The appearance of the rapper in support of Keys’ musical “Hell’s Kitchen” led to a boost of excitement inside the arena but it now appears it was a piece of Hollywood trickery, undercutting the Broadway communities’ full-throated embrace of live singing and dancing.

A representative from Jay-Z’s Roc Nation and a producer at White Cherry Entertainment did not return messages seeking clarification on what happened Sunday night. A senior publicist for the telecast also did not return requests for comment on Monday.

“Hell’s Kitchen,” which won two awards Sunday night — for star Maleah Joi Moon and Kecia Lewis, who plays her mentor — is loosely based on Keys’ years growing up in that Manhattan neighborhood and contains old hits and new songs from the singer-songwriter. Keys is a producer but doesn’t appear in the show. The show ends with a rousing edition of “Empire State of Mind.”

Each best new musical nominee at the Tony Awards gets a slot performing and “Hell’s Kitchen” was first, with the cast playing a medley of songs — including her hit “Fallin’” — from the show.

Then Keys appeared at the piano on the stage of the David H. Koch Theater in Lincoln Center and began singing her and Jay-Z’s 2009 smash. She soon got up and went down the steps of the stage and into the orchestra seat section and out the side of the auditorium — “Had to do something crazy. It’s my hometown,” she explained to the crowd — moments later apparently joining the rapper on some of the venue’s marble steps to wild applause. “Brooklyn, New York City in the Tonys tonight!” Jay-Z signed-off at the end.

The audience and media was inside the auditorium and no photos have surfaced of the two performers live. A version of the two finishing the song was beamed to the TV audience and a video screen inside the venue. Keys wore the same outfit she was wearing onstage. Jay-Z was never spotted entering the packed auditorium.

While some parts of the Tony telecast are pre-taped — technical awards handed out before the show, some advertising packages and often segments from the top nominated plays — the strong feeling is that the musical performances are what audiences will see when they come to Broadway, with no trickery.

New York Magazine first reported that the segment had been pre-taped.

The musical based on the beloved S. E. Hinton book is about rival gangs of haves and have-nots in 1960s Oklahoma. The win meant Angelina Jolie, a producer, landed her first Tony, too.

Producer Matthew Rego, in his acceptance speech, thanked Hinton, in the audience at Manhattan’s Lincoln Center: “Susie, I’m here to tell you that your story and its eternal message of love and family and staying gold has forever changed all of our lives.”

“Stereophonic,” the play about a Fleetwood Mac-like band recording an album over a turbulent and life-changing year, won best new play and had the night’s most total awards at five. It was written by David Adjmi, with songs by former Arcade Fire member Will Butler.

“Oh, no. My agent gave me a beta blocker, but it’s not working,” Adjmi said. He added the play took 11 years to manifest.

“This was a very hard journey to get up here,” he said. “We need to fund the arts in America.”

Two special guests electrified the crowd — Jay-Z and Hillary Rodham Clinton. The latter, a producer of a musical about suffragettes, presented “Suffs.”

“I have stood on a lot of stages, but this is very special,” Clinton said. “I know a little bit about how hard it is to make change.”

In the first musical presentation, Alicia Keys appeared at a piano as the cast of her semi-autobiographical musical, “Hell’s Kitchen,” presented a medley of songs. She sang her and Jay-Z’s 2009 smash “Empire State of Mind,” joining the rapper on interior steps to wild applause.

Later, newcomer Maleah Joi Moon won best leading actress for “Hell’s Kitchen,” brushing aside a challenge from veteran Kelli O’Hara. The 21-year-old, who plays a role loosely based on Keys’ life, dedicated her award to her parents.

Danya Taymor — whose aunt is Julie Taymor, the first woman to win a Tony Award for directing a musical — became the sixth woman to win the same award for “The Outsiders.”

Then Shaina Taub, only the second woman in Broadway history to write, compose and star in a Broadway musical, won for best score, the ninth woman to do so. The “Suffs” creator had already won for best book earlier in the night.

“If you are inspired by the story of ‘Suffs,’ please make sure you and everyone you know have registered to vote and vote, vote, vote!” she said. Taub said the win was for all the loud girls out there: “Go for it.”

Jeremy Strong took home the first big award of the night. The “Succession” star landed his first Tony for his work in the revival of Henrik Ibsen’s 1882 political play “An Enemy of the People.” The award for best lead actor in a play will sit next to his Emmy, Screen Actors Guild Award and Golden Globe.

Kara Young, the first Black performer to be nominated for a Tony three consecutive years in a row, won this time as best featured actress in a play for “Purlie Victorious,” the story of a Black preacher’s plan to reclaim his inheritance and win back his church from a plantation owner.

“Thank you to my ancestors,” she said, giving thanks to a list that included playwright Ossie Davis and co-star Ruby Dee, who originated her role.

“Harry Potter” star Daniel Radcliffe cemented his stage career pivot by winning featured actor in a musical, his first trophy in five Broadway shows. He won for the revival of “Merrily We Roll Along,” the Stephen Sondheim- George Furth musical that goes backward in time.

“This is one of the best experiences of my life,” Radcliffe said. “I will never have it as good again.” He also thanked his parents for playing Sondheim in the car growing up.

