‘Spring Awakening’ and ‘Coast of Utopia’ Rack Up Tony Awards
The 61st annual Tony Awards last night showed a particular fondness for the 19th century with “Spring Awakening,” about sexually frustrated German teenagers from that era, winning the bulk of the early musical awards while “The Coast of Utopia,” Tom Stoppard’s epic period trilogy about Russian intellectuals, set a record for the most awards won by a play in Tony history.
“Coast,” an eight-and-a-half-hour epic, produced by Lincoln Center Theater, won best play, best director, best featured actor and actress, and several design awards. “Spring Awakening” won best book, score, direction and choreography and best featured actor in a musical.
And in the night’s highest-profile nail-biter, Julie White of “The Little Dog Laughed” won best leading actress in a play, beating out acting legends like Vanessa Redgrave (“The Year of Magical Thinking”) and Angela Lansbury (“Deuce”), as well as the actresses Swoosie Kurtz (“Heartbreak House”) and Eve Best (“A Moon for the Misbegotten”) whose performances received raves.
“Oh, my God,” Ms. White said. “You Tony voters, what a bunch of wacky crazy kids!”
“To be nominated with such extraordinary women: I never imagined I would be on a list like this unless it was for dinner reservations at Angus,” she said, referring to a well-known Broadway hangout. “And then to get the tchotchke.”
Frank Langella won the Tony for best actor in a play for his portrayal of Richard Nixon in Peter Morgan’s comedy-thriller-docudrama “Frost/Nixon.” The category was a particularly strong one this year, featuring critically acclaimed performances by Christopher Plummer, Liev Schreiber, Boyd Gaines and Brian F. O’Byrne, but Mr. Langella had long been the favorite.
Unlike the play categories, which were dominated by one show, the musical categories were a bit more varied. “Spring” was followed in its victory count by another unconventional Off Broadway transfer, “Grey Gardens,” a musical about the eccentric mother and daughter, Edith Bouvier Beale and little Edie Beale.
“I want to thank you all for embracing the two little engines that could, ‘Spring Awakening’ and ‘Grey Gardens,’ ” said the designer William Ivey Long upon receiving the award for his “Grey Gardens” costumes. “This really is encouraging for all the regional theaters, all the little basement theaters.”
Accepting his award for the score of “Spring Awakening,” the composer Duncan Sheik, who cut his teeth in the world of popular music before writing for theater, said to the show’s producers: “Thank you for letting this live. You did a very cool thing. And musical theater rocks.”
Michael Mayer won best director for the show, and Bill T. Jones won best choreography. The show also picked up the best featured actor in a musical award, for John Gallagher Jr., who played the suffering, shock-headed Moritz.
Mr. Gallagher made his Broadway debut just last year; Mary Louise Wilson, who won best featured actress in a musical for her portrayal of Big Edie Beale in “Grey Gardens,” first appeared on Broadway in 1963. This was her first Tony.
“I used to wonder, if I ever won one of these things, would I feel like there was a mistake made, would I feel that way?” she said, looking down at her award. “And — I don’t.”
”Company,” John Doyle’s stark adaptation of the Stephen Sondheim-George Furth’s 1970 musical about marriage and its discontents, won best revival of a musical.
There were echoes of last year in this category, when Mr. Doyle’s radical interpretation of Mr. Sondheim’s “Sweeney Todd” was up against (but lost to) “The Pajama Game,” a more faithful revival. This year “Company,” which has struggled at the box office, found itself up against — and eventually prevailed over — the revival of “A Chorus Line,” a faithfully restored musical and a box office hit.
The play awards were anything but varied in the early going, with “Coast” picking up every award in sight. Billy Crudup won for best featured actor in a play for his portrayal of the literary critic Vissarion Belinsky, while Jennifer Ehle won her second Tony for portraying three different characters in the three parts of “Coast.” Jack O’Brien won best director.
“Now let’s have no more nonsense about the state of the American theater,” Mr. O’Brien said.
“Journey’s End,” R. C. Sherriff’s World War I drama, which first appeared on Broadway in 1929, won best revival of a play, just hours after it closed following months of anemic sales.
“First, let me put down immediately a widespread rumor,” said Bill Haber, one of the lead producers. “The show did not bankrupt me.”
In the special theatrical event race, referred to by wags around Broadway as the dummy versus the drag queen, “Jay Johnson: The Two and Only,” a show featuring a ventriloquist, beat out “Kiki & Herb Alive on Broadway,” a show featuring a cabaret duo (of which Kiki was the drag part).
