Sunday, February 28, 2010

Vanya Updated

Variety is reporting that Ralph Fiennes will appear onstage in Dear Uncle, a play by Alan Ayckbourn that is based on Chekhov's Uncle Vanya.  Read the full article at the link below.

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118015837.html?categoryid=15&cs=1&ref=vertlegit

The Featured Actors

My next four entries relating to awards prognostication will be about the featured/supporting actors and actresses.  To start, I will talk about the featured actors in plays.  The five performances I've picked here are what I believe to be the five best performances of the year by any featured actor this year and, on many of them, the critics seem to have agreed.

Eric Bogosian, Time Stands Still
Brooks Ashmanskas, Present Laughter
Reg Rogers, The Royal Family
Michael Cristoger, A View From the Bridge
Santino Fontana, Brighton Beach Memoirs

These performances are above and beyond some of the greatest performances this year, and think the Tony will agree.  Santino Fontana and Reg Rogers will have the "closed show" factor working against them, so we may see an upset from someone like Anthony Mackie or Sam Rockwell from A Behanding in Spokane in the mix on May 4th.  On the outside, we may even see Jon Michael Hill, the young man at the center of Superior Donuts, getting a nomination here, though his chances are slim because of "closed show syndrome" and because, while he gave just as strong a performance as the others, he wasn't as buzzed about as the other five were.

Other shows with potential for nomination in this category are Next Fall, Enron, Looped, Lend Me a Tenor, Fences, Collected Stories, and Lips Together, Teeth Apart.  I doubt, however, that any of these shows will be high on the list to receive many nominations, if any at all.

Saturday, February 27, 2010

More Leading Ladies

This year is a great one for leading ladies in the musical theater, with a large number of showy roles for women and many great pairings of character and actress.  As far as I can tell at the moment, there are at least nine potential nominees in this category to be whittled down to five by May 4th and, as things sit right now, all but two will still be running at that time, giving the field some good competition.  The one hitch in my system is that four of the musicals in which I think there is good potential for a leading actress nomination have yet to open on Broadway and, therefor, I can't yet tell how well they compete against what I already know.  That being the case, I (as always) would like to give the caveat that these predictions are subject to change once the remaining shows of the season open and more information becomes available.  The list of women whom I believe to have the potential for nomination are:

Holley Farmer, Come Fly Away
Vanessa Williams or Barbara Cook, Sondheim on Sondheim
Kristen Chenoweth, Promises, Promises
Bebe Neuwirth, The Addams Family
Catherine Zeta-Jones, A Little Night Music
Kate Baldwin, Finian's Rainbow
Christiane Noll, Ragtime
Montego Glover, Memphis


The first five women on this list are in shows that have yet to open, while the last four appeared in shows that HAVE opened.  Of this list, Catherine Zeta-Jones receiving a nomination is as sure a thing as can be found in this category.  A major Hollywood star in her Broadway debut giving a highly praised performance in the first Broadway revival of a Sondheim classic in a role whose original star won the Tony in the first Broadway incarnation of the show -- sounds like a nomination to me!  The other performance that I can only imagine to be a sure thing is Bebe Neuwirth as Morticia Addams.  A two time Tony winner and a beloved performer, Ms. Neuwirth certainly has the talent, and is such a stellar match for the part of Morticia Addams that I can't imagine her not being nominated, even though her show hasn't opened.  Montego Glover is getting my third nod because she made one heck of a Broadway debut in a major musical and held her own opposite other stellar performances in the show.

The other two nominations are a bit up for grabs.  Kate Baldwin was terrific in Finian's Rainbow, but could easily be trumped by Barbara Cook or Kristen Chenoweth.  Christiane Noll was highly praised by the critics and audiences alike (at least the audience in attendance when I saw the show) in her role as Mother in Ragtime, but will the fact that the show has closed work against her?  We all know that Vanessa Williams and has talent, but will it be enough to get her a nomination?  While Barbara Cook is one of our most beloved gems, will the nominators want to pass the torch to the younger generation of stars?  And, lastly, can lightning strike twice for Twyla Tharp's dancers in getting Tony nominations as actors?  Time will have to tell once the rest of the season opens, but for the moment, I am filling the remaining two slots with actresses in shows that have opened -- Christiane Noll and Kate Baldwin, knowing full well that these will be the first to go if any of the others turn out to be better than they.

Friday, February 26, 2010

Doogie Howser ... Director?

According to Broadway.com, it appears that Neil Patrick Harris will be directing a staged concert version of Rent this August in conjunction with the Rose Bowl.  For full details, see the Broadway.com article.

http://www.broadway.com/buzz/neil-patrick-harris-stage-rent-hollywood-bowl-summer-2010/

The Leading Ladies

This year has been an interesting year for leading ladies in plays, with many major performances relegated to the featured actress category, including Jessica Hecht and Scarlett Johansson in A View From the Bridge, Abigail Breslin in The Miracle Worker, and Rosemary Harris in The Royal Family.  There has also been an onslaught of male driven plays this year, including Superior Donuts, A Steady Rain, RaceHamlet, and Next Fall -- plays in which there were either no women at all or none so prominent as to be eligible for lead actress status.

That being the case, I will start off with the list of who I predict will be nominated and will then talk about the others who are eligible but will not, as far as I can guess, be nominated without major changes in buzz.

My first choice is Valerie Harper in Looped -- the play about a drunken Tallulah Bankhead rerecording, or looping, a line of dialogue for what would become her last film.  This is a wonderful, juicy character for an actress, and the kind of part that Broadway just loves to talk about.  This being the sixth play about the dahling actress to come to Broadway, I would have to agree that Broadway's interest in this character is still alive and healthy -- and that the nominators are morel likely than not to nominate Valerie Harper, a well respected actress who was praised out of town as being better than the play itself, for playing her.

Another of our community's greatest actresses, Laura Linney, came back to the boards this year in one of her most praised performances yet in Time Stands Still.  Ms. Linney is unique in feeling a responsibility to return to the stage every so often, and we love her for it.  Add to that her talent and the extent to which she was praised, it all adds up to a nomination in my book.

Alison Pill will be bringing Anne Bancroft's role in The Miracle Worker back to Broadway in the first ever revival of this classic William Gibson play.  This is a relatively demanding, difficult part to play well due to the language barrier between Annie Sullivan (Ms. Pill's character) and Helen Keller, the character with whom she spends the most stage time.  Ms. Pill, a previous Tony nominee for her performance in The Lieutenant of Inishmore, has become a relatively regular face in the New York theater scene and is fast gaining a positive reputation for doing good work.  Add to the mix that the character Alison will be playing is one that won Anne Bancroft both the Tony AND the Oscar -- one of only eight performances ever to do so and I think a nomination is in order.

Next up is Laurie Metcalf for Brighton Beach Memoirs.  While I think a win here would be a long shot, the nomination would be reminiscent of Mary Louise Parker in Reckless and Laura Linney in Sight Unseen -- a solid, well received performance by a great actress in a play that closed months ago.  Unlike those other two performances, this year the playing field in this category is more level.  In 2005, Linney and Parker were up against Cherry Jones in Doubt, Kathleen Turner in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, and Phylicia Rashad in Gem of the Ocean -- a high bar to meet and VERY steep competition.

My last nomination pick this year goes to Jan Maxwell in The Royal Family.  This was a diva performance in the best of ways and Maxwell deserves to win for playing Julie Cavendish -- a variation of the great Ethel Barrymore.  Maxwell is a rare form of Broadway star who can star in plays or musicals, comedy or drama, and draw your attention every time.  With two previous Tony nominations under her belt, a third nomination is certainly in the future for her in what I think is the best performance of the season.

