Welcome to my Monday newsletter. With no new shows I wanted to talk about, I decided to pivot for this week and talk about the Tony nominations, which are getting revealed tomorrow morning. So, check out that post or if Broadway isn't your thing, I also have my Emmy Preview for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series and brief thoughts on Palm Royale and The Big Door Prize. And I'll be back to more TV talk next week!
It's been a wild and busy Broadway season with a record 15 new musicals opening this year (along with many revivals, plays and play revivals). But what's also been interesting is very few shows have gotten unanimous raves. The revival of Merrily We Roll Along has been the hit of the season, which is wild since the original was an all-time flop. Plays Stereophonic, Appropriate, Prayer for the French Republic and late dance entry Illinoise were also met with rave reviews. But the rest of the musicals all had their supporters and detractors so it's really anyone's guess what will happen tomorrow. It feels like it could truly be spread out like never before or we might see nominators coalesce around some of the upper tier of shows. But it's certainly more unknown than usual so it should be fun!
For musicals, it was better to be late to the game this year. The frontrunners are all recent openings: Suffs, Hell's Kitchen and the aforementioned Illinoise. The other musicals with the best reviews from the season are Days of Wine and Roses and Here Lies Love. The problem is both of them are closed and did not do well with audiences despite the critical love. If you take out the non-starters like Once Upon a One More Time, How to Dance in Ohio, Harmony (save for Chip Zien maybe) and Lempicka (save for Eden Espinosa maybe), there are a bunch of shows in the middle looking to upend the race and overtake the closed shows and frontrunners. The Outsiders probably stands the best chance followed by similar chances for The Notebook and Water For Elephants (though it's highly unlikely both do well). Then there's the big budget spectacles Back to the Future and The Great Gatsby. They seem to have a much better shot at technical nominations than anything above the line. Finally, there's The Heart of Rock and Roll which got better than expected reviews but still seems closer to the "no chance" column than the "contender" column.