“Merrily” was also named best musical revival and earned Jonathan Groff his first Tony, for leading actor in a musical. Groff — previously nominated for “Spring Awakening” and “Hamilton” — thanked co-stars Lindsay Mendez and Radcliffe, both emotional in the audience.

Groff, who said he used to watch the Tonys in Pennsylvania as a kid, also thanked his parents and brother for letting him act out scenes from “I Love Lucy” as a child.

“Thank you for always allowing my freak flag to fly without ever making me feel weird about it,” he said.

Kecia Lewis, who plays a formidable piano teacher in “Hell’s Kitchen,” took home her first Tony, too. The 40-year veteran made her Broadway debut at 18 in the original company of “Dreamgirls.”

“This moment is the one I dreamed of for those 40 years,” she said. “Don’t give up!”

“Appropriate,” Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ show centered on a family reunion in Arkansas, was named best play revival. Jacobs-Jenkins also thanked Davis, saying there would be no “Appropriate” without “Purlie Victorious.”

“Appropriate” star Sarah Paulson added a best leading actress in a play Tony to her awards cabinet. Paulson said she was thrilled to be able to interrogate the human condition: “This is the heart and soul of what we do and I am so honored to be amongst you.”

Three-time Tony-honored Chita Rivera got a special tribute from Audra McDonald, Brian Stokes Mitchell and Bebe Neuwirth. Images of her work in “Chicago,” “Kiss of the Spider Woman” and “West Side Story” were projected while dancers performed her hit numbers. Host Ariana DeBose, who won an Oscar in Rivera’s “West Side Story” role of Anita, joined in.

DeBose, a three-time host, also co-choreographed the opening original number, “This Party’s for You.” The song cheered those who sacrifice for their art and took a gentle swipe at other entertainment types: “You’ll learn that film and TV can make you rich and make you famous. But theater will make you better.”

The performances also included an intense, creepy version of “Willkommen” from the “Cabaret” revival led by Eddie Redmayne, Pete Townshend playing guitar for “The Who’s Tommy” and a messy rumble from “The Outsiders” that included falling water, buckets of dirt, various carpets and an onstage truck.

The telecast teased upcoming shows, inviting Nicole Scherzinger — slated to star in a “Sunset Boulevard” revival — to sing the “In Memoriam” section. Nick Jonas and Adrienne Warren — announced today as stars of 2025’s “The Last Five Years” — presented.

Scherzinger sang “What I Did for Love” as the names appeared, including playwright Christopher Durang and actors Alan Arkin,Glenda Jackson,Louis Gossett Jr., and Treat Williams.

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Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

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More on the Tony Awards: https://apnews.com/hub/tony-awards

Sunday night also saw theater history made for women as Broadway directors and score writers. Danya Taymor won a directing award for “The Outsiders.” Then Shaina Taub won for best score, for “Suffs.”

The musical of “Merrily We Roll Along” also won big, nabbing the revival award as well as trophies for Daniel Radcliffe and Jonathan Groff. The night included surprise appearances from Jay-Z and Hillary Clinton.

See the full list of this year’s winners:

Best Musical: “The Outsiders”

Best Play: “Stereophonic”

Best Revival of a Musical: “Merrily We Roll Along”

Best Revival of a Play: “Appropriate”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical: Maleah Joi Moon, “Hell’s Kitchen”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical: Jonathan Groff, “Merrily We Roll Along”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play: Sarah Paulson, “Appropriate”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play: Jeremy Strong, “An Enemy of the People”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Musical: Daniel Radcliffe, “Merrily We Roll Along”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical: Kecia Lewis, “Hell’s Kitchen”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play: Will Brill, “Stereophonic”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Play: Kara Young, “Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch”

Best Direction of a Play: Daniel Aukin, “Stereophonic”

Best Direction of a Musical: Danya Taymor, “The Outsiders”

Best Original Score: “Suffs,” music & lyrics: Shaina Taub

Best Book of a Musical: “Suffs,” Shaina Taub

Best Choreography: Justin Peck, “Illinoise”

Best Costume Design of a Play: Dede Ayite, “Jaja’s African Hair Braiding”

Best Costume Design of a Musical: Linda Cho, “The Great Gatsby”

Best Orchestrations: Jonathan Tunick, “Merrily We Roll Along”

Best Scenic Design of a Musical: Tom Scutt, “Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club”

Best Scenic Design of a Play: David Zinn, “Stereophonic”

Best Lighting Design of a Musical: Hana S. Kim and Brian MacDevitt, “The Outsiders”

Best Lighting Design of a Play: Jane Cox, “Appropriate”

Best Sound Design of a Play: Ryan Rumery, “Stereophonic”

Best Sound Design of a Musical: Cody Spencer, “The Outsiders”

Dolly Parton is writing new songs to go along with some of her past hits and co-writing a stage story inspired by her life for a stage musical that she hopes to land on Broadway in 2026.

“I’ve written many original songs for the show and included all your favorites in it as well. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll clap, you’ll stomp, it truly is a Grand Ol’ Opera. Pun and fun intended,” she said in a statement.