There are two other contenders who are on my radar as having potential in this category (even if that potential is slim): Laura Benanti for In the Next Room ... or the Vibrator Play and Megan Mullally in Lips Together, Teeth Apart.  While Laura, a Tony winner for the most recent revival of Gypsy, is well loved in the community, this performance was not singled out by anyone as being special the same way that the other performances have been.  Also, her show closed long enough ago that, without the shining review that some of the others in this category have, it will be relatively difficult for her to be nominated this time around.  As for Megan, another well loved performer, I would like to see what is said about her and her show before predicting her for anything.  That being said, however, I have difficulty seeing anything stand out as much as the five performances I have discussed above.  The only possibility I can see in store for Megan is that her show will still be running come nomination time, and THAT may give her a slight edge over, for example, Laurie Metcalf.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

The Stage or the Red Carpet? What is a girl to do?

I just read a great article on the NY Times website about the wonderful Amy Morton, a member of Chicago's Steppenwolf Theater Company, who discusses her preference foe the theater over the red carpet.  Here's the link.  Enjoy!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/21/us/21cncmorton.html?ref=theater

More Leading Men

A few days ago, I wrote about the leading men in plays, so I would like to follow that up today by writing about the leading men in musicals.  This year, this category (and, in fact, all the acting categories for musicals) looks pretty easy because there are enough shows this that do not lend themselves clearly to showcasing individuals in a traditional way.  In particular, I am thinking this way about American Idiot, Come Fly Away, and Sondheim on Sondheim, for which I cannot imagine ANY acting nominations coming to light.  In Bye Bye Birdie, we have John Stamos who starred in a terrible production and who gave a performance to match the show he was in -- no likelihood of a nomination there.  And while Finian's Rainbow had a number of stellar FEATURED performances, neither of the leading men (Cheyenne Jackson and Jim Norton) was good strong enough for a nomination.  As for Million Dollar Quartet and the revival of Promises, Promises, while they likely have some good roles for actors, I think the shows themselves are too much in the wildcard category for me to predict what will come of them in terms of actors ... especially given the strength of the other shows about which we already have good information.

That being said, it seems pretty clear that Sahr Ngaujah of Fela! is going to get a best actor nomination.  The character of Fela is a demanding role in this year's biggest new blockbuster, in a performance that was praised by everyone I've spoken to about it.

Next up is Chad Kimball in Memphis.  Having done my research, I found out that Kimball's character in the show, Huey Calhoun, is based on real-life Memphis DJ "Daddy-O" Dewey Phillips, whose rise to fame (and subsequent fall) is relatively close to what was portrayed in the musical.  Phillips' substance abuse, mannerisms, and voice were exactly as we saw Kimball perform them.  While we may not have known much about the man behind the character before knowing of this musical, the same can be said of Christine Ebersole's most recent Tony winning role -- Edith Beale, and it is no overstatement to say that Kimball channels his character just as well as Ebersole did hers.

Next up is Quentin Earl Darrington in Ragtime.  With the strong reviews this show got, especially for its actors, Darrington was singled out as among the better performances in this show.  Also, in the previous production of Ragtime on Broadway, Brian Stokes Mitchell received a Tony nomination for the same role.  While the show closed too early to guarantee him a win, Darrington has a strong shot at a nomination this year.

Then we get to Nathan Lane in The Addams Family.  This show is looking to be a big spectacle, and is a highly anticipated entry in the current Broadway season, which gives this show a good chance come time for nominations.  Lane is a recurring and beloved face in the New York theater scene and a somewhat frequent nominee for his work in musicals.  Also, how much more perfectly could the role of Gomez Addams have been cast than with Mr. Lane?  His looks and talents are so clearly suited to the role that not to nominate him would be a crime!

Last in this category is Alexander Hanson, who plays Fredrik Egerman in A Little Night Music.  He is the only member of the London production to have transferred with the production to Broadway, and it is easy to see why.  He performs the complex music with apparent ease and conveys the conflict within the character quite well -- a difficult character overall that he pulls of in style.  There is also the history that Len Cariou, who played the role in the original broadway production, was also nominated.  Most importantly, however, the fact that he is able to hold his own against the likes of Angela Lansbury and Catherine Zeta-Jones is no small consideration.

There are two potential monkey wrenches into this system which will have to wait to be seen once the productions actually open before I can tell if they are good enough to knock any of my predictions off the list.  The first (which I highly doubt to come true, but to whom I want to give the benefit of that  doubt) is Sean Hayes in Promises, Promises in the same role for which theater vet Jerry Orbach won his Tony over forty years ago.  The other (who might actually have a chance) is Douglas Hodge in La Cage Aux Folles.  It's a very showy role that won George Hearn his first Tony and gave Gary Beach an additional nomination.  On this one, I will have to feel out the buzz and the politics over the coming few months before officially giving him a nomination prediction.

High Flying Adored ... and Coming Back to Broadway

An upcoming revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Evita", the show that made Patti LuPone a star in 1979, will be coming back to Broadway.  Directed by Michael Grandage, the artistic director of the Donmar Warehouse who directed the 2006 London revival, will helm this production which will bring that production's star Elena Roger to our shores as Eva Peron.  According to the announcement in the New York Times, producers are looking for a household name for the role of Che.  The production is likely to appear in the spring of the 2011-2012 season.

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

"Short Eyes" to Return to Main Stem

Variety has reported that indie filmmaker Abel Ferrara will direct a revival of Miguel Pinero's 1974 play "Short Eye."  Marking the director's Broadway debut, the production is looking to open in the 2010-2011 Broadway season.  For full details, see the article at Variety's website.

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118015665.html?categoryid=15&cs=1&ref=bd_legit

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

The Leading Men

Today, I'll talk about half of the leading men in discussing the Leading Actor in a Play category.  (Not to worry -- I will discuss the musicals' leading men in another post in a few days).

Starting out on the non-musical side, there is a large number of potential nominees.  There are Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman from A Steady Rain and Bill Pullman of Oleanna, none of whom have any chance because of how poorly reviewed they were in their performances.  Any potential nominees from After Miss Julie or Brighton Beach Memoirs left the boards too long ago to be remembered.  Denzel Washington in Fences and possibly others from Next FallLend Me A Tenor and Lips Together, Teeth Apart may have a chance, but these will have to wait to be seen.  My thought right now, however, is that it would be difficult for any of them to compete with those already in the mix.  Then there are Michael Cerveris for In the Next Room ... or the Vibrator Play, James Spader in Race, Michael McKean from Superior Donuts, Christopher Walken in A Behanding in Spokane, and Jude Law from Hamlet who all gave much buzzed about performances that are, in my opinion, in the middle of the set.  Last, there are the sure things.  Liev Schreiber in A View From the Bridge, Present Laughter's Victor Garber, and Brian d'Arcy James in Time Stands Still.  These last three were singled out as absolutely outstanding by everyone I've spoken to about these shows, and the critical buzz for them was also quite high.

So, which of the middle pack am I picking for nominations?  I think that, for the remaining two slots, Michael Cerveris has little to no chance for two reasons.  1) Though he is a well respected Broadway veteran, he has already won a Tony, so there is no pressure to nominate him again this year.  2)  This performance was in a play that had only a luke warm reception and has long since closed -- it's not clear that anyone really will remember this one.  I also think that James Spader is an unlikely candidate for a nomination because, while he got a few good reviews and has the chance to be one of the few eligible performances still going come nomination time, he hasn't been singled out in any big way.

