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- [00:00]
Jackson McHenry
Foreign.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. The Tony nominations came out yesterday morning,
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Alison Stewart
and leading the pack were Schmigadoon, the
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
Broadway adaptation of the TV show parody of golden age musicals, and the Lost Boys, the Broadway adaptation of the 1980s teen vampire movie. They each got 12 nominations. Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman that had the strongest showing of a play. With nine nominations, Chess featured the trio of Lea Michele, Aaron Tveit, and co star Nicholas Christopher. But only Christopher received the nod. And big names making Broadway debuts, Jon Bernthal, Adrien Brody, Iowa. Debery also missed out on nominations. Joining me now for a Broadway breakdown is vulture critic Jackson McHenry. Hey, Jackson.
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Jackson McHenry
Hi. Thanks for having me.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
We are taking your calls as well. Dear listeners, what were your reactions?
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Caller Paul
Who are.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
Who did you think got overlooked? Who are you extremely happy for? Our number is 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. What did you see this season that you liked? What didn't you like? Our phone lines are wide open. 212-433. WNYC. 212-433-9692. Okay, Jackson, what's your headline for yesterday's Tony nominations?
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Jackson McHenry
Oh, gosh. I mean, one of the ones you already mentioned is the fact that Lea Michelle didn't get a nomination. I. It surprised a lot of people. She's in Chess. She's gotten a lot of press for it. She's really selling tickets. And I guess it sort of just turned out the nominating committee are just not gigantic fans of the musical, which is a very particular 80s ABBA soundtrack thing. And so there was a lot of other competition there.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
Yeah, it's interesting. Why do you think so much attention has been given to Leah's lack of a nomination?
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Jackson McHenry
I think it's partially because her sort of career has brought her from Broadway to Glee and then back to Broadway with her sort of replacing in Funny Girl. And she's someone who is so known as a theater kid and has never had a Tony nomination. Even when she was in oh, my gosh, I'm blanking on it. Spring Awakening, she didn't get a nomination. And so it's sort of this thing where it's someone who's so associated with this and has had sort of a lot of time in the public eye. There's a lot of scrutiny on that. And I think the other women who were nominated in the category are all fantastic. I think it's just happened to be in a competitive year.
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Alison Stewart
She's got an amazing voice. First of all, when you hear her sing live, it's extraordinary. And we had the three leads from Chess here at WNYC for our Broadway on the Radio series. And they performed live. They had the room in the palm of their hands. Let's listen to Nicholas Christopher sing Where I Want to Be live from the WNYC green space.
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Nicholas Christopher (singing)
Who needs a dream who needs ambition could be the fool in my position Once I had dreams now that obsessions, hopes became needs lovers, possessions Then they move in.
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Alison Stewart
Jackson, why do you think this was his year to get a nod?
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Jackson McHenry
Well, I mean, as you can hear in that performance, his control as a singer and his sort of authority and power and presence is really striking. And he's also someone who's sort of come up through the theater. He was a standby and then took over for part of the role in Sweeney Todd. He was in a sort of wonderful encores revival of the musical Jelly's Last Jam. He's someone who a lot of people I know have been like, well, Nicholas Christopher, he's so striking, but hasn't had a sort of moment to open a show like the revival of Chess and sort of to be a marquee name. So I think there's also the kind of accumulating enthusiasm for his presence that has led him to this nomination, which is fun.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
He's also very funny.
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Alison Stewart
Let's talk about Lost Boys and Schmigatoon
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
got more nominations than any other shows.
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Alison Stewart
Were you surprised by this, Ty?
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Jackson McHenry
I think it sort of makes sense in an interesting year for the best musical race where there's sort of. I think you sort of. The two of them are pretty head to head, but I think there are about really four frontrunners for the category and you could make a convincing argument. It's a little bit like there's something for everyone or a type of musical that many different types of musical fans could latch onto. And the Lost Boys is big on spectacle. It makes sense that it got a ton of nominations because there's a gigantic set, they're flying around, there's a lot to see on stage. Schmigadoon is very classical. And then I think the other two in the running, I think especially Two Strangers Carry a Cake Across New York, which is a smaller show. It got fewer nominations because it's a two person cast. There's fewer people, fewer things on stage to nominate, but I think is sort of beloved for its sort of charm. And the two leads both got nominated. And then Titanique is sort of the, you know, fun choice, I guess, the sort of big pop culture parody thing. So I think it's an interesting year because there's sort of something for everyone in the race.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
This text said, did Joshua Henry get a nomination? His performance is so memorable and probably one of the reasons the musical run. The musical's run keeps getting extended. Of course, they're talking about ragtime. I think Joshua Henry got nomination.