Parton will team up with Maria S. Schlatte on the story. Schlatte won an Emmy for producing Netflix’s “Christmas on the Square,” which starred Christine Baranski.

“Hello, I’m Dolly” is the name of Parton’s debut album released in 1967, which had the songs ″Dumb Blonde″ and ”Something Fishy.″

Parton went on to become a national treasure, starring in movies, writing books, earning Grammys, becoming the first country artist to be named MusiCares Person of the Year and donating $1 million for coronavirus research.

Food & Drink May 14

Krispy Kreme teams up with Dolly Parton for new ‘Southern Sweets' doughnuts

Jan 19

Dolly Parton surprises fans with new music to celebrate her 78th birthday

With 52 Grammy nominations and 11 wins, she is the second-most nominated woman in Grammy history, only behind Beyoncé, who has 79 nods and 24 wins. The country icon earned the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award a decade ago.

Parton will have plenty of past hits to choose from, including her three Top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 — “9 to 5,” “Here You Come Again” and “Islands in the Stream.” She also has 25 No. 1 Hot Country songs like “Yellow Roses,” “Think About Love,” “Tennessee Homesick Blues” and “Jolene.”

This won’t be the first time Parton’s music will be heard on Broadway. A stage version of “9 to 5” landed in 2009 starring Stephanie J. Block, Megan Hilty and Allison Janney, and the 1993 Christmas special “Candles, Snow & Mistletoe” contained her song “With Bells On.”

Parton’s show will be the latest musician bio on Broadway using their songs, joining such recent artists as Neil Diamond, Alicia Keys, Michael Jackson, Carole King and Gloria and Emilio Estefan.

She will join such pop and rock luminaries as Elton John, Cyndi Lauper, The Go-Gos, Sting, Alanis Morissette, Dave Stewart, Edie Brickell, Trey Anastasio, David Byrne and Fatboy Slim and Bono and The Edge with Broadway scores.

“Hello, I’m Dolly” will be produced by Parton, Adam Speers for ATG Productions and Danny Nozell for CTK Enterprises.

The June 19 concert, put on by the Broadway League, will take place at “the Crossroads of the World” from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. (rain or shine).

This year’s celebration will include the presentation of the Juneteenth Legacy Award to Tony Award-winner Phylicia Rashad.

The concert lineup includes: Blu Allen, Donovan Louis Bazemore, Jace Bentley, Ronnie S. Bowman Jr., Maya Boyd, Tsilala Brock, Max Chambers, Taylor Colleton, Jay Copeland, Lorna Courtney, Charity Angél Dawson, Mariama Diop, Desmond Sean Ellington, Will Ervin Jr., Jerome Hermann-Hardeman, Dorian Harewood, Jackson Hayes, Najah Hetsberger, Afra Hines, Manny Houston, Jaylen Lyndon Hunter, Bre Jackson, Polanco Jones Jr., John-Michael Lyles, Mehret Marsh, Deja McNair, Alex Newell, Veronica Otim, Cristina Rae, Jelani Remy, William Rhem Jr., Albert Rhodes Jr., Walter Russell III, Antoine L. Smith, Nia Thompson, Lamont Walker II, Rachel Webb, NaTasha Yvette Williams, and Hailee Kaleem Wright.

The team of Broadway performers, from shows like “The Notebook,” “The Wiz,” and “Moulin Rouge!” will be joined by kids of Young Gifted and Broadway.

The Broadway League’s Black to Broadway initiative was started in 2019 with the goal of inspiring “deeper engagement with awareness of, and access to Broadway for all Black people.”

Clooney will play legendary TV journalist Edward R. Murrow in a stage adaptation of the 2005 movie that earned him directing and writing Oscar nominations and was among the best picture contenders.

“I am honored, after all these years, to be coming back to the stage and especially, to Broadway, the art form and the venue that every actor aspires to,” Clooney said in a statement.

The play “Good Night, and Good Luck” — with David Cromer directing — will premiere on Broadway in spring 2025 at a Shubert Theatre to be announced. It will be again co-written by Clooney and Grant Heslov.

The 90-minute black-and-white film starred David Strathairn as Murrow and is a natural to be turned into a play: The dialogue-heavy action unfolds on handful of sets. The title comes from Murrow’s signoff on the TV series “See It Now.”

A key part of Clooney’s film portrayed Murrow’s struggle to maintain support from CBS executives for critical reporting on Republican Sen. Joseph McCarthy, known for accusing government employees of disloyalty. Clooney played “See It Now” co-creator Fred Friendly, who resisted intense pressure and ensured the reports got to air.

Murrow, who died in 1965, is considered one of the architects of U.S. broadcast news.

“Edward R. Murrow operated from a kind of moral clarity that feels vanishingly rare in today’s media landscape. There was an immediacy in those early live television broadcasts that today can only be effectively captured on stage, in front of a live audience,” Cromer said in a statement.

The Clooneys are boosters of journalism. Clooney’s father, Nick Clooney, worked as a TV news anchor and host in a variety of cities including Cincinnati, Salt Lake City and Los Angeles. He also wrote a newspaper column in Cincinnati and taught journalism students at American University.

At the time the movie came out, Clooney said his family took pride in how journalists held the government accountable during the paranoia of the 1950s communist threat. Clooney said he wanted to make a movie to let people hear some “really well-written words about the fourth estate again.”