That leaves me with three potential nominees to fill the two remaining slots in this category -- Christopher Walken, Michael McKean, and Jude Law.  Christopher Walken has the advantage of being in a production that is more recent and that the nominators are more likely to remember, as well as the great respect the community has for him.  Law and McKean have the disadvantage of having starred in productions that closed, but both got good (but not great) reviews.  The last time that Hamlet played Broadway, it starred Ralph Feinnes, who ultimately won the Tony for the role of the great Dane.  I am not entirely sure how that will affect Law's chances of a nomination, especially considering that Feinnes is the only actor to have played Hamlet even to be nominated for a Tony -- and there have been eleven Broadway productions of the show since the Tonys first began in 1947.  Jude Law is by no means as well respected in the theater as he is in Hollywood, unlike Michael McKean, who has become a theater darling in the last few years with great performances in Hairspray, The Homecoming, and The Pajama Game (which scored him a supporting actor Tony nomination) under his belt.  Based on their respectability within the community, ultimately I think these last two slots will go to Walken and McKean, with Law and Spader in position to threaten these spots.  (This is a slight change from my previous predictions, which I am in the process of updating.  I will likely post my new predictions at the end of the week, by which point I expect to have processed some new information.)  This makes my list of predictions as follows:


Lead Actor in a Play
Brian d’Arcy James, Time Stands Still
Victor Garber, Present Laughter
Liev Schreiber, A View From the Bridge
Christopher Walken, A Behanding in Spokane
Michael McKean, Superior Donuts
Major Threats: Jude Law, Hamlet, James Spader, Race

West Side Redux?

It looks as though New York may be seeing a new musical based on William Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet.  Given the title The Last Goodbye, the rock musical will feature the songs of the late Jeff Buckley and is eyeing a premier in the 2010-2011 season.  for full details, see the article at Broadway.com.

http://www.broadway.com/buzz/romeo-and-juliet-musical-last-goodbye-set-jeff-buckley-tunes-may-debut-next-season/

Hail to the Prince!

Harold Prince, one of the most prolific director/producers in Broadway history, "will receive the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center's annual award for achievement in the theater," The New York Times reports today.  Prince, who has won 21 Tony Awards over his long career, is known for his work on a number of Sondheim musicals, including Company, Follies, and Sweeney Todd.  As the fates would have it, Stephen Sondheim himself will be on board at the April 5th gala dinner to present Prince with the prize.  For more information on the prize and the O'Neill Center, check out their website at theoneill.org.

Monday, February 22, 2010

Gay Theater About Politics or Love?

I just found another great article on the NY Times website that appears as though it will be printed in tomorrow morning's paper.  The article talks about the development of gay theater over the past 20 or so years, from the AIDS era through gay marriage.  A great read.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/23/theater/23gaytheater.html?hp

Revivals Galore

I just finished getting through the Sunday New York Times and read an interesting article that talked about the economics of revivals, with particular reference to the increased frequency of certain shows coming back.  (For example, Gypsy and La Cage Aux Folles were back this year 5 years after the previous productions of each closed.)  I strongly recommend that all my readers look at this article because it explains a lot of how Broadway works in terms of what things are produced versus not and how that might affect what occurs come Tony time.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/21/theater/21revivals.html?ref=theater

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Christopher Walken

I just got to reading todays New York Times Arts & Leisure section and read a great profile of Christopher Walken.  Promoting the upcoming production of the new play A Behanding in Spokane by Martin McDonagh, the article gave me more insight into the play and how good a fit it appears Walken will be.  Somehow, I think I will have to sneak him into my nomination predictions.  The tough part will be deciding who to take off the list in order to include him.  Hmmm...

Orchestrations

I noticed a slight problem in the way my post about orchestrations from yesterday was published, so I thought I'd try again.  This is an interesting category in that, while orchestrators don't really compose any music, they DO turn most of the music they receive into what we hear when we go to the show.  After the composer gives them little more than the tune and lyrics for each song (and maybe some basic chord progressions underneath that), it is the orchestrator's job to create everything the orchestra plays and decides how large of an orchestra to have (along with that instrumentation that orchestra will contain).  This becomes an interesting task in the case of revivals or jukebox musicals because, in these cases, they are reworking music with which we are already familiar.  With that in mind, here are my nomination predictions for the Best Orchestrations category.

Fela!
A Little Night Music
Ragtime
Million Dollar Quartet

I have chosen Fela! and Million Dollar Quartet because they are two musicals which are all about the music -- and music with which we are not necessarily all that familiar, but which I think we are going to leave the theater humming and appreciating more.  I also think there is a good chance that, after seeing these shows, or even in preparation for seeing them, people will research the original recordings from which these shows take their scores.  Translating this music into something medium-appropriate will be quite a challenge and, I think, quite rewarding come May 4th.  As for Ragtime and A Little Night Music, these are two well received productions with lush scores which sounded better than ever in these productions.  The clear major threat in this category is Finian's Rainbow because of the large orchestra and old-fashioned sound that the M-G-M production values provide.  Memphis is the other logical show to consider in this category.  While, on the one hand, the music felt right and sounded of its time, the songs were rather formulaic and were simply standard rock or blues songs.  So, while this can't entirely be counted out here, it is not high on my list.

Memphis

I just got back a little while ago from seeing "Memphis" and was an interesting experience.  This show clearly has a lot of potential and lives up to most of it, but the lack of that last bit was important.  The transitions were sloppy, the songs formulaic, and the scenes dragged in places.  Also, the design of the show, especially the lights, seemed a bit indulgent -- spectacle for spectacle's sake without any other clear motivation for it.  In other words, I was entertained but never wowed, though I felt as though I could have been had the show been slightly better.  That being said, it had a LOT going for it.  The show was 100% spot on in historical accuracy.  According to my parents (with whom I saw the show), the racial tensions and interactions really did occur the way they did in the show, and the issues relating to the cross over of the music from black radio to white radio were right on, too -- they remember having conversations about Rock & Roll that were right in line with what was presented in the show.  The acting was also pretty good, though not excellent.  There was a number of stellar featured performances, particularly from James Monroe Iglehart, J. Bernard Calloway, and Cass Morgan.  The two leads, Montego Glover and Chad Kimball, gave strong but occasionally inconsistent performances.  The physical design (sets and costumes) added to the production and gave the show the right feel.  Overall, this was a good show that could have been great, but it's still worth the price of admission.

Friday, February 19, 2010

More Lincoln Center News

After reading on the web that LCT is producing an upcoming musical based on a Pedro Almodovar film, I was looking through the New York Times arts section and found more information on their near future.  According to the article, there are three interesting pieces of news to report.  The first is that their long running production of "South Pacific", the longest Broadway revival of any Rogers and Hammerstein musical, will be closing on August 22nd after two and a half years and 1,000 performances at the Vivian Beaumont Theater.  The next piece of news is that, following the closing of "South Pacific", John Guare (of "Six degrees of Separation" and "The House of Blue Leaves" fame) will be again represented on Broadway with a production of his "A Free Man of Color" moving into the Beaumont Theatre to begin previews on October 21st and opening on November 18th.  The show will be directed by George C. Wolfe.  Third, while there is no official closing date set for "A Free Man of Color", LCT has announced that "War Horse", a transfer from the National Theater in London, will be following "Free Man" into the Beaumont.  "War Horse" is a World War 1 story about the connection between a British boy and his horse and is based on a novel by Michael Morpurgo.  This production is notable for its use of life-sized puppets for the horses that are controlled by the actors.  "War Horse" will begin previews on March 17th, 2011, and will open on April 14th.