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Jackson McHenry
Oh, you can rest very assured that Joshua Henry got a nomination. And I think a lot of people think that Joshua Henry has, you know, odds on chances to get the trophy as well. I think, you know, Nicholas Gritcifer is wonderful and there are other wonderful actor groups in that category, but Joshua Henry's sort of authority and power and those big hefty songs and ragtime that he sort of lays into with so much emotion and kind of grace and anger. It's a real rich, rich performance. So that has really propelled that along.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
I'm speaking to vulture critic Jackson McHenry about yesterday's Tony nominations and we're taking your calls. What were your reactions? Who got overlooked? Who are you happy for? Our number is 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. What did you see this year that you really liked? What did you see this year that or thought, meh. Our numbers? 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. Let's talk about Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. It earned the most nominations in any play of any play. It got nine. What do you make of the dominance of this show?
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Jackson McHenry
I think it's really. I mean, it's, as the review said, it's sort of a thought through revival with these great sort of theater stars. You have Laurie Metcalfe, you have Nathan Lane, Christopher Abbott, Ben Allers, who was on the Gilded Age. And it's one of those things where a kind of revival, especially of a masterwork, can come in. And it's doing it, it's staging it. Joe Mantello is staging it in a sort of different than the expected approach to Death of a Salesman. It's a more impressionistic set. They have doubles of the younger versions of the Sons, which is not something that is typically done. And so it sort of brought this thing to new life and to new sort of debate. I mean, I know people who didn't necessarily love it, but sort of love to argue about it. And I think that has been a useful kind of a play can do that, especially A play revival can sort of have a kind of crystallizing effect on a theater season, which is kind of fun.
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Alison Stewart
This says saw the Ballisters in previews. It was terrific. Great cast working together, especially Mary Louise Burke. Have you seen the Ballisters yet?
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Jackson McHenry
I've seen the Ballisters, yes. It's a David Lindsay Hebert play with. It is one of those great sort of ensemble plays. It's very, it feels totally real of a moment. It's a neighborhood sort of homeowners association in a fictional sort of New Jersey, New York, tri state area suburb arguing over all sorts of details like whether they should have a stop sign and whether they should, you know, whether people are throwing away their dog poop properly. And Mary Louise Burke is sort of one of the sort of reigning older members of the group and it sort of captures all sorts of, you know, culture war dynamics and things and it's really fun and sort of sparkling. And I think that's kind of gotten. It got, I think five nominations.
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Alison Stewart
And she was nominated as well for best feature.
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Jackson McHenry
She was nominated as well, which is great. And in a category with also June Squibb, a sort of a great reigning women of the theater category.
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Alison Stewart
The next most nominated play after Death of a Salesman was Oedipus. And according to award survey, the award website Gold Derby, it says since the Tonys were established in 1947. 1947, five Broadway revivals of Oedipus were eligible for nominations, but none had ever received bids until this year. Why do you think this production broke the curse of Oedipus?
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Jackson McHenry
It's a new curse for Oedipus. It's a different kind of curse, I think. I mean it's Robert Icke, who's the British director who has done it. And it's kind of fun because he and Sophocles are credited together. If they win the Tony, it goes to him and to Sophocles. Congrats to Sophocles. He needed a break, but he did a sort of full scale revising of it. It still contains all the elements of Oedipus in terms of the sort of curse being discovered and everything. But his version with Mark Strong had him as a sort of Obama esque politician who is in the midst of the election night and there's a countdown on stage as you're waiting for the results to come in. But you start to realize that's also going to be the moment when he realizes the terrible things that he's done. And so it kind of again It's a kind of reinvigoration of a classic. And I think Mark Strong, Leslie Manville, who was nominated, who sort of give the shattering realization later on he's his wife. And if you know the plot of Oedipus, that becomes complicated. And so I think there was sort of a sense of, oh, here's a way to kind of bring this into the present in a different and exciting way that struck people.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
We had Mark Strong on the show to talk about Oedipus and he talked
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Alison Stewart
about how they make the show suspenseful when so many people know the ending. Let's hear this clip.
