Canucks compete for Tonys
Win or lose, Come From Away can expect boost from award nods
TORONTO — Bob Martin knows the benefits of the Tony bump.
Martin and Don McKellar cowrote the book for The Drowsy Chaperone, a musical comedy that got its start in Toronto before going to Broadway and scoring 13 Tony nominations, including a nod for best musical.
“We didn’t expect anything, so it was fantastic — and then we ended up winning five Tony Awards,” recalled Martin, who along with McKellar won the best book of a musical prize. The show also won Tonys for original score, costume design, scenic design and best featured actress in a musical for Beth Leavel.
Falling just shy of capturing Broadway’s biggest musical prize did little to dim the fortunes of Drowsy. The show enjoyed two national tours, was staged in Australia starring Oscar and Tony winner Geoffrey Rush, and other countries including Japan and Sweden.
“It’s been an incredible journey. It changed my life completely because now I spend six months of the year in New York,” Martin said in a phone interview from the Big Apple, where he is doing a workshop for the new musical Millions, for which he has written the book.
“As soon as I won the Tony, I was immediately identified as a librettist — and before that, I had been an actor and a TV writer. So really, it’s hard to overstate how completely my life has changed.”
Come From Away co-creators Irene Sankoff and David Hein may be in shared company with their Drowsy Chaperone counterparts come Sunday.
The Canadian husband-andwife team are nominated for best book and best score of a musical, two of the seven Tony nods for Come From Away.
The heartwarming musical about Newfoundland hospitality in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks will compete against Dear Evan Hansen, Groundhog Day: The Musical Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 for the prestigious best musical Tony.
Come From Away heads into the Tonys with a slew of best musical wins from New York’s Drama Desk Awards, Outer Critics Circle Awards, and the Helen Hayes Awards in Washington, D.C.
The show’s nominations for Broadway’s biggest honours already put it in a distinct class, with potential to boost its box office fortunes even if the Tony nods don’t yield trophies.
Rick Miramontez is president of New York-based public relations firm DKC/O&M, whose client roster includes past Tony winners Fun Home, Kinky Boots, and Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, and current best musical nominee Dear Evan Hansen.
Tony-nominated play A Doll’s House, Part 2 is also under the DKC/O&M umbrella. The new production is up for eight Tonys — the most of any play — but had a rough road on the path to the awards show.
“When it was in previews it was selling very anemically. The grosses were not encouraging. But it did open right toward the end of the season, the day of the Tony cutoff limit,” recalled Miramontez.
The show received “tremendous reviews” in the days leading up to the Tony nominations on May 2 — and its fortunes changed overnight.
“In that period between opening, Tony nominations and now, it’s done a dramatic turnaround, and it’s selling four times on a daily basis what it sold at the beginning, and it’s selling out many performances,” said Miramontez.
“Even if it doesn’t win, it will have the kind of life that it would never have had — it probably would have been closed by now — prior to the Tony Award attention.”
The musical lucky enough to capture the top Tony prize has the potential to book “a robust tour” and sell out engagements across the U.S., said Miramontez.
“In New York, it will increase the longevity of a run for a show because that tag ‘best musical’ differentiates that from many other shows, of course,” he said.
“There are very few ‘best musicals’ currently running on Broadway, and it helps audiences who are coming in from out of town who don’t necessarily know a lot about any given show to take a chance on it, because it’s got the imprimatur of a best musical Tony trophy, he added. “And that matters to audiences across the country and internationally.”
Toronto’s Mirvish Productions staged Come From Away ahead of its current New York run and will mount a new production of the show beginning next February.
Mirvish has seen its subscription renewal rate hit an all-time high of 85 per cent heading into its new season — and Come From Away is what has made the difference, said director of communications John Karastamatis.
“The show was a hit here before Broadway happened,” said Karastamatis. “The fact that it has become a solid success in New York has just added fuel to the fire and it has made that show that much more powerful.”