View the full NY Times article at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/theater/19lincoln.html?ref=theater

Women on the Verge of A Nervous Breakdown

A musical adaptation of Pedro Almodovar's Oscar-nominated 1988 film Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown is on its way to Broadway's Belasco Theatre.  Lincoln Center Theater will produce the new musical, with a score by David Yazbeck and a book by Jeffrey Lane will be directed by Bartlett Sher, with previews starting on October 2nd, 2010.  For the full announcement, see the article at Broadway.com.

http://www.broadway.com/buzz/women-verge-nervous-breakdown-musical-coming-broadways-belasco-theatre-october-2010/

Directors and Choreographers

Now for the directors.  Overall, I tried to look at what the best received productions were, because while many people don't really get what a director does, they know (or, at least, think they know) when they've seen a good result from a director.  With that said, as a reminder, my choices on the play side were:

Gregory Mosher for A View From the Bridge.  This production has received the most unanimously stellar reviews of any show this season, both from critics and audiences, as a direct result of Mosher's work.

Daniel Sullivan, Time Stands Still.  This is another production that received stellar reviews for all its actors, for the script, and almost everything else about it.  The nominators would be silly not to pick the one who put it all together.

Tina Landau, Superior Donuts.  I picked Tina Landau here for a few reasons.  First, because her show dealt well with a tricky issue and was a major play by a popular playwright and second, because she is a woman, and I think I'm not the only one to see the benefit that a nomination for a female director can do. Besides which, after Anna D. Shapiro won the best director Tony 2 years ago for the Broadway transfer of another Tracy Letts play that started at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theater, I think Tina has a good shot in this category.

David Cromer, Brighton Beach Memoirs.  This is the one I am most shaky on, but still think (hope, maybe?) could happen.  This show got great reviews for its acting and for bringing out a strong depression era feel, but failed to pick up enough advanced sales to last longer than a week.  This one may be too far gone for anyone to remember, but I think it deserves a nod here out of nostalgia.

There are a few possible threats in this category.  Kate Whoriskey, who is directing the upcoming revival of "The Miracle Worker" has a few things going for her.  First, a female director is always a plus when it comes to these things (Kate Bigelo at the Oscars, anyone?).  Second, she is doing an innovative production of a classic play that hasn't been back to Broadway since its debut 50 years ago, and is bringing a stellar cast with her.  If the show actually turns out to be good, I think she will have a great shot at a nomination.

The other threat here could be David Mamet for directing his own play, "Race".  While it is always a tricky proposition  for writers to start directing their own work (for those who saw the movie "Synecoche, New York", the only movie that Charlie Kaufman, who wrote "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind", both wrote AND directed, you know what I mean), it sometimes can work out.  Also, since this play is not really secure in any nomination other than a likely Best Play nod, the committee may be looking for an excuse to nominate Mamet for an award, particularly as he has never won a Tony before.

The third (and probably strongest) threat is Nicholas Martin, who directed this season's production of "Present Laughter" at the Roundabout.  The show got strong reviews for its actors and for some of its designers, and is likely to get a Best Revival nomination, but if it gets a nomination for direction is still a question in my mind.


As for the Director of a Musical category, my picks are:
Bill T. Jones, Fela!
Warren Carlyle – Finian’s Rainbow
Marcia Milgrom Dodge, Ragtime
Trevor Nunn – A Little Night Music

I have picked these based on their having been the most successful and best received musicals this year.  Bill T. Jones and Marcia Milgrom Dodge have also been singled out by many critics for their work, adding to the likelihood that there is a nomination in their future.  Terry Johnson's production of La Cage Aux Folles and Eric Schaeffer's Million Dollar Quartet also pose potential threats to Warren Carlyle and Ms. Dodge, but the reviews and buzz that will come after they open will tell if these will come true.


Finally (for the moment) for choreography, I have chosen four shows that are, pretty much, all about the dancing.


Bill T. Jones, Fela!
Twyla Tharp, Come Fly Away
Sergio Trujillo, Memphis
Warren Carlyle – Finian’s Rainbow
Major Threat: Lynne Page – La Cage Aux Folles


For starters, I should say that I think this season is one that is light on choreography.  There is only a handful of shows that, in my mind, have choreography that would even make the shortlist to be considered.  After discussing my nomination choices, I will also mention the other shows that I think may have a chance.  In "Fela!" we have Bill T. Jones, a previous Tony winner for choreographing "Spring Awakening" a few seasons back, on the boards again in a show which is likely to take home the Best Musical Tony and received raves for his direction and choreography.  "Come Fly Away" brings Twyla Tharp and her dancers back to Broadway after "Movin' Out" a few years ago in a danced-through collection of Frank Sinatra's songs.  This combination of talent (Tharp and Sinatra are two of New York's most beloved artists within their fields) and momentum are sure to net Tharp a nomination for her choreography.  In "Memphis," we have a show that received mixed reviews, but whose high energy choreography was pretty well praised and that sounds nomination worthy to me.  Lastly, I have chosen "Finian's Rainbow" which, as I have stated before, is a glorious spectacle harkening back to the old fashioned, M-G-M movie musical production style.  For those of you who have seen enough movie musicals to know what that means, you'll also remember all the big production numbers and the exciting dancing.  The only potential threat I can think of is "La Cage Aux Folles" -- the show that won Jerry Mitchell is first Tony back in 2005.  This show has strong potential for great dancing, so we will have to see how good it really is once the show opens.  The only other shows that could potentially make my shortlist are "The Addams Family", "Bye Bye Birdie" and "Promises, Promises".  "A Little Night Music" has a very little bit of dancing in it, but that consists only of a waltz, as best I can remember.  Not much to nominate for Best Choreography, if you ask me.

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Back to the Prognosticating ...

It's been a while since I've written about how I arrived at the nomination choices that I did, so I wanted to get back to those now.  In this post I'll discuss more categories than I have in this series because, for the categories I will be discussing today, there is a lot less politicking to navigate.

For example, in the category of Best Original Score, it looks like there are only three shows that are even eligible for the four spots in this category -- "Fela!", "Memphis", and "The Addams Family".  Revivals are not eligible in this category, clearly, and the other shows all take their music either from popular music ("Come Fly Away" gets its music from the recordings of Frank Sinatra, "American Idiot" from a Green Day album, and "Million Dollar Quartet" from a jam session by Elvis, Johnny Cash, and others) or, in the case of "Sondheim on Sondheim", from music that has all been on Broadway before.

As for the Best Book category, also available only to new musicals, I have picked the only shows which I think make any sense.  I can't imagine "Sondheim on Sondheim", "American Idiot", or "Come Fly Away" having much in the way of a book, leaving the remaining four shows -- "Fela!", "Memphis", "Million Dollar Quartet", and "The Addams Family" -- to get the four slots for their books.

That's all for now.  I will be back later tonight with my thoughts on directors and choreographers.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Ben Brantley and Charles Isherwood Take Your Questions

Ben Brantley and Charles Isherwood, the two major theater critics and arts journalists for the New York Times are talking Tony and taking questions.  By visiting the link below, you can ask them about their thoughts on the current Broadway season and the upcoming awards.  As always, feel free to ask me any questions, as well.  Enjoy!

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/theater-talkback-spring-is-in-the-air/?ref=theater

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Send In the Scripts!

Well, it seems that Catherine Zeta-Jones is already thinking about her next Broadway venture.  As reported on Broadway.com, the Oscar winning Welsh beauty currently in an acclaimed run in "A Little Night Music" sat down with the Toronto Star and dished about what roles she would love to bring back to Broadway.  What's on the list?