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Mark Strong
It's the drip feed of information that keeps them on their toes. Because if you know the story, what you're thinking is, how are they going to do this? How is he going to find out the truth about himself? How are we going to see that happen? So I think what you're, what you're waiting for is I know the excellence of Rob's translation, really, or adaptation, I should say, which is that he feeds you that information in a very subtle way. You hear things, people make speeches, you learn things. And by the end of it you realize that everything has been encapsulated in that two hours. And the story of Oedipus as written by Sophocles, it's all there, but he's given it to you piecemeal through various bits of everybody giving information. Merope, my mother's speech, for example, about me being not her son or you know, Leslie talking about the child that she gave birth to that's gone missing, you know, that she presumes is dead. That's all drip fed, right? And then by the end it all comes together and you realize what all that information means.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
Okay, so Mark Strong for Oedipus against Daniel Radcliffe for every brilliant thing. John Lithgow for Giant, Nathan Lane for Death of a Salesman and Will Harrison for Punch. That is a tough category. Where would you put your dollars?
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Jackson McHenry
Oh gosh, that is a tough. That is one of the tougher categories. And it's interesting actually, as you say, Will Harrison for Punch. He's. That's a play that ran in the fall and he is not a big name among sort of. There were a bunch of names of theater, I mean, screen and tele and film stars who couldn't get in. Will Harrison gave incredibly interesting performance in that. So it was kind of fun. But I think it feels as if it is narrowing down toward Nathan Lane and salesman John Lithgow in Giant. John Lithgow In Giant is playing a version of Roald Dahl who made anti Semitic remarks and is sort of throughout the play trying to be coerced into. There are his publishers are trying to get him to apologize and he gets more and more furious about it. It was had a run in London and it's come to New York and then Mark Strong. So the three of them, all names of the theater that we know, all giving rich sort of titanic performances as these patriarchal figures struggling with their choices.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
Those are Titanique. Excuse me. No, let's talk to Paul calling in from Essex County. Hey, Paul, you're on the air.
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Caller Paul
Hey. Hi, everybody.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
Hi.
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Caller Paul
Well, I did not see the original chess in the 80s, but I did get to see a one night only gala which was a reunion of the cast at Carnegie Hall. And like a lot of fans of musical theater, I've been watching its trajectory through the decades. And it's one of those cult musicals that many of us were really excited to see back on Broadway or revived on Broadway. So I wanted to first say that that I found in a love letter to the fans that we finally got to see Chess on Broadway again. And this was reimagined. I liked the breaking of the fourth wall where the narrator really is engaging the audience in a way that's sometimes very satirical, sarcastic. The musical's dated in terms of the content, but you get pulled into it and you go along for the ride. It's a problematic musical. The book's weak. It's ending is a little forced, but again, just to see it on Broadway and with this cast, including the chorus and amazing choreography, I thought a really nice kind of love letter to the base.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
Paul, thank you so much for calling. We are talking about the Tony nominations with vulture critic Jackson McHenry. If you'd like to get in on this conversation, if you want to tell us who got overlooked, who are you happy for? Give us a call. 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. We'll have more after a quick break.
- [15:21]
Alison Stewart
You're listening to all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. We are talking about the Tony nominations with vulture critic Jackson McHenry and you as well. Give us a call at 2124-3396-9222-2433. WNYC. Tell us your reactions. Who got overlooked? Who are you happy for? Let's talk to Beth from the Jersey Shore. Hey, Beth, thanks for calling, all of it. What did you get to see?
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Caller Beth
Thanks, Allison. I got to see Ragtime twice this year. I had seen 90s and went back or went to see it the first time with my daughter and another mother daughter group and then was just so blown away that I went back with my friends who I'd seen the 90s version with. It just was outstanding. Obviously Joshua Henry, but almost every everyone that was in it I just kept being overwhelmed by. So I thought, I think everyone should see it. I also did see Two Strangers, which I thought was very creative, especially the set design. So highly recommend it too.
