TONY AWARD disgrace!!! — Page 5

While there might have been a slight element of a Sondheim dig in Herman's statement, I think that MAINLY he was trying to say how happy he was that he and his style of "hummable" showtune writing was back and welcomed again by audiences and the Tonys. Remember he had had flop after flop since his last success with Mame, almost two decades before and conventional wisdom was that he was washed up and that his style of writing was too old-fashioned for the 80s. It wasn't just about Sondeim, it was that the Broadway of the 80s was a very different place that the Broadway of his heyday and he had been very depressed for years at the rejections he'd received in the late 60s, 70s and 80s because it seemed like he'd lost "it" and would never be a success again.

He really wondered whether time had passed him by and when he won for La Cage, it as, to him, a welcoming back by the theatre community after several years wandering the wilderness. He had and has no vendetta against Sondheim. Why should he? He could always take solace in the fact that his shows have also won Tonys and have run longer than anything Sondheim has ever written. His Tony speech had nothing to do with SITPWG and and everything to do with him being grateful that his style of writing was being honored and accepted again for the first time in many years.

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Updated On: 2/4/05 at 11:01 PM

InfiniteTheatre, I disagree - I think NINE is one of the most brilliant shows and definitely deserved it's wins.

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Munk... I don't feel like Nine winning was a disgrace on any level, don't get me wrong... I just think Dreamgirls is more deserving, but not by TOO much.

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I agree.

This thread has gotten me thinking about all the years that there was EXCITING competition. Even though more amazing people lose, it's SO great for the state of our favorite art!

Here's to hoping this season shapes up to be very competitive!!

(no matter what it means for our dear Norbert, Sherie, Raul, Sutton, etc...)

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Re the politics of why a show does or does not win, I cannot address here

In 1974, while living in Astoria, a small group of citizens (including yours truly) banded together to try & have a 3100 seat picture palace designated as a Landmark. I will not get into specific politics other than the party in power went out of its way to see the vote of Landmarks to preserve it was overturned & they sided with the developer. The theater was demolished & the community suffered. I was also involved in a similar effort in Flushing with the RKO Keiths. When I saw the same public official again siding with the developer, I walked away & soured on politics.

The moral of the story: If the theaters are in Manhattan & you have the right people behind you great. Anywhere else & without friends in high places, you are wasting your time. There was too much money to be made by knocking the theaters down so the hell with art & culture etc. Their is always a silver lining. The rest of the theaters are landmarked although developers can always find a way to get what they want. Penn Station was pounded to dust but as a result we got the Landmarks law & saved Grand Central

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Updated On: 2/5/05 at 09:05 AM

Sondheim's no nomination for the score of A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM (it did win for Best Musical!)

Jerry Herman's non nomination for MACK and MABEL

Debbie Allen's no nomination for RAISIN

Elaine Stritch's no nomination for SHOW BOAT (her role was rather ungrand, but there were, in the end, only two nominees for Best Actress in a musical that year) It was simply embarassing and cruel for the Tony committee not to nominate her that year, as well as Megan Mullaly from HOW TO SUCCEED....

the non nomination of the young Peter Allen (can't recall the boy's name) from THE BOY FROM OZ

THE SINGULAR WORST TONY DISGRACE??? well there are so many! WHEN THEY NOMINATE TWO PEOPLE TOGETHER! HOW MORONIC IS THAT?
They couldn't tell the performances apart from Ripley and Skinner in SIDESHOW so they nominated them together? They nominated the stars of SIZWE BANZI IS DEAD (sp?) as a "team" also and they won a joint best actor Tony. Was it, at the time, because they were black, or young? Or was the Tony commitee too lame to tell the performances apart. The double noms are simply moronic.

Lastly, when Mary Tyler Moore (I love the woman to pieces) replaced Tom Conti on Broadway in WHO'S LIFE IS IT ANYWAY the Tony commitee deemed that she WAS eligible for a Best Actress in a play nomination. She was not nominated. The Tony commitee awarded her a "special Tony" for "taking the ultimate theatrical risk." Huh???

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GODSPELL was an off Broadway production wasn't it. Perhaps at one time it moved to Broadway for a brief period. Was it ever Tony eligible?

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Sarah Brightman did not receive a Tony nomination for Phantom.

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Yes, Godspell was off broadway, but transfered to Broadway and remained for over a year. It must have been eligible, it was nominated for best score...but thats all

thanks for the information about A Chorus Line....indeed my coment was basically just off of the songs....

dry2olives,,,,,,,,weird stuff happens..........DRIVING MISS DAISY won the Best Picture Oscar without the director even being nominated for Best Director, simply absurd.

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Heather Headley winning was HARDLY a disgrace. For those of us that saw the performance, we understand without a doubt why she could beat out those other talented girls.

If we wanna talk absurd recent stuff...how did John Lithgow win over Gavin Creel, John Collum, Patrick Wilson, and John McMartin?

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