Martha in Edward Albee's "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?", ideally opposite her husband, Michael Douglas as George.

Cleopatra

Any Checkov Heroine

Momma Rose in Gypsy

Anything Andrew Lloyd Weber


For the full article, go to:  http://www.broadway.com/shows/little-night-music/buzz/night-music-diva-catherine-zeta-jones-reveals-dream-roles/

Let the New Tribe In!

A new tribe is descending on Broadway's Al Hirschfeld Theatre.  Starting as of the March 9th performance, Ace Young, Kyle Riabko, and Diana DeGarmo will be the new headliners of the Tony winning revival, along with a number other new tribe members.  For all the info, see the full article at Broadway.com.

http://www.broadway.com/shows/hair/buzz/kyle-riabko-ace-young-and-diana-degarmo-hair-new-headliners-complete-cast-announced/

Ready to get "Looped"? Valerie Harper is!

I wanted to bring to my readers' attention a wonderful profile piece on Tallulah Bankhead in today's New York Times.  Though clearly printed to generate excitement for the upcoming play, "Looped" (beginning previews on Broadway at the Lyceum Theatre this coming Friday),  about the dahling Ms. Bankhead, the article was actually pretty insightful and interesting to read, bringing the aura of a true star to those who never knew an era before an actor's every indiscretion was blasted all over the internet and news media as it was happening.  Enjoy!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/16/theater/16tallulah.html?ref=theater

The Importance of the Roundabout

Broadway.com has announced that they will bring the Stratford Shakespeare Festival's recent production of Oscar Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest", starring Brian Bedford as Lady Bracknell, to the American Airlines Theatre in the winter of 2011.  A classic play by a prominent Irish playwright, this will be the first production of a Wilde play to be tackled by the Roundabout -- a surprise given their penchant for bringing to Broadway classy revivals of major works in the theatrical repertoire.  For the full press release, check out the article at Broadway.com.


http://www.broadway.com/buzz/roundabout-present-brian-bedfords-i-importance-being-earnesti-broadway/

Monday, February 15, 2010

Javier Bardem as Dracula?

It seems that Oscar winner Javier Bardem, star of such films as "No Country For Old Men, "Before Night Falls" and "Vicky, Cristina Barcelona", might be coming to the New York stage to perform in a new production of "Dracula".  Though no dates, venue, or other casting have yet been announced, The New York Post says that the upcoming production will incorporate designs that Edward Gorey created for the 1977 production which starred Frank Langella.  For more detail, there are two good articles to read, one at The NY Post's site and the other at Broaddway.com.

http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/theater/broadway_out_for_blood_islxKT7p7DKnIhSEAnAtPN

http://www.broadway.com/buzz/will-oscar-winner-javier-bardem-play-dracula-new-york-stage/

Sunday, February 14, 2010

More Prognostication

Keeping up with my recent thread discussing the thinking behind my pics for the upcoming Tony nominations, I'll be writing today about the last of the four production categories -- Best Revival of a Musical.  As a reminder, the productions that can be considered for this year's award are "Bye Bye Birdie",  "Finian's Rainbow", "Ragtime", "A Little Night Music", "La Cage Aux Folles", and "Promises, Promises".  Of these, the first four have opened and the first three have closed.  With only six potential nominees for four slots, this year the decision is rather easy, but that's not to say that there isn't some logic to my choices.

Based on what I know of the productions that have already opened, "Bye Bye Birdie" seems the only one not fit for nomination.  "Bye Bye Birdie" was so horrendous that I was actually embarrassed for the people on stage.  The other three were very well received by both critics and audiences, and I think are all deserving of nomination.  Further, in the case of "A Little Night Music", we have another strong revival of a classic Sondheim musical with major star wattage from Angela Lansbury and Catherine Zeta-Jones.  As for "Finian's Rainbow", the well received production harkens back to the old fashioned M-G-M style musicals that made "Pajama Game" such a success a few years ago.  In fact, that's what won that show the Best Revival Tony in 2006 -- while most voters thought that the John Doyle revival of "Sweeney Todd" was smart and innovative but had so much more fun at "Pajama Game" that it won them over and got their votes.  The thing that ended up being this show's demise was, I think, related to the thing that made it great.  While that M-G-M quality was wonderful and the size of the cast and pit made the show that much more rich, it ended up making the show too costly to keep going.  As for "Ragtime", this fabulous production (and the first revival of any musical from the 1990's) suffered from an awful marketing department and, thus, failed to pick up a wide audience.  While theater die-hards who remember the original flocked to this production, there was a lot of untapped opportunity to expand the audience base for the show.  That being said, I still think the show was strong enough to net a nomination come May 4th.

Then there is the enviable fourth spot, which will go to either "Promises, Promises" or "La Cage Aux Folles".  For the moment I have gone with "La Cage" for two main reasons.  One is that it is a show with which I (and the voters) am familiar and which has great brand value, compared to "Promises, Promises", which I only know as the show in which Jerry Orbach won his Tony some 40 years ago but about which I know nothing otherwise.  The second reason is that this production which is a transfer from London, at the now famous Menier Chocolate Factory, where it was pretty well received and popular enough to transfer to the West End and now to Broadway.  In fact, it was so well received that it has been said that this production is better than the 2004 Broadway production which received only mixed reviews and still managed to win that year's Best Revival Tony.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Continuing the Series

To continue my series on how I arrived at my decisions for who I think will be nominated in each Tony category, I am going to write today about the play revival category.

There are eleven productions scheduled this season (of which seven have already opened) that are eligible in this category.  Based on the reviews of shows already opened, "A View from the Bridge" and "Present Laughter" are almost guaranteed nominations come May 4th.  These two productions were so universally praised that it would be a great surprise if they were not nominated.

Of the remaining shows that have opened in this category ("Hamlet", "The Royal Family", "Brighton Beach Memoirs", "Oleanna", and "After Miss Julie"), the first three are all strong contenders, having received relatively strong reviews, but not strong enough to guarantee nominations.  Coupled with the fact that all of these productions have already closed, the reviews may not be enough if the nominators don't remember the shows themselves.  "After Miss Julie" and "Oleanna", both of which also closed long ago, are likely also to fall prey to not being remembered, but that won't matter for these two.  They were so poorly reviewed that those who saw the shows will basically remember them as bad and those who didn't see them will have heard about how bad they are.

The play revivals remaining to open are "Miracle Worker", "Collected Stories", "Lend Me A Tenor" and "Fences".  "Collected Stories" and "Lend Me a Tenor" are not likely to be nominated as they seem to me right now to be too insubstantial to be serious contenders.  Depending on reviews, though, "Miracle Worker" and "Fences" stand decent shots.  For the two slots that won't be filled by "Present Laughter" and "A View From the Bridge", I am forecasting "The Royal Family" and "Miracle Worker".  I have chosen "Family" because it was a really well done production of a classic play from the golden age with star performances by some of Broadway's brightest stars.

"Miracle Worker" gets my fourth slot based on a number of factors.  First, it brings to the stage in her Broadway debut one Abigail Breslin, one of Hollywood's most beloved young stars (with an Oscar nomination to her credit) in one of Broadway's most challenging roles.  (By the way, there is a great article in the New York Times Sunday arts section this week talking about this fact in more detail.)  Second, this is the first Broadway revival in 50 years of a classic Broadway play by William Gibson.  Third, and most importantly, the production will be performed in the round -- an innovative way to do any play not written with that concept in mind, but particularly for a show which depends so heavily on communication without spoken language, thus requiring the emotional and physical connections to be more concrete and yet being able to convey all that to an audience on 4 sides.

