not be the case for Beautiful anyway), I feel like there are some roles where "the material does the work for them", which usually all but guarantees a nomination.  But even so the actor still has to put in a certain level of work and craft to really earn the award, and at the end of the day it does also come down to who their competition is.  

RippedMan said: "I didn’t see her but I agree with your point. I think a lot of people are blinded by the “they look and sound just like them” so it sort of stuns them. Much like Frost winning for MJ."

Yes, the Tony went to them just because they were the best look-alikes. 🙄

This person makes many ignorant/nonsensical statements. 

Updated On: 7/4/24 at 02:05 AM

Dylan Smith4 said: "WiCkEDrOcKS said: "FWIW, I would've voted for Kelli O'Hara, but regardless BroadwayFlash's unhinged and ill-informed posts on this board are driving me nuts."

Flash has been driving people nuts on here for quite some time! They've even resorted to DMing people who call them out now!"

And even their DMs are "Nonsensical."

The original post is so freaking dumb. Cant believe anyones actually dignified it with a proper response.

So maybe we stop responding to Flash's nonsensical postings. We are giving him or her exactly what they want. A reaction. They are getting off on the many responses they are getting to their stupid opinions.