In the 10 days since this year’s Tony Awards ceremony, a revolt has been growing: In all my decades in the theater community, I’ve never seen such widespread complaints about the commercialization of the Tonys.
Established in 1947 to honor the best work on Broadway, the awards are vital to New York’s billion-dollar theater industry. But the sense is growing that the Tonys aren’t going to the most deserving artists, but simply to those who generate the most cash.
This year — in a way I’ve never witnessed before — the surest ways to win a Tony Award were to be a big Hollywood “name” and/or be in a commercial hit. I’ve heard these same complaints voiced over and over — at parties, at theatrical hangouts, on social-networking and theater-chat sites.
At the jazz club Birdland, Linda Lavin (a Tony nominee for her work in the play “Collected Stories”) was invited up to do a number on the day after the awards show. Before singing, she vented at length about the Tonys, bemoaning the way they’re become big and commercial (“like the Grammys”), focusing on celebrity rather than artistic talent.
She may have a point. Denzel Washington won the Tony for “Best Actor in a Play” (“Fences”). But the Drama Desk Awards reflect the consensus of theater critics. And Washington not only didn’t win for “Best Actor” (Liev Schreiber did, for “A View from the Bridge”), he wasn’t even nominated.
So how did Washington wind up winning the Tony? In the last year, the theater critics and journalists (about 100 in all) were removed from the 800-person pool of Tony voters. That gives more weight to producers, road-show presenters and publicists — who likely think more in terms of commercial success (or may have vested interests), rather than just artistic merit.
Which may help explain why Catherine Zeta-Jones — with her big name from films — won the Tony for “Best Actress in a Musical” (for “A Little Night Music”) even though the Drama Desk voters gave it to both her and Montego Glover (for “Memphis”).
And heaven help you if you gave a brilliant performance in a production that flopped. The Drama Desk — whose awards are given strictly for artistic merit, not box-office success — honored Santino Fontana as “Best Actor in a Play,” for his work in “Brighton Beach Memoirs.” But the production closed after just nine performances — and he didn’t get even a nomination for the Tony. Indeed, not a single Tony Award this year went to a performer in a flop.
Last Thursday, Broadway star Hunter Foster created a Facebook page called “Give the Tony’s Back to Broadway.” In just a few days, that page has already attracted 7,000-plus members. Broadway star Meredith Patterson wrote on the page that this year, for the first time ever, the Tonys left her feeling sad. I felt the same way.
If they want to restore the Tonys’ credibility, the American Theatre Wing and the Broadway League should go back to the old system that worked well for decades — and restore the theater critics and journalists as Tony voters.
The author of eight published books and five pub lished plays, Chip Deffaa was a longtime entertain ment critic for The Post. His play “George M. Cohan Tonight!” opens in London in September.