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Alison Stewart
Thanks for calling in. Yeah, the best leading actor in a musical was you said Joshua Henning for Ragtime, but also Brandon Uranowitz for Ragtime and Sam Tutty for Two Strangers Carry a Crate Across New York, as well as Luke Evans for the Rocky Horror show and Nicholas Christopher. That's another category that's really hard to pick from.
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Jackson McHenry
It is. And as sort of you can see with the ensemble of Ragtime, they have someone in every musical acting category who feels like the most likely contender, if not the front runner. So it's quite an ensemble. Their voices are pretty incredible altogether.
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Alison Stewart
We noticed that Adrien Brody didn't get a nomination for his Broadway debut in the fear of 13, although he received an Olivier nomination when he played in London. John Bernthal. He's a huge crowd favorite in Dog Day Afternoon. He didn't get a nod. I owe debris. What does this say about the voting body?
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Jackson McHenry
I think it's often, I mean, you just sort of think of through the mechanisms of Tony season, there's sort of a nominating committee that goes and sees all these productions and makes their determinations on the nominations ahead of the wider body of producers, actors, et cetera, theater people who vote on the Tonys. And the committee often can kind of come off as a little bit of a snob in a way, in a way that I think is healthy for the system where they're going to see these big name things and they're sometimes saying, well, this isn't quite as good as this theater star that we know, or this isn't quite the same. And it happened also last year there was a production of Othello that the nominee committee really didn't seem fond of at all and left off Denzel Washington, Jake Gyllenhaal. And so there's often these sort of a list names that are coming in to do theater that they just determine aren't quite up to this enough or aren't at the level of the rest of the season and sort of it Happens also, I think just because there's a lot of star produced plays, this is a viable business model for producers. And so it comes down to narrowing it down. Inevitably, there will be quite a number of star names that aren't there.
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Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
This said Love Liberation. This said Ali. Louis Briguzzi as David in the Lost Boys was a revelation. Oh, he's great. This goes on to say, his sinuous sex appeal reached to where I was sitting in row P. And for the first time ever, I thought it might not be so bad to be a vampire. Great show, great cast. Not to be missed.
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Jackson McHenry
Wow. I love that person's experience. And it is true. The Lost Boys is really going for that. He's quite great. He was also in the who's Tommy previously and he's caught that rocker vibe.
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Alison Stewart
There's another nod I want to give to Alden Einrich. Einrich. Is that how he's. His name?
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Jackson McHenry
Ehrenreich.
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Alison Stewart
Ehrenreich. Thank you. Alden Ehrenreich. He was so good in Becky Shaw. He was nominated for his featured role. You wrote a profile of him.
- [19:15]
Jackson McHenry
Yes, I did. Yes. And this is actually. This is kind of a wonderful counter example to the stars being left out. Alden Ehrenreich, who's someone. If you watch a lot of films, he was in Hail Caesar, the Coen Brothers movie. He was famously the young Han Solo in the somewhat tortured Disney Young Han Solo project. But he's come. He's making his Broadway debut and he is really so incredible and sharp and funny in this play. It's sort of a relationship comedy. And he plays a sort of incredibly caustic finance guy who's set up on the date with obviously the wrong woman and things spiral. But he's wonderful. And people I keep talking to are sort of like Alden Ehrenreich. Who knew? We need him on stage. We're so thrilled to have him in New York and on Broadway. So I'd encourage people to seek out that play and also sort of say that sometimes people come in who you know from elsewhere and you're like, you really do have the chops. And it's such a wonderful thing to celebrate.
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Alison Stewart
Only six musicals were eligible for best musical. Only five were eligible for best revival. Did the musical slate seem a little thin this year?
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Jackson McHenry
It did. I think it's a tough year. I think people have been shy and nervous about the financial costs of producing musicals, of producing the spectacle on the level of a Broadway musical. And it has been. I think I'm a member of the New York Drama Critics Circle. And for this year, we decided to simply not give a prize for best musical because no consensus could be reached. And so it's a little bit of what feels like, I guess, in sports, you would say a rebuilding season.
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Alison Stewart
That's a good way to put it. Let's talk to sue on line three, calling from the Upper west side. Hi, Sue. Thanks for calling all of it. You're on the air.
