Is Tootsie Closing Next? — Page 7

Audiences don't see shows because of Tony acting awards. They'll see stars. They don't care about awards, except Best Musical (and this year, Best Play).

I liked Tootsie well enough as a first-night-in-New-York musical comedy when I was glad we made it in time to see a show at all. It was enjoyable in the moment. But for those who haven't seen the show, that Tony performance illustrates its problem: It feels like an old show. The jokes are funny, but it's written and performed like a mostly clever sitcom. And in the end, Michael Dorsey - the main character - has no character arc. He's a jerk at the beginning. He's a jerk during the climactic scene. He's not even a terribly interesting jerk.

And as JBroadway observed on another thread:

"But I will say: the culture of “complaining about art” had a HUGE effect on this production. There’s no way this collection of white men would have put in such a strained, laborious, heavy-handed, overcompensating, sweat-dreanched effort into this story’s feminist themes, if not for the current climate and culture around criticizing the gender politics of media."

You can see the creatives trying very hard not to offend and to milk current sensitivities about gender for laughs (and often succeeding). But Tootsie neither works as a throwback comedy nor as a daring take-off to something new, because the plot creaks and often just doesn't work. (It is a failure of the book, for all its good one-liners, that two key second-act scenes fall completely flat while others succeed mostly because the actors make them work.) The "controversy" about Tootsie, which seems limited to social media and that one one theater publication, is ironic in part because the creative team was clearly going out of its way not to irritate anyone.

On the nights after seeing Tootsie, we saw revivals of My Fair Lady and Oklahoma!, and they felt much more daring and exciting. Those are the shows, along with Hadestown, that I'll remember from this year's New York City trip. I wouldn't really think about Tootsie except for the fact that people on this board keep bringing it up for other reasons. And here I am, contributing to the problem.

Audiences don't see shows because of Tony acting awards. They'll see stars. They don't care about awards, except Best Musical (and this year, Best Play).

Don't speak for anyone else other than yourself. That's fundamentally untrue anyways, many people go to shows to see the person who the Tony for acting.

Pose2 said: "Audiences don't see shows because of Tony acting awards. They'll see stars. They don't care about awards, except Best Musical (and this year, Best Play).

Don't speak for anyone else other than yourself. That's fundamentally untrue anyways, many people go to shows to see the person who the Tony for acting."

The Tootsie producers can't sell a show starring a well-reviewed, Tony-winning Best Actor performance. Why? Because not enough people want to see Tootsie, and Santino Fontana isn't a big enough star to draw crowds himself. And the number of people who feel compelled to see a show because it won Best Actor isn't large enough. It may include you. (Shoot, I read enough praise of Fontana's performance for that to influence my decision to see it.) But it's not about you or me. It's about the box office.

Why weren't audiences beating down the doors to see Stephanie J. Block in The Cher Show after she won? The show announced it was closing 16 days after her big win. Why? Because the producers knew Block's acting award wouldn't help the show.

Many years, shows with acting awards also win Best Musical, so those don't really count.

There are shows where an actor's presence in the show really does influence the box office. Bette Midler in Hello, Dolly or Bryan Cranston in Network. Shoot, they shut down the whole play when he went on vacation. But those are examples of star power, not a response to Tony awards.

A big box office hit usually does well because it can survive the loss of any stars. Ben Platt would probably be your best recent counterexample, but Dear Evan Hansen also won Best Musical and it's done just fine after his departure.

My point was never that nobody - not a single person - decides to see a show because it won acting awards. My point is that the box office numbers strongly suggest that acting awards don't matter to most ticket buyers. Do the people seeing Hamilton on Broadway these days even know who's in it, or care all that much? No, they're going to see Hamilton.

The biggest hits on Broadway right now are Hamilton, To Kill a Mockingbird, Moulin Rouge!, Ain't Too Proud, and Hadestown. I'll toss in Beetlejuice since it's doing better than expected. Between them, those six shows currently star two actors who won Tonys in supporting actor categories. The lack of acting award winners isn't hurting these shows at all.

Updated On: 8/11/19 at 02:00 AM