Tony races too tight to call
‘Doll’s House’ and ‘Oslo’ suddenly neck & neck
Iwent out on a limb last year and predicted a big night for “Hamilton” at the Tony Awards — and did pretty well in the office pool. This year some of the races are so close that, after talking to a dozen Tony voters this week, I have no idea how things are going to shake down.
Ballots are due Friday at 5 p.m., and anxiety is running high. The Tony is a powerful marketing tool, one that can add years to a show’s run and fill up its coffers. As one Tony voter says, “I’ve never had this much power in my life. It’s fun!”
Best Musical is still too close to call. It’s “Dear Evan Hansen,” with its $35 million advance, versus “Come From Away,” which started with zero in the till when it opened and, weeks later, jacked the advance up to $10 million. The producers of “Come From Away” are keeping their heads down and avoiding flashy stunts. Sources say one of the extremely rich producers of “Dear Evan Hansen” was going to be profiled in the Times, but wiser heads killed the story.
“You don’t want to look like you’ve got everything — and now you want your Tony Award, too,” a veteran press agent says. “That could have been a disaster.”
The race for Best Play has heated up to such a pitch that even the Amazing
Kreskin would get a headache trying to predict it.
A few weeks ago, I’d have said “Oslo,” J.T. Rogers’ play at Lincoln Center about the Norwegian diplomats who orchestrated the 1993 Middle East accords, was the favorite. But that was before “A Doll’s House, Part 2” decided to go for broke.
The play, which checks in with Nora 15 years after she slammed the door in Henrik Ibsen’s 1879 classic, opened with pennies in the box office. In the past two weeks, the advance has soared, sources say. Producer Scott Rudin doubled down on advertis- ing, buying up acres of print as well as radio and TV spots. “Doll’s House 2” ads are almost as ubiquitous as the ones for My Pillow.
The four-person, Tonynominated cast, led by Lau
rie Metcalf and Chris Cooper, has jumped into the fray, fanning out to Tony parties like presidential candidates at a summer fair in Iowa. Metcalf is promoting the play this week on both “The Tonight Show” and “Nightline.”
“Look, they saw nobody in the house that first week of previews,” a source says. “They know what you have to do to sell a new play in this market.” The playwright, Lucas
Hnath, is out and about as well — and everybody loves his long hair.
Rogers doesn’t have Hnath’s hair, but he’s a charmer and he’s working the circuit. “You know what? I’m enjoying it,” he told me the other day at Gallaghers Steakhouse.
A perennial problem for nonmusicals is getting Tony voters in the door, especially out-of-towners who have time only to see the big musicals that will play well in their markets.
“Doll’s House 2” solved the problem by having a midnight performance during a Broadway League conference a couple of weeks ago. Tony voters enjoyed a few drinks and then settled in for the brisk 90-minute running time. As my colleague Johnny Oleksinski wrote, “The energy in the room was . . . raucous, frenzied and downright sexy. Broadway’s usual politeness was overtaken by absolute drunken delirium.”
Albert Nocciolino, who runs a bunch of theaters in Buffalo and Rochester, says, “That midnight performance really caught my attention.” Nocciolino, who has an investment in the play, thinks the production might be able to tour.
“Plays are tough to sell on the road,” he says. “But we’ve had ‘ God of Carnage’ and ‘Doubt,’ and like ‘Doll’s House,’ they’re 90 minutes, one set and a small cast. Doesn’t cost a lot.”
I still think the Best Play race is up for grabs. But there’s no question Rudin has ratcheted up the tension.
Expect Radio City Music Hall to fall silent Sunday night when the presenters say, “And the Tony goes to . . .”