In a ceremony that took place before the live broadcast, the awards for orchestration, set, costume and lighting design were given out by the cast of “Jersey Boys,” two of whom won Tonys last year. “The Coast of Utopia” took all three categories on the play side, as, given the scale of the project, had been predicted.
The musical side was mixed, with “Grey Gardens” taking the award for costume design, “Mary Poppins,” Disney’s stage adaptation of the 1964 movie musical, taking set design and “Spring Awakening” taking lighting design and orchestration.
That means that Bob Crowley, who designed the set for “Mary Poppins” and, with Scott Pask, the set for “The Coast of Utopia,” took home two Tony Awards, one for a play and one for a musical.
“This is slightly indecent, actually,” Mr. Crowley said, upon picking up his award for “Poppins.” “I’m completely gobsmacked.”
The show’s broadcast kicked off with Marvin Hamlisch playing his well-known opening chords of “One,” from “A Chorus Line,” currently in revival, segueing into that show’s opening number, “I Hope I Get It” and then the famous gold kick line.
The Tony Awards ceremony, broadcast from Radio City Music Hall, is the last hurrah of the Broadway season, which was crowded and unusually eclectic this year. Though there was no monster new hit — “Mary Poppins” being the only show that came close — Broadway as a whole continued to flourish, setting a new record for paid attendance with 12.3 million people. That’s an increase of 2.6 percent from the previous year, according to the League of American Theaters and Producers. Ticket sales grew at much higher rate, up 8.9 percent to $939 million from $862 million. The discrepancy is due in large part to increasing ticket prices, including the now prevalent “premium” tickets, which can go for as much as $350.
The Tony Awards are voted on by 785 producers, journalists, union officials and other industry professionals. They are presented by the league and the American Theater Wing, a nonprofit service organization that created the Tonys in 1947.
The ratings for the Tonys have traditionally been less than impressive, a problem made worse this year with the broadcast up against the final episode of “The Sopranos” on HBO. An idea was floated this year to include musical numbers from shows that weren’t nominated — traditionally excluded from performing at the ceremony — but the plan was rejected. For the second year there was no master of ceremonies, but a rotating cast of presenters, including Harvey Fierstein, Felicity Huffman and Usher.
At the prebroadcast ceremony the Alliance Theater in Atlanta was given the annual regional theater award, the only recognition for work outside Broadway.
The Coast of Utopia picked up Tony Awards for, from left, Best Direction of a Play, Jack O'Brien; Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play, Jennifer Ehle; and Best Featured Actor in a Play, Billy Crudup.
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON
Published: June 11, 2007
“Coast,” an eight-and-a-half-hour epic, produced by Lincoln Center Theater, won best play, best director, best featured actor and actress, and several design awards. “Spring Awakening” won best book, score, direction and choreography and best featured actor in a musical.
And in the night’s highest-profile nail-biter, Julie White of “The Little Dog Laughed” won best leading actress in a play, beating out acting legends like Vanessa Redgrave (“The Year of Magical Thinking”) and Angela Lansbury (“Deuce”), as well as the actresses Swoosie Kurtz (“Heartbreak House”) and Eve Best (“A Moon for the Misbegotten”) whose performances received raves.
“Oh, my God,” Ms. White said. “You Tony voters, what a bunch of wacky crazy kids!”
“To be nominated with such extraordinary women: I never imagined I would be on a list like this unless it was for dinner reservations at Angus,” she said, referring to a well-known Broadway hangout. “And then to get the tchotchke.”
Frank Langella won the Tony for best actor in a play for his portrayal of Richard Nixon in Peter Morgan’s comedy-thriller-docudrama “Frost/Nixon.” The category was a particularly strong one this year, featuring critically acclaimed performances by Christopher Plummer, Liev Schreiber, Boyd Gaines and Brian F. O’Byrne, but Mr. Langella had long been the favorite.
Unlike the play categories, which were dominated by one show, the musical categories were a bit more varied. “Spring” was followed in its victory count by another unconventional Off Broadway transfer, “Grey Gardens,” a musical about the eccentric mother and daughter, Edith Bouvier Beale and little Edie Beale.
“I want to thank you all for embracing the two little engines that could, ‘Spring Awakening’ and ‘Grey Gardens,’ ” said the designer William Ivey Long upon receiving the award for his “Grey Gardens” costumes. “This really is encouraging for all the regional theaters, all the little basement theaters.”
Accepting his award for the score of “Spring Awakening,” the composer Duncan Sheik, who cut his teeth in the world of popular music before writing for theater, said to the show’s producers: “Thank you for letting this live. You did a very cool thing. And musical theater rocks.”