Check out the full list of Drama Desk nominations below!

Outstanding Musical

Dead Outlaw

Illinoise, Park Avenue Armory

Lizard Boy, Prospect Theater Company

Teeth, Playwrights Horizons

The Connector, MCC Theater

The Outsiders

Outstanding Revival of a Play

Appropriate, Second Stage Theater

Doubt: A Parable, Roundabout Theatre Company

Philadelphia, Here I Come!, Irish Repertory Theatre

Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch

Uncle Vanya, OHenry Productions

Outstanding Revival of a Musical

Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club

Gutenberg! The Musical!

I Can Get It for You Wholesale, Classic Stage Company

Outstanding Lead Performance in a Play

Nicole Cooper, Macbeth (an undoing), Theatre for a New Audience, Rose Theatre, and Royal

Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh

William Jackson Harper, Primary Trust, Roundabout Theatre Company

Jessica Lange, Mother Play, Second Stage Theater

Rachel McAdams, Mary Jane, Manhattan Theatre Club

Tobias Menzies, The Hunt, St. Ann’s Warehouse and Almeida Theatre

Leslie Odom, Jr., Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch

Sarah Paulson, Appropriate, Second Stage Theater

A.J. Shively, Philadelphia, Here I Come!, Irish Repertory Theatre

Juliet Stevenson, The Doctor, Park Avenue Armory

Michael Stuhlbarg, Patriots

Outstanding Lead Performance in a Musical

Andrew Durand, Dead Outlaw

Santino Fontana, I Can Get It for You Wholesale, Classic Stage Company

Brody Grant, The Outsiders

Brian d’Arcy James, Days of Wine and Roses, Atlantic Theater Company

Maleah Joi Moon, Hell’s Kitchen

Kelli O’Hara, Days of Wine and Roses, Atlantic Theater Company

Liam Pearce, How to Dance in Ohio

Gayle Rankin, Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club

Ben Levi Ross, The Connector, MCC Theater

Ricky Ubeda, Illinoise, Park Avenue Armory

Outstanding Featured Performance in a Play

Brittany Adebumola, Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, Manhattan Theatre Club

Marylouise Burke, Infinite Life, Atlantic Theater Company

Michael Esper, Appropriate, Second Stage Theater

Marin Ireland, Uncle Vanya, OHenry Productions

Will Keen, Patriots

Celia Keenan-Bolger, Mother Play, Second Stage Theater

Conrad Ricamora, Oh, Mary!

Sheila Tousey, Manahatta, The Public Theater

Bubba Weiler, Swing State, Goodman Theatre

Kara Young, Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch

Outstanding Featured Performance in a Musical

Shoshana Bean, Hell’s Kitchen

Natalie Venetia Belcon, Buena Vista Social Club, Atlantic Theater Company

Dorian Harewood, The Notebook

Leslie Rodriguez Kritzer, Monty Python’s Spamalot

Kecia Lewis, Hell’s Kitchen

Bebe Neuwirth, Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club

Steven Pasquale, Teeth, Playwrights Horizons

Maryann Plunkett, The Notebook

Thom Sesma, Dead Outlaw

Emily Skinner, Suffs

Outstanding Direction of a Play

Daniel Aukin, Stereophonic, Playwrights Horizons

Rupert Goold, The Hunt, St. Ann’s Warehouse and Almeida Theatre

Kenny Leon, Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch

Lila Neugebauer, Appropriate, Second Stage Theater

Ciarán O’Reilly, Philadelphia, Here I Come!, Irish Repertory Theatre

Outstanding Direction of a Musical

David Cromer, Dead Outlaw

Rebecca Frecknall, Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club

Daisy Prince, The Connector, MCC Theater

Jessica Stone, Water for Elephants

Danya Taymor, The Outsiders

Outstanding Choreography

Camille A. Brown, Hell’s Kitchen

Graciela Daniele and Alex Sanchez, The Gardens of Anuncia, Lincoln Center Theater

Rick Kuperman and Jeff Kuperman, The Outsiders (includes fight choreography)

Lorin Latarro, The Heart of Rock and Roll

Justin Peck, Illinoise, Park Avenue Armory

Jesse Robb and Shana Carroll, Water for Elephants (includes circus choreography)

Outstanding Music

Jason Robert Brown, The Connector, MCC Theater

Justin Huertas, Lizard Boy, Prospect Theater Company

Jamestown Revival (Jonathan Clay & Zach Chance) and Justin Levine, The Outsiders

Shaina Taub, Suffs

David Yazbek and Erik Della Penna, Dead Outlaw

Outstanding Lyrics

Rachel Bloom, Eli Bolin, and Jack Dolgen, Rachel Bloom: Death, Let Me Do My Show

Jason Robert Brown, The Connector, MCC Theater

Michael R. Jackson, Teeth, Playwrights Horizons

Jamestown Revival (Jonathan Clay & Zach Chance) and Justin Levine, The Outsiders

David Yazbek and Erik Della Penna, Dead Outlaw

Outstanding Book of a Musical

Justin Huertas, Lizard Boy, Prospect Theater Company

Michael R. Jackson, Teeth, Playwrights Horizons

Michael John LaChiusa, The Gardens of Anuncia, Lincoln Center Theater

Rebekah Greer Melocik, How to Dance in Ohio

Itamar Moses, Dead Outlaw

Outstanding Orchestrations

Timo Andres, Illinoise, Park Avenue Armory

Will Butler and Justin Craig, Stereophonic, Playwrights Horizons

Andy Evan Cohen, The Greatest Hits Down Route 66, New Light Theater Project

Marco Paguia, Buena Vista Social Club, Atlantic Theater Company

Erik Della Penna, Dean Sharenow, and David Yazbek, Dead Outlaw

Michael Starobin, Shaina Taub (vocal arrangements), and Andrea Grody (vocal arrangements),

