Tony Wrap Up: How'd I Do?

Well, the main event has come and passed. The performances have taken place and the winners have collected their trophies (but I think they have to send them back to be engraved with their name, so it may not be in their immediate possession). So before I get to a review and thoughts on the telecast, here's how I did in my predictions.

Overall Production Categories: 5/5

Told you they were very predictable.

Performances: 7/8

The only one I missed was Featured Actor in a Musical, which I thought would go to Christopher Sieber. He had to settle for a shout out in the closing number. My dark horse, Greg Jbara, actually pulled off the award, so I'll give myself half credit for that, for a real total of 7.5/8.

Craft: 8.5/14

That darn tie in orchestrations threw me for a loop, so that's what the .5 up there is for.
I thought Blithe Spirit would get costumes, but my dark horse with Victorian dresses AND a concept, Mary Stuart, won out, so half credit there.
I was completely off on lighting design, as I guessed the Equus win in this category, not sound where it actually won, and my dark horse of 33 Variations didn't get the nod either over Joe Turner.
I underestimated the power of Billy, and didn't think he would get Lighting, so no points there.
Half credit for sound design since Equus was my dark horse over Exit the King.
I pulled the wrong Warchus for play direction, in a very surprising move on the part of the voters, so no credit for me there, since I thought it would be Norman or nothing.
My dark horse in orchestrations was Shrek since they have the biggest orchestra and a varied score, but the scrappy rock stylings of N2N pulled out the tie with Billy.
This makes my real score (with all the half credits added in) 9.5/14. Not bad, especially for my first time out, eh?


And now for the telecast. In a word: WHY? I mean, most of the ideas were good in theory, but if you're going to execute your telecast like that, why even bother trying? I sincerely hope the sound guy had a good excuse for the horrible mixing, because it seems he deprived us of a truly transcendent, thrilling opening number. I even liked the mash ups (and I liked the rock underscored "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered" a surprising amount. I'd buy that track!) and got really excited in parts where everyone was all singing together. But I wasn't truly taken away because of the awful, awful sound mixing. I do also wish we could have gotten a clearer picture of more people when they were all on stage at the end, and that people behind the front row could be properly identified.

Neil Patrick Harris did a good job smoothly piloting, and was often barely noticeable, giving the shows and awards a chance to shine before killing with his hilarious closing number. But all the talented people in the world on that stage could not have saved the telecast from the stranger choices of the directors (swooshing on the memorials? really?) and the strange places where mics were turned up too much or not enough.

Seriously, if you are going to turn the awards into a giant commercial while sacrificing some very important awards (Best Book? Choreography?) to the preshow (hosted by the hilarious Laura Benanti and smooth Brian Stokes Mitchell) please do a good job selling your product. I'm ok with featuring touring companies a bit, to draw in those who may not ever get to NYC, but are interested in the shows in their neck of the woods, but maybe you can feature a bunch of them in their own big medley instead of spreading it out to three performances. That would also save us from having to suffer through 3 verses of Dancing Queen for the umpteenth time, which I would very much support and appreciate.

The Tony Awards have the potential to put on a great show and sell some tickets at the same time. But do please remember that this is about honoring the great work of the past year, so relegating important awards to the preshow and having Jersey Boys perform for the third time in four years isn't always sending the right message. Hopefully you'll get back on track next year. I know I'll be there watching, but if other people don't because of the quality of the telecast this year, I certainly can't blame them.