‘A Strange Loop’ creates history in Tonys; ‘Company’ won 5

“A Strange Loop,” an irreverent, sexually explicit work about blackness and queerness, took home the Best New Musical crown at the Tony Awards on Sunday, as voters chose an envelope-pushing black voice to be one of Broadway’s most popular musicals. Celebrated the racially diverse season.

Michael R. Jackson’s 2020 Pulitzer Prize drama winner is a theater meta-journey—a sweet show about a black gay man writing a show about a black gay man. Jackson also won the Best Book Award. Many other tones of the night were spread over several productions.

The triumph of a smaller, more offbeat musical against more commercial offerings continues a recent trend, when the intimate musical “The Bands Visit” replaced the big-brand musicals “Frozen,” “Mean Girls” and “SpongeBob SquarePants” in 2018. or when a year later “Hadstown” outperformed “Tootsie,” “Beetlejuice” and “Ain’t Too Proud.”

“A Strange Loop” beat “MJ”, a bio-music of the King of Pop’s greatest hits, for the top prize, although other Jackson musicals garnered four Tony Awards, including Best Choreography. Miles Frost Moon won Best Lead Actor in a Musical for playing Michael Jackson, becoming the youngest singles winner in that category. “Mom, I made it!” They said.

“MJ” represents 22-year-old Frost’s Broadway debut as he plays Jackson with a high, whispering voice, a Lady Diana-like coaxing, and a fierce embrace of Jackson’s iconic dancing and singing style. “Heal the world,” said Frost, broadcasting to Jackson from the stage.

Joaquina Calucango won a Tony for Best Leading Actress in a Musical for her work in “Paradise Square”, a show about Irish immigrants and black Americans struggling to survive in New York City during the time of the Civil War. was. Earlier in the night, she blew up the house with a groundbreaking performance of the musical “Let It Burn.”

The gender-swapped revival of Stephen Sondheim’s “Company” graced Broadway by earning five statuettes, including Best Musical Revival, for the late iconic composer.

“The Company” is an exploration of one person’s conflicting feelings about commitment, traditionally centered on a 35-year-old bachelor. This time, it had a bachelor and the sexes of several couples were swapped.

Marianne Elliott made Tony history by becoming the only woman to win three tons for directing, the latest for “The Company.” She thanked Sondheim for letting one woman put her “front and center.” He dedicated his award to all those who fought to keep theaters open.

Patti LuPone won Best Actress in a Musical for her work in the revival, thanking COVID-19 safety officials in her acceptance speech. Matt Doyle won Best Actor in a Musical for “Company”.

“The Lehman Trilogy”, spanning 150 years and running for three and a half hours, follows the fate of a single family in the financial crash of 2008. It was crowned Best New Drama and Sam Mendes won for Best Direction of a Play. The season for its “widespread creativity”. One of its three stars, Simon Russell Beale, won Best Actor in a Drama and thanked audiences for watching the trio of British actors tell the story of New York.

Deirdre O’Connell won Best Actress in a Drama for her work in “Dana H,” about a real woman abducted by a former criminal and white supremacist. O’Connell never speaks, instead lip-syncing to the edited recording of Survivor. On Sunday, O’Connell urged the crowd to ignore safer alternatives and “make weird art.”

“Take Me Out” won for Best Drama Revival, and “Modern Family” star Jesse Tyler Ferguson won a Tony for Best Actor in a Drama for his work in it. “Mom, dad, thank you for letting me move to New York when I was 17. I told you it would be okay,” said Ferguson, who also thanked her understanding and her husband.

Host Ariana DeBos kicked off her part of the show in a stunning white jumpsuit and wide-brimmed hat, dancing and singing to the song “This Is Your Round of Applause,” which mashed up pieces from musical theater favorites like “Chicago,” Gave. The Wiz,” “Evita,” “Rent,” “Hair,” “Cabaret,” “Hairspray” and “West Side Story,” the film remake for which she recently won an Oscar.

Welcoming the audience still gasping, she told the crowd that this season was “Broadway’s got this groove back.”

Phylicia Rashad won Best Actress in a Drama for “Skeleton Crew”. The Dominique Morisseau drama set in a Detroit auto stamping plant is about blue-collar job insecurity. Rashad said, “It is wonderful to present humanity in its entirety.”

And Tony debuted the latest EGOT winner: Jennifer Hudson, who has an Emmy, a Grammy, and an Oscar, and joined that elite group on Sunday when “A Strange Loop” won Best Musical—she’s a producer.

A starry revival of the classic show “The Music Man” with Hugh Jackman and Sutton Foster went empty-handed despite being six nominations and a box office smash, regularly grossing over $3 million a week.

The season was marked by the embrace of seven Black playwrights, ranging from contemporary writers such as Dominique Morisseau, Keenan Scott II and Antoinette Nwandu to lauded historical playwrights such as Alice Childress and Nozek Shange. DeBos said Broadway was more representative.

DeBos celebrated the Black voice and talent on stage – as well as noting that two Broadway theaters were being renamed after Black icons James Earl Jones and Lena Horn – saying that The Great White Way is now There was a nickname “the opposite of the how-to guide.”

DeBoss also praised the heroic efforts of understanding, swings and standbys to keep the show running during the pandemic, noting that he and several other Tony nominees were once unhelpful grasps and swings. After the cast of “Six” performed, DeBos noted that there was a last-minute fill-in.

After being freed from technical rewards, the main broadcast had a less frenetic, more airy feel. DeBoss was a confident, witty and versatile host who swung seats, sat on Andrew Garfield’s lap, danced with Sam Rockwell and inspired Laurence Fishburne to imitate Daffy Duck. He closed the show with a medley of musical nominees, at one point making “MJ” a part of the Dylan show: “You’ve been hit / A Rolling Stone hit.”

Some of the show’s highlights included the massive cast of “The Music Man” filling the massive Radio City stage with “Seventy-Six Trombones”, as well as Prince Jackson and Paris Jackson dancing with “MJ” before their father. Introduced about the show. For an energetic “smooth criminal”.

Billy Crystal taught the crowd “Yedish Scattering” and the original cast of the 2007 Tony-winning musical “Spring Awakening” – which included Lea Michele and Jonathan Groff – reunited for a performance.

Several acceptance speeches thanked viewers for bravery in COVID-19 for coming to see the show, and Marsha Gay Harden invited 150 security officers as guests.

Previously, Darren Criss and Julianne Hough co-founded the Four Hours Awards, giving away most of the design awards. Chris began the broadcast with the original song, “Set the Stage”, as he and Huff danced energetically on laundry hampers and sliding theater seats to celebrate the performers who kept the theater alive. did.

The first prize of the night – for Best Score – went to “Six: The Musical” with music and lyrics by Toby Marlowe and Lucy Moss. Marlowe became the first non-binary composer-songwriter to win a Tony. “Six: The Musical” also won the award for Best Costume for a Musical.

The season – with 34 new productions – represents a full return to theaters after nearly two years of pandemic-mandated shutdowns. In the final ton nine months ago, winners were drawn from only 18 character plays and musicals, and several competing categories were eliminated.

Sondheim, the iconic musician who died in late 2021, was honored in a special segment by Bernadette Peters singing her song “Children Will Listen.” Angela Lansbury, who had been awarded a lifetime achievement Tony, was not present, so her “Sweeney Todd” co-star Len Carrio accepted on her behalf.