Tony nominations tomorrow morning...Plays

[skynyc]

It will be interesting to see...while there have been several shows that, to me, have been "less than"... this year has had an extraordinary number of "Wow"s. Remember what follows is just my opinion....

 

There are ELEVEN new plays, and nine revivals of plays...and having only missed two...(well, one, I haven't been able to find an inexpensive way to see Fish in the Dark,) I feel several would be worthy of the big award. In the Best Play category:

Airline Highway is an interesting ensemble piece, well performed, but I feel lacking the cohesion to be a Tony winner...

I found The Audience greatly enjoyable, but more for the performance than the play...

Constellations was the one I missed.

Country House was enjoyable but this fall entry is long-forgotten by most.

Curious Incident of the Dog....: a remarkable interpretation of a novel, which I greatly enjoyed. Creative and incisive and revealing

Disgraced was powerful...the assault at the end still haunts me.

Fish in the Dark...tk.

Hand to God...provocative and dark. The dark side of Avenue Q meets light side of The Exorcist?

Living on Love was a silly romp, worthy of a $40 ticket, but not going to change anyone's lives.

The River was provocative but in a different way than HtoG above. LOL Worthy of discussion, and folks loved or hated it, but should have been off-Broadway perhaps.

Wolf Hall, Parts 1&2. Fast-paced and engaging...telling a fairly familiar tale accessibly with pomp and panache.

 

There can only be four nominees...(five if the fifth place nominee is within three votes of the fourth place nominee in the committee's tallying.) I would easily choose Curious Incident, Disgraced, Hand to God, and Wolf Hall...with The Audience as my fifth.

 

I suspect Audience will definitely be there with Constellations and Disgraced duking it out for the fifth slot. Constellations might make the ballot to get Jake Gyllenhall to the awards. |

 

Revivals: A Delicate Balance was last fall, and this is a strong category, but a powerful delivery of this Albee work, which I think is under-appreciated, (even with the Pulitzer) is still very much on my mind.

Elephant Man...Bradley Cooper is very likely to get a nod...and perhaps pull the show along.

Heidi Chronicles hasn't pulled in people despite pleasant reviews...and is closing three months earlier than announced. A lovely play of it's time, (Heck, it won the Pulitzer in it's time.) But it's time isn't now.

It's Only a Play...Nathan Lane and the (mostly) stellar cast made this THE hot ticket of the Fall...even if there's not much to the piece.

Love Letters...a mis-fire for Broadway.

Real Thing...a mis-fire for everyone involved.

Skylight. Not a revival for me...the only play in this category that I had never seen. Loved it. Thought the prose, presentation, and production were all stellar.

This is Our Youth...again...a long time ago in the theater-goer's memory...but this production hummed and whined beautifully.

You Can't Take It With You. Silly comedies don't usually do well, but if this was still running, I think it could win....but this was a real romp of an evening.

I wold pick Delicate Balance, Skylight, You Can't Take with you. My fourth and fifth are interchangeable: This is our Youth and Elephant Man.

 

Musicals next. (Don't worry...I won't bore you with the performing awards.)