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Caller Beth
Hi. There is a play that had us shivering with amazement and wonder, and that is Manhattan Theater Club's the Monsters with Enye Mizel and Oops, A Hard Name, Okira Yete Ona Onao Doan. I've never heard it pronounced, so I don't know how to pronounce it. And the two actors were phenomenal. You would not have believed that they hadn't always been part of the mixed martial arts scene. But it's also a story about a brother and sister who have lost and found one another. And we were absolutely entranced by it.
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Alison Stewart
First of all, you did a good job with his name. I almost did as bad a job with. When I had to pronounce it and that. Secondly, that's not available for a Tony. Correct.
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Jackson McHenry
That's. Yeah, it was off Broadway, but it's
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Alison Stewart
a great show, by the way. Great, great show. This said thought Bug was overlooked. Outstanding performance was had by Carrie Coon, although she was nominated.
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Jackson McHenry
Yes, she was nominated. It's always a question with these plays that have had their runs end before Tony season, to what extent people will remember them. But she was nominated. It was recognized for things. I mean, Liberation, which someone else had also written in, was healthily nominated and recognized, which is great to see.
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Alison Stewart
Who did you think got overlooked? Or if they could have had another. Another role for that person, One more slot for that person, you would have slid this person in. Who was it?
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Jackson McHenry
Oh, gosh. I think they got in a lot of people I really liked. I think actually some of the other ensemble members in Becky Shaw, I would have liked to see Mallon Brewer, Lauren Patton in the direction for that Trip Coleman. I think it was a tight season in many ways, but I think a lot of the people that I was most excited about and I was worried would be left off weren't, I think Susanna Flood, who was the lead in Liberation, was really quite fantastic and she got in. And she's not someone who is, you know, Rose Byrne level famous, but she's in the category, which is so exciting for me. So I think her. I think that there were other people in the ensemble of Liberation. They recognized Betsy Aidem, who's wonderful, but there could have been more there. And I think also the ensemble of the revival of Cats, if people have seen it's a whole scale reimagining of Cats as the Jellicle Ball with sort of a queer ballroom influence. And they recognized Andre de Shields, who is the sort of reigning patriarch of the Cats. But there are so many ensemble members. Emma Sophia, who plays the train cat Skimbleshanks Chasity Moore, who plays Grizabella, the glamour cat and sings. Memory is so moving in that part in a way where you're sort of surprised that you are kind of overwhelmed by the emotion of the musical Cats. So I would have loved to see more recognition for them.
- [23:55]
Alison Stewart
Hey, by the way, we have a few tickets left for our Broadway on the Radio event with cats. Go to wnyc.org cats One quick question and we got a minute for it. In 2021, the Broadway producer Scott Rudin was accused of widespread abusive behavior. He's faced a kind of exile among Broadway community. But this year he received two nominations for Death of a Salesman and Little Bear Ridge Road. Does this say something about how Broadway handles its bullies?
- [24:23]
Jackson McHenry
I potentially, yes, it does. And so many sort of top shelf stars are willing to work with him. I think Laurie Metcalf, who just did a profile for the New Yorker and she discussed it and she laid out her reasoning of he is a man who could bring her play Little Bear Ridge Road, which was in the fall, and then also Salesman in the way that she believed it should be kind of handled. But she had a split and they're sort of still litigating the she said sort of dynamics of a split with Steppenwolf, the theater that originally produced that play. But yes, it's sort of interesting that, I mean, as much as there is so much praise for Salesman, that it is a Scott Rudin vehicle that he has sort of and he has sort of somewhat disputed the allegations against him and also said that he's trying to make amends and apologize. It's sort of unclear the extent to which he is a changed man. And it's sort of the open question of how much and how we should rehabilitate people and also do we want to immediately hand him an award? That's a tough question.
- [25:29]
Alison Stewart
Jackson McHenry is Vulture's critic. Thanks for discussing the Tonys with me.
- [25:34]
Jackson McHenry
Thank you for having me.
- [25:36]
Alison Stewart
And that is all of it.
- [25:37]
Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
I appreciate you listening.
- [25:38]
Alison Stewart
I appreciate you. I will meet you back here next
- [25:41]
Host (possibly Alison Stewart)
time
- [25:44]
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