Suffs

Outstanding Music in a Play

Michael “Mikey J” Asante, The Effect, The Shed

S T A R R Busby and JJJJJerome Ellis, (pray), Ars Nova and National Black Theatre

Will Butler, Stereophonic, Playwrights Horizons

Dionne McClain-Freeney, The Harriet Holland Social Club Presents The 84th Annual Star-Burst

Cotillion in the Grand Ballroom of the Renaissance Hotel, New Georges and The Movement Theatre Company

Ben Steinfeld, Pericles, Classic Stage Company and Fiasco Theater

Outstanding Revue

Amid Falling Walls, National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene

Outstanding Scenic Design of a Play

Es Devlin, The Hunt, St. Ann’s Warehouse and Almeida Theatre

dots, Appropriate, Second Stage Theater

Derek McLane, Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch

Scott Pask, Grey House

David Zinn, Stereophonic, Playwrights Horizons

Outstanding Scenic Design of a Musical

AMP featuring Tatiana Kahvegian, The Outsiders

Paul Tate dePoo III, The Great Gatsby (includes projections)

Riccardo Hernández, Suffs

Arnulfo Maldonado, Dead Outlaw

Grace Smart, Good Vibrations: A Punk Rock Musical, Irish Arts Center

Outstanding Costume Design of a Play

Alex Berry, Macbeth (an undoing), Theatre for a New Audience, Rose Theatre, and Royal

Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh

Karen Boyer, Warrior Sisters of Wu, Pan Asian Repertory Theatre

Enver Chakartash, Stereophonic, Playwrights Horizons

Lux Haac, Manahatta, The Public Theater

Rodrigo Muñoz, Sally & Tom, The Public Theater

Outstanding Costume Design of a Musical

Dede Ayite, Buena Vista Social Club, Atlantic Theater Company

Márion Talán de la Rosa, The Connector, MCC Theater

Loren Elstein, Once Upon a One More Time

David Israel Reynoso, Water for Elephants

Paul Tazewell, Suffs

Outstanding Lighting Design of a Play

Jane Cox, Appropriate, Second Stage Theater

Stacey Derosier, Uncle Vanya, OHenry Productions

Natasha Katz, Grey House

Lizzie Powell, Macbeth (an undoing), Theatre for a New Audience, Rose Theatre, and

Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh

Eric Southern, Swing State, Goodman Theatre

Outstanding Lighting Design of a Musical

Lap Chi Chu, Suffs

Heather Gilbert, Dead Outlaw

Bradley King, Water for Elephants

Brian MacDevitt and Hana S. Kim (projections), The Outsiders

Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew, The Connector, MCC Theater

Outstanding Projection and Video Design

Eric Dunlap, Our Class, MART Foundation and Arlekin Players Theatre

Jared Mezzocchi, Russian Troll Farm: A Workplace Comedy, Vineyard Theatre

Peter Nigrini, Hell’s Kitchen

Olivia Sebesky, Melissa Etheridge: My Window

Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew, The Connector, MCC Theater

Outstanding Sound Design of a Play

Adam Cork, The Hunt, St. Ann’s Warehouse and Almeida Theatre

Tom Gibbons, Grey House

Palmer Hefferan, The Comeuppance, Signature Theatre

Bray Poor and Will Pickens, Appropriate, Second Stage Theater

Ryan Rumery, Stereophonic, Playwrights Horizons

Outstanding Sound Design of a Musical

Jason Crystal, Suffs

Kai Harada and Joshua Millican, Dead Outlaw

Nick Lidster for Autograph, Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club

Cody Spencer, The Outsiders

Walter Trarbach, Water for Elephants

Outstanding Wig and Hair

J. Jared Janas and Cassie Williams, Sally & Tom, The Public Theater

Charles G. LaPointe, Suffs

Nikiya Mathis, Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, Manhattan Theatre Club

Nikiya Mathis, The Harriet Holland Social Club Presents The 84th Annual Star-Burst Cotillion in

the Grand Ballroom of the Renaissance Hotel, New Georges and The Movement Theatre Company

Robert Pickens and Katie Gell, Stereophonic, Playwrights Horizons

Outstanding Solo Performance

Michael Cruz Kayne, Sorry for Your Loss

Madeleine MacMahon, Breathless, Theatre Royal Plymouth

Wade McCollum, Make Me Gorgeous!, triangle productions!

