Grade the 2006 Tony Award musical performances

From A+ to F, as we did last year, let's grade the performances on this year's telecast.

Jersey Boys: B
The Color Purple: B+
The Wedding Singer: B
The Drowsy Chaperone: B+
The Threepenny Opera: C
The Pajama Game: B-
Sweeney Todd: B+

I thought all in all, this years' performances were quite good and pretty smooth sailing.

Jersey Boys: A
The Color Purple: B+
The Wedding Singer: A+
The Drowsy Chaperone: C+
The Threepenny Opera: C-
The Pajama Game: B
Sweeney Todd: B+

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Why didn't they spotlight La Chanze in The Color Purple? The song choice was poor.

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Jersey Boys: B
The Color Purple: C
The Wedding Singer: B
The Drowsy Chaperone: B
The Threepenny Opera: F
The Pajama Game: C
Sweeney Todd: D

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Updated On: 6/12/06 at 11:22 PM

Although I liked the recording of the Sweeney Todd revival, the show came across as thin, dull, and lifeless on the Tony Awards. And where was the tuba? I guess when you've seen Cariou as Sweeney, it's a little difficult to appreciate anyone else.

THE WEDDING SINGER performance totally exceeded my expectations. Was it brilliant? No. Was it great? Actually, yeah it was. It was energetic, adorable, entertaining, and it will definitely sell tickets. It was really very good.

Jersey Boys: A
The Color Purple: C+
The Wedding Singer: A+
The Drowsy Chaperone: A-
The Threepenny Opera: C-
The Pajama Game: C
Sweeney Todd: A-

And in defense of Sweeney Todd, each show is only given 4 minutes. Sweeney needed to speed things up a little in order to fit it all in. The Pajama Game & The Color Purple bored me. Still have no intentions of seeing either of them. And I can see why Threepenny Opera got such bad reviews. BORING! YIKES! The Wedding Singer looks like it's a lot of fun.

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I dont think "TCP" really had a choice.... if you spotlight LaChanze, she has to sing "I'm Here", and then you dont get the rest of the cast... I thought they handled it well.

Jersey Boys: A
The Color Purple: B
The Wedding Singer: B+
The Drowsy Chaperone: *will watch on tape later*
The Threepenny Opera: D
The Pajama Game: C+
Sweeney Todd: B

Jersey Boys: C
The Color Purple: B
The Wedding Singer: A
The Drowsy Chaperone: B
The Threepenny Opera: B+
The Pajama Game: C
Sweeney Todd: A+

I'm not even gonna lie: Wedding Singer, regardless of what I think of the whole show, rocked the house.

Sweeney is one of the best productions I've seen in years, but I didn't care for this arrangement.

Color Purple sound beautiful. I liked 3Penny, but I'm curious why they chose that song. It didn't capture me.

Pajama Game was fun, but I was constantly distracted by the blonde girl with the bouncing head behind Harry.

Drowsy Chaperone was awesome. Even after bouncing, twirling, and flipping over the whole stage, Sutton sounded as wonderful as ever. Bob Martin was funny, too.

Updated On: 6/11/06 at 11:27 PM

The performances were great!

The Drowsy Chaperone- A. Sutton was great and that was one of my favorite numbers from the show.

Sweeney Todd- B. I love this show to death, but the execution of the performance could have been a little better, it wasn't really fluent, and seemed sort of rushed.

The Wedding Singer- A. Great choice of song (but obvious!). Stephen seemed a bit nervous, but pulled it together and the cast was energetic as always, nothing beats the exhilaration of seeing it live though!

The Threepenny Opera- B-. Ummmmm...both Alan Cumming and Cyndi Lauper are great, but the choice of song was bad. They should have done a medley that included "The Ballad of Mack The Knife".

Jersey Boys- A+. John Lloyd Young is fantastic! I know this combination has been done before on talk show after talk show, but it just gets better and better all the time, this show deserved best musical because it has both a gripping story and the great music of Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons as well!

The Pajama Game- B-. I did not like the way it was done! It seemed completely rushed! Hernando's Hideaway is great in the production and on the Tonys it seemed wasted because of all of the missing humor with Megan Lawrence. Overall disappointment with the exception of Kelli O'Hara who is amazing in everything she does.

The Color Purple- I'm not giving it a letter grade because I will probably be criticized like mad. In my opinion, it was boring as hell!(Fell asleep during the show!) I went with my girlfriend and I pretty much fell asleep in the first 30 minutes. LaChanze has a great voice, but sorry, Patti deserved it in my opinion.

Overall, great show, with the exception of the abysmal opening number!

Updated On: 6/11/06 at 11:29 PM

I LOVED Wedding Singer and Drowsy! Jersey Boys was a pleasant surprise as well. Sweeney Todd's performance was...horrible. LOVED the show, but hated the song choice for the medley (like somebody earlier said). Threepenny was kind of creepy. I'd love to see it though...that's weird. aaand...Pajama Game was nice. Not my kind of musical, but nice energy. The Color Purple was alright. It didn't make much sense to me why they didn't pick a better song for LaChanze. She didn't sing until the last minute of it, it seemed--and that wasn't even by herself--she was a little bit mixed in with the rest of the TCP ensemble. I really hope that performance of Wedding Singer helps sell tickets. It needs it! Sutton has amazing stage presence. I'm in love with her now. lol

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