If any of "Hamlet", "Brighton Beach Memoirs", and "Fences" were to make it into the mix, it would probably take the place of "Miracle Worker" and would most likely be as a result of that show not living up to the quality standards I am anticipating.

Friday, February 12, 2010

More Tony politicking

Tonight I thought I'd continue my series on how I arrived at my picks for the upcoming Tony nominations.  Tonight's topic ... Best Musical.

This year, picking the nominees in this category is significantly easier than it has been in the past.  First of all, with only seven new musicals scheduled to open this season (and only two of them having done so at the time of this writing), picking the best four of them to nominate is not all that difficult.  Based on the almost unanimously outstanding notices that "Fela!" received on its opening night, it is a clear cinch for a nomination, and may even be the frontrunner in the category.  The other new musical this year that seems pretty clearly destined for a nomination this year is "Memphis".  Even though it received mixed reviews for its writing (and its score was pretty well panned), it and "Fela!" are the only two entirely original new musicals opening this season.  All the other new musicals scheduled to open are adaptations of music or characters taken from other places.

That being said, "The Addams Family," based on the cartoons by Charles Addams and the movie adaptations from about 15 years back, is looking to take the third nomination slot in the Best Musical category based on its grand scale and star performances ... something that I think "Young Frankenstein" tried to do a few seasons back, when that show was a weak contender facing much stronger competition for a slot than "The Addams Family" seems to have this year.

The fourth slot is a toss-up this year.  I've ruled out "Sondheim on Sondheim" because, though it will star many well respected theater veterans (including the legendary Barbara Cook) and will feature the songs of one of the musical theater's greatest composers, reviews of this sort almost never get even the honor of a nomination.  The celebration of all the talent involved is the award here.  I have also ruled out "American Idiot" because it's the latest in a string of jukebox musicals that have declined in quality and popularity over the years and, from what I understand of it so far, is going to be more like a rock concert than a musical anyhow.

That being said, however, whether the fourth Best Musical nomination will go to "Million Dollar Quartet" or "Come Fly Away" is up for grabs.  Twyla Tharp had great success with "Movin' Out" a few years back, in which she applied her unique story-through-dance concept to the songbook of Billy Joel.  Now applying that to the songs and recordings of Frank Sinatra, in my mind a much bigger star and a MUCH more popular performer than Billy Joel, she may have even greater success.  However, if this show turns out to be anything like Tharp's previous Broadway outing, "The Times They Are a Changin'", this show may be out of luck come nomination time.  The other show that has a good shot at a Best Musical nomination this year is "Million Dollar Quartet".  This is the kind of show that, like "Come Fly Away", has the opportunity to be either wonderful or awful.  It's got a great concept -- the story of what really happened during the recording of a jam session of the combined talents of Johnnie Cash, Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis -- and some great music.  The success of the show, however, will rely on how seriously the show takes its subject matter.  In other words, all the difference will lie in whether or not this show makes cartoons of the singers and people involved.  I have gone with "Come Fly Away" for the moment only because of Twyla Tharp's previous success on Broadway with "Movin' Out", but I will definitely be  updating my predictions because once the shows officially open and the reviews are out, because it will be easier to determine who will get the nomination at that point.

New Production Announced

I just read an article online that Mark Rylance (star of the recent Broadway revival of "Boeing Boeing") and David Hyde Pierce will be returning to Broadway in a production of David Hirson's "La Bete", which is expected to play a limited run in London's West End (I'm guessing over the summer and/or the early fall) before transferring to Broadway this autumn.  Joanna Lumley, a London stage vet known in the US for the TV show "Absollutely Fabulous" will make her Broadway debut in this production, which is to be directed by Matthew Warchus, who directed (and was a double directing nominee at last year's Tonys for) last year's productions of "G-d of Carnage" and "The Norman Conquests".  With the talent attached to this production, I am very excited to see this show, and can't wait till it comes to Broadway.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Second Nomination Predictions

Based on the recent eligibility decisions released by the Tony Awards nomination committee, I have slightly edited my first round of predictions.  The only difference between these predictions and my previous ones results from both Jessica Hecht and Scarlett Johansson being deemed eligible in the supporting/featured actress category, while I had predicted Hecht would be in the leading actress category. As a result, I have moved Valerie Harper into the slot I had reserved for Hecht and added Hecht into a supporting actress slot, bumping Harriet Harris (a previous Tony winner for "Thoroughly Modern Millie" back in 2002) of "Present Laughter" down to major threat status.  The new predictions are:


New Play
A Behanding in Spokane
Time Stands Still
Superior Donuts
Race
Major Threats: In the Next Room … or the Vibrator Play, A Steady Rain

Play Revival
A View From the Bridge
Present Laughter
The Royal Family
Miracle Worker
Major Threats: Brighton Beach Memoirs, Hamlet, Fences

New Musical
Memphis
Fela!
Addams Family
Come Fly Away
Major Threat:  Million Dollar Quartet

Musical Revival
Finian’s Rainbow
Ragtime
A Little Night Music
La Cage Aux Folles
Major Threat: Promises, Promises

Book of a Musical
Memphis
Fela!
Million Dollar Quartet
Addams Family

Score of a Musical
Fela!
Memphis
Addams Family
* Since the remaining new musicals all have scores that derive from previously released music, they are ineligible for a best score nomination.  Otherwise, there would be 4 nominees in this category.

Director of a Play
Gregory Mosher, A View From the Bridge
Daniel Sullivan, Time Stands Still
Tina Landau, Superior Donuts
David Cromer, Brighton Beach Memoirs
Major Threats:  Kate Whoriskey – Miracle Worker, Michael Grandage – Hamlet, David Mamet – Race

Director of a Musical
Bill T. Jones, Fela!
Warren Carlyle – Finian’s Rainbow
Marcia Milgrom Dodge, Ragtime
Trevor Nunn – A Little Night Music
Major Threats: Terry Johnson – La Cage Aux Folles, Eric Schaeffer – Million Dollar Quartet

Choreography
Bill T. Jones, Fela!
Twyla Tharp, Come Fly Away
Sergio Trujillo, Memphis
Warren Carlyle – Finian’s Rainbow
Major Threat: Lynne Page – La Cage Aux Folles

Orchestrations
Fela!
A Little Night Music
Ragtime
Million Dollar Quartet
Major Threats: Memphis, The Addams Family, Finian’s Rainbow, La Cage Aux Folles

Lead Actor in a Play
Brian d’Arcy James, Time Stands Still
Victor Garber, Present Laughter
Liev Schreiber, A View From the Bridge
Jude Law, Hamlet
Michael McKean, Superior Donuts
Major Threats: James Spader – Race, Michael Cerveris -- In the Next Room … or the Vibrator Play
On the Outside:  Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman – A Steady Rain

Lead Actress in a Play
Valerie Harper, Looped
Laura Linney, Time Stands Still
Alison Pill, The Miracle Worker
Laurie Metcalf, Brighton Beach Memoirs
Jan Maxwell, The Royal Family
Major Threats: Laura Benanti – In the Next Room … or the Vibrator Play, Viola Davis, Fences, Megan Mullally – Lips Together, Teeth Apart

Featured Actor in a Play
Eric Bogosian, Time Stands Still
Bruce Ashmanskas, Present Laughter
Reg Rogers, The Royal Family
Michael Cristofer, A View From the Bridge
Santino Fontana, Brighton Beach Memoirs

Featured Actress in a Play
Alicia Silverstone, Time Stands Still
Scarlett Johansson, A View From the Bridge
Jessica Hecht, A View From the Bridge
Abigail Breslin, The Miracle Worker
Rosemary Harris, The Royal Fmily
Major Threats: Kerry Washington – Race, Harriet Harris and Lisa Banes – Present Laughter


Lead Actor in a Musical
Kevin Mambo and/or* Sahd Ngaujah, Fela!
Chad Kimball, Memphis
Quentin Earl Darrington, Ragtime
Nathan Lane, Addams Family
Alexander Hanson, A Little Night Music
Major Threats: Sean Hayes – Promises, Promises, Douglas Hodge or Kelsey Grammer – La Cage Aux Folles,

*These two actors alternate in the lead role of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti.  It is unclear to me at the moment if only one of them will be nominated or if they will share a single nomination the way the three boys in “Billy Elliot” did last year.