Robert Montano, SMALL, Penguin Rep Theatre

Patrick Page, All the Devils Are Here: How Shakespeare Invented the Villain

Unique Theatrical Experience

A Eulogy for Roman, Through the Tollbooth Co.

A Simulacrum, Atlantic Theater Company

ADRIFT: A Medieval Wayward Folly, Happenstance Theater

I Love You So Much I Could Die, New York Theatre Workshop

Grenfell: in the words of survivors, St. Ann’s Warehouse, National Theatre, and KPPL Productions

Outstanding Fight Choreography

Michael G. Chin, Warrior Sisters of Wu, Pan Asian Repertory Theatre

Cha Ramos, Water for Elephants

Steve Rankin, The Who’s Tommy

Outstanding Adaptation

An Enemy of the People, by Amy Herzog

Macbeth (an undoing), by Zinnie Harris, Theatre for a New Audience, Rose Theatre,

and Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh

The Comedy of Errors, by Rebecca Martínez and Julián Mesri, The Public Theater Mobile Unit

The Doctor, by Robert Icke, Park Avenue Armory

The Hunt, by David Farr, St. Ann’s Warehouse and Almeida Theatre

The Whole of Time, by Romina Paula, Joben Studios

Outstanding Puppetry

Matt Acheson, Hotel Happy, Houses on the Moon Theater Company

Adrian Kohler and Handspring Puppet Company, Life & Times of Michael K, St. Ann’s Warehouse,

Baxter Theatre Centre, and Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus

Ray Wetmore, JR Goodman, and Camille Labarre, Water for Elephants

David Valentine, Poor Yella Rednecks, Manhattan Theatre Club

SPECIAL AWARDS

Ensemble Award

The cast of Stereophonic – Will Brill, Andrew R. Butler, Juliana Canfield, Eli Gelb, Tom Pecinka, Sarah Pidgeon, and Chris Stack – who execute David Adjmi’s hypernaturalistic text with extraordinary care and precision, while also performing Will Butler’s music with the freshness and life that makes us believe we are witnessing, first-hand, the creation of a new American classic.

Sam Norkin Off-Broadway Award

Cole Escola, who both wrote and stars in one of this season’s biggest hits Off Broadway, Oh, Mary! Following in the long legacy of queer artists who write themselves into American history, Escola’s new “gay fantasia on national themes” is a hilarious reminder of why we must continue to interrogate our past.

ADDITIONAL SPECIAL AWARDS

How to Dance in Ohio Authentic Autistic Representation Team – Sammi Cannold, Nicole D’Angelo, Becky Leifman, Ava Xiao-Lin Rigelhaupt, Liz Weber, and Jeremy Wein  – for their steadfast support of autistic theatermakers, and their strides toward true accessibility for neurodiverse individuals both on and offstage.

Lighting designer Isabella Byrd, whose self-described technique as a “darkness designer” has earned her a cache of nominations and awards in the United States and abroad. During this season, Byrd illuminated two Broadway shows done in the round, An Enemy of the People and Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club. Off Broadway, her spotlight on quiet, small-scale stories both enchanted us in Primary Trust and mesmerized us in Infinite Life, with a parking-lot sky that marked the passage of time.

Lady Irene Gandy, for career achievement. A press agent extraordinaire for over five decades, Lady Irene has always demonstrated her passion, dedication, and love for theater. A Broadway producer and Sardi’s honoree, she is a zealous advocate for inclusion, diversity, and equity in the arts.

Fast-forward more than two decades and Iglehart found himself playing the first Genie on Broadway, killing it, and on his way to a Tony Award.

“To play the role that I loved so much and be able to be my full, silly self with the volume at 20 to 25 and go crazy was just so cathartic,” he says.

“Aladdin” turns 10 this month and it has done more than become Broadway’s go-to for young people experiencing their first musical. It has also become an incubator for Black actors like Iglehart leading a big Disney musical with joy and humor.

There are currently Genies on Broadway and on tour in the United Kingdom and United States, in Japan and Spain, all doing cartwheels, high kicking and singing “Friend Like Me.” They call it a Genie Brotherhood.

“I kind of just tell the guys, ‘Listen, make sure that you give your authentic self. You don’t have to play it like me,’” Iglehart says. “As long as you bring your brand of silliness and comedy and heart and realness to it, the audience will accept it.”

After ‘Aladdin,” Iglehart went on to land TV and voice work, the Broadway dual roles of Marquis de Lafayette and Thomas Jefferson in “Hamilton,” King Arthur in the new “Spamalot” revival and will next star as Louis Armstrong in “A Wonderful World.”

“It’s made me the actor I am today. And it’s given me a legacy that I can be thoroughly proud of,” he says. “It changed my life.”

At the Tony Awards in 2014, Iglehart sang, danced and lifted one of the coveted statuettes for best featured actor in front of millions of viewers.

Hundreds of miles away, a Genie-to-be was watching, his life changing.

Marcus Martin was 16 at the time, an aspiring actor in Akron, Ohio, who sat transfixed as Iglehart filled the Tony stage.

“I was always told that I would have a hard time in this business because the best roles were for skinny white tenors, and I’m not any of those things,” says Martin. “So seeing James gave me permission to dream a new dream.”