Michael Mayer won best director for the show, and Bill T. Jones won best choreography. The show also picked up the best featured actor in a musical award, for John Gallagher Jr., who played the suffering, shock-headed Moritz.
Mr. Gallagher made his Broadway debut just last year; Mary Louise Wilson, who won best featured actress in a musical for her portrayal of Big Edie Beale in “Grey Gardens,” first appeared on Broadway in 1963. This was her first Tony.
“I used to wonder, if I ever won one of these things, would I feel like there was a mistake made, would I feel that way?” she said, looking down at her award. “And — I don’t.”
”Company,” John Doyle’s stark adaptation of the Stephen Sondheim-George Furth’s 1970 musical about marriage and its discontents, won best revival of a musical.
There were echoes of last year in this category, when Mr. Doyle’s radical interpretation of Mr. Sondheim’s “Sweeney Todd” was up against (but lost to) “The Pajama Game,” a more faithful revival. This year “Company,” which has struggled at the box office, found itself up against — and eventually prevailed over — the revival of “A Chorus Line,” a faithfully restored musical and a box office hit.
The play awards were anything but varied in the early going, with “Coast” picking up every award in sight. Billy Crudup won for best featured actor in a play for his portrayal of the literary critic Vissarion Belinsky, while Jennifer Ehle won her second Tony for portraying three different characters in the three parts of “Coast.” Jack O’Brien won best director.
“Now let’s have no more nonsense about the state of the American theater,” Mr. O’Brien said.
“Journey’s End,” R. C. Sherriff’s World War I drama, which first appeared on Broadway in 1929, won best revival of a play, just hours after it closed following months of anemic sales.
“First, let me put down immediately a widespread rumor,” said Bill Haber, one of the lead producers. “The show did not bankrupt me.”
In the special theatrical event race, referred to by wags around Broadway as the dummy versus the drag queen, “Jay Johnson: The Two and Only,” a show featuring a ventriloquist, beat out “Kiki & Herb Alive on Broadway,” a show featuring a cabaret duo (of which Kiki was the drag part).
In a ceremony that took place before the live broadcast, the awards for orchestration, set, costume and lighting design were given out by the cast of “Jersey Boys,” two of whom won Tonys last year. “The Coast of Utopia” took all three categories on the play side, as, given the scale of the project, had been predicted.
The musical side was mixed, with “Grey Gardens” taking the award for costume design, “Mary Poppins,” Disney’s stage adaptation of the 1964 movie musical, taking set design and “Spring Awakening” taking lighting design and orchestration.
That means that Bob Crowley, who designed the set for “Mary Poppins” and, with Scott Pask, the set for “The Coast of Utopia,” took home two Tony Awards, one for a play and one for a musical.
“This is slightly indecent, actually,” Mr. Crowley said, upon picking up his award for “Poppins.” “I’m completely gobsmacked.”
The show’s broadcast kicked off with Marvin Hamlisch playing his well-known opening chords of “One,” from “A Chorus Line,” currently in revival, segueing into that show’s opening number, “I Hope I Get It” and then the famous gold kick line.
The Tony Awards ceremony, broadcast from Radio City Music Hall, is the last hurrah of the Broadway season, which was crowded and unusually eclectic this year. Though there was no monster new hit — “Mary Poppins” being the only show that came close — Broadway as a whole continued to flourish, setting a new record for paid attendance with 12.3 million people. That’s an increase of 2.6 percent from the previous year, according to the League of American Theaters and Producers. Ticket sales grew at much higher rate, up 8.9 percent to $939 million from $862 million. The discrepancy is due in large part to increasing ticket prices, including the now prevalent “premium” tickets, which can go for as much as $350.
The Tony Awards are voted on by 785 producers, journalists, union officials and other industry professionals. They are presented by the league and the American Theater Wing, a nonprofit service organization that created the Tonys in 1947.
The ratings for the Tonys have traditionally been less than impressive, a problem made worse this year with the broadcast up against the final episode of “The Sopranos” on HBO. An idea was floated this year to include musical numbers from shows that weren’t nominated — traditionally excluded from performing at the ceremony — but the plan was rejected. For the second year there was no master of ceremonies, but a rotating cast of presenters, including Harvey Fierstein, Felicity Huffman and Usher.
At the prebroadcast ceremony the Alliance Theater in Atlanta was given the annual regional theater award, the only recognition for work outside Broadway.
The Coast of Utopia picked up Tony Awards for, from left, Best Direction of a Play, Jack O'Brien; Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play, Jennifer Ehle; and Best Featured Actor in a Play, Billy Crudup.
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON
Published: June 11, 2007
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