Lead Actress in a Musical
Montego Glover, Memphis
Kate Baldwin, Finian’s Rainbow
Catherine Zeta-Jones, A Little Night Music
Bebe Neuwirth, Addams Family
Christiane Noll, Ragtime
Major Threat: Kristen Chenoweth – Promises, Promises

Featured Actor in a Musical
Christopher Fitzgerald, Finian’s Rainbow
James Monroe Iglehart, Memphis
Bobby Steggert, Ragtime
Chuck Cooper – Finian’s Rainbow
Kevin Chamberlin, Addams Family

Featured Actress in a Musical
Lillias White, Fela!
Terri White, Finian’s Rainbow
Jackie Hoffman, Addams Family
Carolee Carmello, Addams Family
Angela Lansbury, A Little Night Music

Set Design of a Play
Present Laughter
A View From the Bridge
The Royal Family
Brighton Beach Memoirs
Major Threats: Race, Superior Donuts, A Behanding in Spokane

Set Design of a Musical
Fela!
A Little Night Music
Finian’s Rainbow
Ragtime

Costume Design of a Play
Present Laughter
A View From the Bridge
The Royal Family
Brighton Beach Memoirs
Major Threat:  In the Next Room … or the Vibrator Play

Costume Design of a Musical
Fela!
A Little Night Music
Finian’s Rainbow
La Cage Aux Folles
Major Threat: Addams Family

Lighting Design of a Play
A Behanding in Spokane
A View From the Bridge
Present Laughter
Miracle Worker
Major Threat: The Royal Family, Race

Lighting Design of a Musical
Fela!
A Little Night Music
Finian’s Rainbow
Ragtime

Sound Design of a Play
A View From the Bridge
Present Laughter
Brighton Beach Memours
Superior Donuts

Sound Design of a Musical
Ragtime
Fela!
La Cage Aux Folles
Addams Family

Second Round of Eligibility Decisions

The Tony nomination committee has met again and made a second set of decisions about how to consider certain performances and productions.  In text copied from Tonyawards.com, here are their decisions.


  • Jim Norton, Cheyenne Jackson and Kate Baldwin will be considered eligible in the Best Performance by a Leading Actor/Actress in a Musical category respectively for their performances in Finian’s Rainbow.

  • James Clow and Melissa Errico will be considered eligible in the Best Performance by a Leading Actor/Actress in a Musical category respectively for their performances in Irving Berlin’s White Christmas.

  • Quentin Earl Darrington, Robert Petkoff and Christiane Noll will be considered eligible in the Best Performance by a Leading Actor/Actress in a Musical category respectively for their performances inRagtime.

  • Michael Cerveris and Laura Benanti will be considered eligible in the Best Performance by a Leading Actor/Actress in a Play category respectively for their performances in In the Next Room or The Vibrator Play.

  • Sahr Ngaujah will be considered eligible in the Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Musical category for his performance in Fela!

  • David Alan Grier, Richard Thomas and Kerry Washington will be considered eligible in the Best Performance by a Featured Actor/Actress in a Play category for their performances in Race.

  • Angela Lansbury will be considered eligible in the Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical category for her performance in A Little Night Music.

  • Scarlett Johansson and Jessica Hecht will be considered eligible in the Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play category for their performances in A View from the Bridge.



  • There are two notable decisions in this list.  First of all, both Scarlett Johansson AND Jessica Hecht are being considered as featured/supporting actresses for their performances in "A View From the Bridge".  I had predicted Hecht as a lead actress based on Allison Janney's lead actress nomination for playing the same character in the 1998 revival (but it looks as though that will have to change!).  Also, Sahr Ngaujah, star of "Fela!", appears to be the only one being considered for lead actor in a musical, even though he alternates in the role with Kevin Mambo.

    Some early politicking

    Well ... now that my first predictions are up, I thought I would talk about the process by which I arrived at them.  I'm going to talk about the one of the biggest categories of the night -- Best Play -- right now, and update about the process for more categories over the next few days.  In these posts, I'll mostly be talking about the shows I've picked for nomination, but if you want to see a full list of who is eligible, I have a post from a few weeks ago listing every production that opened this season or is planning to open by the Tony cut-off date.

    The category for new plays is a tricky one this year, mainly because so many of the shows that are eligible are set to close long before the nominations come out, if they haven't closed already.  This will make it difficult for nominators who may not remember every production they saw because they can't go back to revisit a show that's already closed.  It will be even harder for such shows to win once the nominations are out because, while the nominating committee at least sees every production once, not every voter sees every show -- and some voters (owners of Road Houses, where touring productions play) might not have seen ANY of this year's shows.

    For this reason, I have entirely ruled out "A Steady Rain", which not only closed months ago, but got such negative reviews that anyone who remembers it is unlikely to give it one of the coveted four nomination slots.  A similar logic goes to Sarah Ruhl's "In the Next Room ... or the Vibrator Play".  This play got mixed reviews and closed long enough before the nominations that its chances are slim.  It does, however, have the saving grace of marking the Broadway playwriting debut of a female playwright who has been well respected for her previous work.  Is this enough to secure it a nomination?  Not for sure, but this does give it a leg up in nominators' minds.  

    Since "Next Fall", "Looped", and "Lips Together, Teeth Apart" have not yet opened, it is not yet clear how well done each is and, therefore, how each will fare come nomination time.  That being said, however, I do have some thoughts on these.  The fact that I know almost nothing about "Next Fall" -- its plot is unknown to me, it has no stars that I'm aware of in either the cast or creative team, I've never heard of the playwright -- I find it unlikely that it will get nominated without some stellar reviews across the board.  As for "Looped", a play starring Valerie Harper as the marvelous Tellulah Bankhead going back to the studio to loop one last line of dialogue, I feel as though this is simply a star vehicle.  While there may be some attention-worthy acting in the show, I think that is where this show's deservedness stops.  And with "Lips Together, Teeth Apart", Terrence McNally's play about two straight couples entering a gay community on Fire Island after one character's brother dies of AIDS, we have a topic that's been done before (Angels in America, Love, Valour, Compassion, etc.) so many times and in such historic productions that this play won't have the weight that it needs to get a nomination.


    As for my actual choices?  All four of my choices are new works by previously successful playwrights.

    The first is "A Behanding in Spokane" by Martin McDonagh, who is known for his Leenane trilogy (including "The Beauty Queen of Leenane" and "The Lonesome West"), and his chilling fairy tale for grownups, "The Pillowman".  His plays have consistantly received rave or near rave reviews, and McDonagh has received 4 previous nominations without a single win.  And the starry cast, including Zoe Kazan (directing legend Elia Kazan's granddaughter), Sam Rockwell, Anthony Mackie, and Christopher Walken, will certainly make waves in this suspensfull thriller.