He had grown up going to Broadway shows with his mom when they came through Ohio. Watching the Tony telecast, he decided he would one day play the Genie and began memorizing the music and lines. Naturally, he and his mom saw “Aladdin” when the first national tour came to Cleveland.

He graduated Baldwin Wallace University in May 2020 — not the best time to have a degree in performing live for large groups of people. But he persisted. He auditioned for Disney four times and got his dream role.

He is now the Genie on the second national tour.

He started in Schenectady, New York, and has performed in over 50 cities, from Little Rock, Arkansas, to Los Angeles. He’s geeked out over playing historic venues like The Fabulous Fox Theatre in St. Louis and the Fox Theatre in Atlanta.

“I’m such a theater nerd. I always say I’m a fan first, actor second,” he says. Martin likes to look for famous autographs on the walls or under desks in his new dressing rooms.

“All the greats, and some that I’ve even looked up to as a young performer, I’m now in the same space as them, sharing dressing rooms,” he says. “This is a very special way to start my career.”

He has become friends with Iglehart and the two were joined by a third Genie before Martin went to lead the tour. “They took me to lunch to kind of send me off and give me the secrets of the lamp,” says Martin.

That third Genie is Michael James Scott — the Genie that Martin and his mom saw when “Aladdin” came to Cleveland.

Disney has a gravitational pull in Orlando, Florida, where Scott grew up. He performed as a younger man in the theme parks and at special events, always readying for the spotlight in New York.

“Broadway was always a dream of mine since I was a little boy,” he says.

Scott is a Broadway veteran by now, with credits in “Mama Mia!” “Tarzan,” “Elf” and “Something Rotten!” But he calls Genie “one of those once-in-a-lifetime roles. It’s like everything in the kitchen sink in one role.”

He led the first national tour of “Aladdin” and played the Genie in London’s West End. He originated the role when the show went to Australia and was deeply moved when a group of Aboriginal children came to see him in their very first Broadway tour.

“The Genie is love, light, laughter and people want to have that right now,” Scott says. “To be that person for young people to look out to see and also as a person of color and what that really means in representation, is something I don’t hold lightly.”

These days, he’s the proud Genie on Broadway.

“If this little chocolate, chubby child from Orlando, Florida, could one day grow up to be the Genie in ‘Aladdin’ on Broadway and around the world, anything is possible,” he says.

As the show celebrates its 10th anniversary, Scott has an idea why it has lasted. “It does not apologize for being this big Broadway musical, epic comedy,” he says. “Don’t you want to have joy?”

After making her record-breaking Broadway debut in “Chicago” last year, Monsoon will reprise her role as Matron “Mama” Morton for a limited run this summer.

The “RuPaul’s Drag Race” winner returns to the Ambassador Theatre for a limited 20 performance run from June 27 to July 12.

“Most of my life, and my entire artistic career—I have known the roles I would play well, but I also knew the industry was not yet giving actors like me the chance to prove it,” Monsoon said in a statement. “Over the last decade, I, and queer artists like myself have been chipping away at the antiquated ideas of gender and performance—leading to my life-changing run as Mama Morton in ‘Chicago.'”

“During that one 10-week run, I learned so much about my craft and myself—and I cannot wait to take all of that back into this role and show. I am still just a kid, in shock and awe of this wonderful world I get to be a part of.”

Monsoon’s debut helped set record sales for the long-running musical, breaking box office records and playing to standing-room-only crowds, Playbill reports.

The current cast of “Chicago” features Ariana Madix as Roxie Hart, Amra-Faye Wright as Velma Kelly, Max von Essen as Billy Flynn, Lili Thomas as Matron “Mama” Morton, Red Concepción as Amos Hart, and R. Lowe as Mary Sunshine.

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The show, which plays at the Neil Simon Theatre, opened on Feb. 1, 2022 and has played to over 1 million patrons. It celebrates the music and legacy of Michael Jackson.

Elijah Rhea Johnson is currently starring in the musical in the role of MJ.

The production won four Tony Awards, including Best Choreography and Sound Design.

There are additional productions of the show in London, Hamburg, and Sydney, along with a national tour.

Rivera’s death was announced by her daughter, Lisa Mordente, who said she died in New York after a brief illness.

Rivera first gained wide notice in 1957 as Anita in the original production of “West Side Story” and was still dancing on Broadway with her trademark energy a half-century later in 2015’s “The Visit.”

“I wouldn’t know what to do if I wasn’t moving or telling a story to you or singing a song,” she told The Associated Press then. “That’s the spirit of my life, and I’m really so lucky to be able to do what I love, even at this time in my life.”

In August 2009, Rivera was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor the U.S. can give a civilian. Rivera put her hand over her heart and shook her head in wonderment as President Barack Obama presented the medal. In 2013, she was the marshal at the Puerto Rican Day Parade in New York City.

“She was a true Broadway legend,” playwright Paul Rudnick said on X, formerly Twitter. “She always delivered and audiences adored her. The moment she stepped onstage, the world became more exciting and glorious.”

Rivera rose from chorus girl to star, collaborating along the way with many of Broadway’s greatest talents, including Jerome Robbins, Leonard Bernstein, Bob Fosse, Gower Champion, Michael Kidd, Harold Prince, Jack Cole, Peter Gennaro and John Kander and Fred Ebb.

