Entertainment

The time the Tonys got tense

There is, I regret to report, very little agita surrounding this year’s Tonys.

That’s because the winners — “The Book of Mormon” and “War Horse” — are as certain as the sun rising in the east.

And where’s the fun in that?

In the absence of a bitter, juicy rivalry this year, let’s jump in the Shubert Alley time machine and travel back to June 1982, the summer Broadway was alive with Tony tension.

The musical that was supposed to win everything that year was Michael Bennett’s “Dreamgirls.”

It opened to rave reviews the previous December and certified Bennett as the greatest director-choreographer of his generation. As far as everyone was concerned, the 1982 Tonys were not going to be a competition — they were going to be a coronation.

But on May 9, the very last day a show could open and still be eligible to win a Tony, a musical called “Nine” debuted at the Richard Rodgers Theatre, and overnight, the coronation became a horse race.

“Nine” was directed by Bennett’s former prodigy, Tommy Tune.

Bennett knew that anything Tune was involved with was a potential threat. When he got wind of “Nine,” he called Tune and urged him to take the show out of town first — and open it on Broadway the next season. But that was impossible.

“We had no money — zip, nada, nothing,” recalls Judy Jacksina, the show’s press agent. “Either we opened cold on Broadway or we didn’t open at all. The paint was still drying on the set when the critics came.”

The reviews were good, with the notable exception of the one in the New York Times, which was a cheerleader for “Dreamgirls.”

A day later, however, “Nine” received 12 Tony nominations. “Dreamgirls” picked up 13.

Bennett and Tune’s friendship began to fray.

“They were very polite in the room,” says Jacksina, “but you could see the machine guns over to the side.”

Also pitted against each other were the mighty Shubert Organization, which bankrolled “Dreamgirls,” and the scrappy Nederlanders, who backed “Nine.” “They barely spoke to each other in those days,” says a source.

Jon Wilner, who created the ad campaign for “Nine,” says: “The Shuberts were scared of ‘Nine.’ ”

The Tonys were held at the Imperial Theatre that year. On the right side sat the Shuberts. On the left, the Nederlanders. The awards went back and forth all night long.

“When they said ‘Nine,’ the left side of the house cheered,” says Wilner. “When they said ‘Dreamgirls,’ the right side cheered.” And then Lena Horne tore open the envelope for Best Musical.

” ‘Nine!’ ” she announced, shocked.

The camera cut to Bernard B. Jacobs, the powerful head of the Shuberts. He looked like he was at the dentist’s. The Nederlanders, meanwhile, were jumping up and down.

“Nine” went on to run 729 performances.

“It’s my opinion that if we had not won, we would be a footnote,” says Jacksina. “To ‘Dreamgirls,’ the Tony would have been a well-deserved award. To us, it was life and death.”

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michael.riedel@nypost.com