As soon as living legend Barbra Streisand presented the Best Musical award to Hamilton, the audience erupted into a standing ovation.
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NEW YORK, The 2016 Tony Awards are generating more buzz than usual ahead of Sunday’s ceremony, with all eyes on musical juggernaut “Hamilton”, a pop culture phenomenon that is expected to take the lion’s share of honors at Broadway’s annual salute to itself.
We’ll be live-blogging the Tonys here, and will be paying particular attention to how the broadcast is affected by the tragedy.
“Hamilton” creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda, said tonight’s performance of the number “Battle of Yorktown” wouldn’t include muskets, a nod to the day’s sensitivity. “Art can entertain us and educate us and at times like this, console us”. Corden at one point suggested there were so many diverse performers on the show that the Republican candidate would want to put a wall around the theater.
For the most part, veteran director Glenn Weiss (who has won nine Emmy Awards for previous Tony telecasts) captured the essence of each number, with only the performance of Spring Awakening feeling frustratingly limited by the camera. Oftentimes, as during the presentations for Best Play and Best Play Revival, the music was so loud I could barely hear what the people on stage were saying. “I urge you, Orlando, to be strong…”
“Think of tonight as the Oscars but with diversity”, quipped Corden in reference to this year’s Academy Awards, which were panned for failing to honor minority actors and directors.
Stephen Karam’s “The Humans” is a fan favorite to win Best Play and Jessica Lange, Lupita Wyong’o and Michelle Williams are competing against one another for Best Actress in a Leading Role in a Play.
Bebe Neuwirth also led a 20th anniversary tribute to the revival of long-running musical “Chicago”, the show which earned her second Tony Award in 1997. He later flirted with Oprah Winfrey.
Corden’s Everyman personality turned out to be the ideal balm for the evening, which saw “Hamilton” nab 11 awards, including Best Musical, Best Original Score and Best Book of a Musical. Onstage before the “On Your Feet” medley began, Emilio Estefan joked that all the Latino cast of the musical was in the country legally, in a jab at Trump.
“Hamilton” also stars largely black and Latino actors.
Glenn Close appeared on stage dressed as his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, singing: “I really need this job” to applause. The season also was rich in diversity among actors: Fourteen of the 40 Tony nominees for acting in plays and musicals – or 35 percent – were actors of color.
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Usually when an awards show reaches that kind of milestone they at least do a segment that looks back on the great moments in their history. In 2014, it reached 7.02 million and captured 7.24 million in 2013.