    Next is Donald Margulies' "Time Stands Still".  A Pulitzer Prize winner for his play "Dinner With Friends", with two other plays having been finalists for the award (including the always popular "Sight Unseen"), Margulies has never been nominated for a Tony, and this play has been reviewed pretty consistently as his best play yet.  Add in the stellar leading performances by two theater vets, Laura Linney and Brian d'Arcy James, in what may be the best performances of their careers thus far, this is pretty much a sure bet for a Tony nomination come May 4th.

    Then, we have "Race".  While the reviews were only mixed, and the production follows a long string of poorly received, short lived Broadway productions of Mamet plays lately, Mamet still knows how to tackle tough issues and challenge our thoughts.  This is his directorial debut on Broadway, Mamet may be nominated as a result, mostly out of respect for a legend who has never won a Tony, and for getting us talking about a hot button issue in a new medium, let alone for being one of a small handful of new plays still running come nomination time.

    Last, we have Tracy Letts' new play "Superior Donuts".  While Letts had a huge success two seasons ago with "August: Osage County", this play failed to pick up much of an audience because of a lack of star power at a time when much of Hollywood was invading Broadway.  The play packs a powerful punch and is among the best written plays I've seen in a while, making it (in my mind, anyhow) quite deserving of a nomination.

    Monday, February 8, 2010

    First Nomination Predictions

    OK, everyone.  Here are my official first predictions.  We'll see how they develop until May 4th -- the date the real nominations come out.




    New Play
    A Behanding in Spokane
    Time Stands Still
    Superior Donuts
    Race
    Major Threats: In the Next Room … or the Vibrator Play, A Steady Rain

    Play Revival
    A View From the Bridge
    Present Laughter
    The Royal Family
    Miracle Worker
    Major Threats: Brighton Beach Memoirs, Hamlet, Fences

    New Musical
    Memphis
    Fela!
    Addams Family
    Come Fly Away
    Major Threat:  Million Dollar Quartet


    Musical Revival
    Finian’s Rainbow
    Ragtime
    A Little Night Music
    La Cage Aux Folles
    Major Threat: Promises, Promises

    Book of a Musical
    Memphis
    Fela!
    Million Dollar Quartet
    Addams Family

    Score of a Musical
    Fela!
    Memphis
    Addams Family
    * Since the remaining new musicals all have scores that derive from previously released music, they are ineligible for a best score nomination.  Otherwise, there would be 4 nominees in this category.

    Director of a Play
    Gregory Mosher, A View From the Bridge
    Daniel Sullivan, Time Stands Still
    Tina Landau, Superior Donuts
    David Cromer, Brighton Beach Memoirs
    Major Threats:  Kate Whoriskey – Miracle Worker, Michael Grandage – Hamlet, David Mamet – Race

    Director of a Musical
    Bill T. Jones, Fela!
    Warren Carlyle – Finian’s Rainbow
    Marcia Milgrom Dodge, Ragtime
    Trevor Nunn – A Little Night Music
    Major Threats: Terry Johnson – La Cage Aux Folles, Eric Schaeffer – Million Dollar Quartet

    Choreography
    Bill T. Jones, Fela!
    Twyla Tharp, Come Fly Away
    Sergio Trujillo, Memphis
    Warren Carlyle – Finian’s Rainbow
    Major Threat: Lynne Page – La Cage Aux Folles

    Orchestrations
    Fela!
    A Little Night Music
    Ragtime
    Million Dollar Quartet
    Major Threats: Memphis, The Addams Family, Finian’s Rainbow, La Cage Aux Folles

    Lead Actor in a Play
    Brian d’Arcy James, Time Stands Still
    Victor Garber, Present Laughter
    Liev Schreiber, A View From the Bridge
    Jude Law, Hamlet
    Michael McKean, Superior Donuts
    Major Threats: James Spader – Race, Michael Cerveris -- In the Next Room … or the Vibrator Play
    On the Outside:  Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman – A Steady Rain

    Lead Actress in a Play
    Jessica Hecht, A View From the Bridge
    Laura Linney, Time Stands Still
    Alison Pill, The Miracle Worker
    Laurie Metcalf, Brighton Beach Memoirs
    Jan Maxwell, The Royal Family
    Major Threats: Laura Benanti – In the Next Room … or the Vibrator Play, Valerie Harper – Looped, Viola Davis, Fences, Megan Mullally – Lips Together, Teeth Apart

    Featured Actor in a Play
    Eric Bogosian, Time Stands Still
    Bruce Ashmanskas, Present Laughter
    Reg Rogers, The Royal Family
    Michael Cristofer, A View From the Bridge
    Santino Fontana, Brighton Beach Memoirs

    Featured Actress in a Play
    Alicia Silverstone, Time Stands Still
    Scarlett Johansson, A View From the Bridge
    Harriet Harris, Present Laughter
    Abigail Breslin, The Miracle Worker
    Rosemary Harris, The Royal Fmily
    Major Threats: Kerry Washington – Race, Lisa Banes – Present Laughter


    Lead Actor in a Musical
    Kevin Mambo and/or* Sahd Ngaujah, Fela!
    Chad Kimball, Memphis
    Quentin Earl Darrington, Ragtime
    Nathan Lane, Addams Family
    Alexander Hanson, A Little Night Music
    Major Threats: Sean Hayes – Promises, Promises, Douglas Hodge or Kelsey Grammer – La Cage Aux Folles,

    *These two actors alternate in the lead role of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti.  It is unclear to me at the moment if only one of them will be nominated or if they will share a single nomination the way the three boys in “Billy Elliot” did last year.

    Lead Actress in a Musical
    Montego Glover, Memphis
    Kate Baldwin, Finian’s Rainbow
    Catherine Zeta-Jones, A Little Night Music
    Bebe Neuwirth, Addams Family
    Christiane Noll, Ragtime
    Major Threat: Kristen Chenoweth – Promises, Promises

    Featured Actor in a Musical
    Christopher Fitzgerald, Finian’s Rainbow
    James Monroe Iglehart, Memphis
    Bobby Steggert, Ragtime
    Chuck Cooper – Finian’s Rainbow
    Kevin Chamberlin, Addams Family

    Featured Actress in a Musical
    Lillias White, Fela!
    Terri White, Finian’s Rainbow
    Jackie Hoffman, Addams Family
    Carolee Carmello, Addams Family
    Angela Lansbury, A Little Night Music

    Set Design of a Play
    Present Laughter
    A View From the Bridge
    The Royal Family
    Brighton Beach Memoirs
    Major Threats: Race, Superior Donuts, A Behanding in Spokane

    Set Design of a Musical
    Fela!
    A Little Night Music
    Finian’s Rainbow
    Ragtime

    Costume Design of a Play
    Present Laughter
    A View From the Bridge
    The Royal Family
    Brighton Beach Memoirs
    Major Threat:  In the Next Room … or the Vibrator Play

    Costume Design of a Musical
    Fela!
    A Little Night Music
    Finian’s Rainbow
    La Cage Aux Folles
    Major Threat: Addams Family

    Lighting Design of a Play
    A Behanding in Spokane
    A View From the Bridge
    Present Laughter
    Miracle Worker
    Major Threat: The Royal Family, Race

    Lighting Design of a Musical
    Fela!
    A Little Night Music
    Finian’s Rainbow
    Ragtime

    Sound Design of a Play
    A View From the Bridge
    Present Laughter
    Brighton Beach Memours
    Superior Donuts

    Sound Design of a Musical
    Ragtime
    Fela!
    La Cage Aux Folles
    Addams Family