She rebounded from a car accident in 1988 that crushed her right leg and became an indefatigable star on the road. She was on Broadway in a raucous production of “The Mystery of Edwin Drood” in 2012 and the chilly “The Visit” in 2014, earning another best actress Tony nomination.

“She can’t rehearse except for full-out,” said playwright Terrence McNally in 2005. “She can’t perform except for full-out, no matter what the size of the house. She’s going to be there 101% for that audience.”

She won Tonys for “The Rink” in 1984 and “Kiss of the Spider Woman” in 1993. When accepting a Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2018, she said “I wouldn’t trade my life in the theater for anything, because theater is life.”

She was nominated for the award seven other times, for “Bye Bye Birdie,” which opened in 1960; “Chicago,” 1975; “Bring Back Birdie,” 1981; “Merlin,” 1983; “Jerry’s Girls,” 1985; “Nine,” 2003; and “Chita Rivera: The Dancer’s Life,” 2005.

“I don’t think we have enough original musicals,” she told The Associated Press in 2012. “I know I’m being old fashioned, but the theater is the place where music, lyrics, words, scenery and stories come together. And I’ve been blessed enough to have done several shows when they really did. They take you places and they’re daring. That’s what we need.”

Her albums include 16 tracks pulled from her original cast recordings and put out as part of Sony’s Legends of Broadway series and two solo CDs — “And Now I Sing” for a tiny record label in the 1960s and “And Now I Swing” in 2009 for Yellow Sound Label.

In the 1993 musical “Kiss of the Spider Woman,” Rivera played the title role, a glamorous movie star at the center of the fantasy life of an inmate in a South American prison. The story, from a novel by Manuel Puig, had already been made into an Oscar-winning 1985 movie.

In his review, then-Associated Press drama critic Michael Kuchwara wrote that Rivera “is more than a musical theater star. She’s a force of nature — which is exactly what is needed for the role of the Spider Woman. With her Louise Brooks haircut, brassy voice and lithe dancer’s body, Rivera dominates the stage whenever she appears.”

In 1975, she originated the role of Velma Kelly (to Gwen Verdon’s Roxie Hart) in the original Broadway production of “Chicago.” Rivera had a small role in the 2002 film version, while Catherine Zeta-Jones won the best supporting actress Oscar as Velma — just as Rita Moreno had picked up an Oscar for her portrayal of Anita in “West Side Story.”

The songwriters for “Chicago,” Kander and Ebb, also wrote Rivera’s first Tony-winning performance, for “The Rink.” In winning the Tony for best actress in a musical, Rivera topped the show’s top star, Liza Minnelli, who also had been nominated. The two played a mother and daughter who struggle to rebuild their relationship after a long estrangement; the setting is an old-fashioned roller rink that has seen better days.

“Spider Woman” had been her first Broadway show since 1986, when she suffered a broken leg in the traffic accident while she was appearing in “Jerry’s Girls,” a Broadway tribute to the songs of Jerry Herman.

At the Tony awards a few weeks later, she flashed her cast and belted out “Put on a Happy Face” from the musical “Bye, Bye, Birdie.”

It took months of physical therapy to bring back her dancing skills. She told The Associated Press: “It never entered my mind that I wouldn’t dance again. Never. I can’t explain to you why. It’s hard work getting back but that’s what I’m doing.”

“My spirit is still there.”

Dolores Conchita Figueroa del Rivero was born Jan. 23, 1933, in Washington, D.C. Her Puerto Rican father, Pedro del Rivero, was a musician who played in the United States Navy Band, who died when she was 7. Her mother was Scottish and Italian descent.

She took dance classes and then entered the prestigious School of American Ballet in New York. Her first theater gig, at age 17, was in the touring company of “Call Me Madam.” That led to chorus stints in such shows as “Guys and Dolls” and “Can-Can.”

In her 2023 memoir, “Chita: A Memoir,” another woman steals scene after scene: her self-proclaimed alter ego, Dolores. Unapologetic and fiery, Dolores was the unfiltered version of Chita and served as motivation in times of self-doubt. In one chapter, Rivera writes that she doesn’t read reviews “or Dolores just might invest in a dozen voodoo dolls.”

“I consist of — and I think we all do — I consist of two people: Dolores and Conchita,” Rivera sain in an interview with the AP that year. “Conchita, she’s the one that has been taking all the glory, you know. She’s been doing all the shows, but Dolores is the one that’s pushed her into it. And she’s been keeping me on track, so I listen to Dolores. I listen to her. She’s growing in my head now as we speak.”

Among other early appearances on the New York stage were roles in “The Shoestring Revue,” 1955; a 1955 musical version of “Seventh Heaven” starring Ricardo Montalban; and “Mr. Wonderful,” a 1956 show starring Sammy Davis Jr.

“I can’t believe that I’ve been given the gift to look back and relive my life,” she told The Associated Press shortly before “The Dancer’s Life” opened on Broadway in late 2005. “It’s about how anybody can do it — if you really believe it, you have the good fortune, you do all the right things and you really work hard.”

Rivera, who had a relationship with the now-deceased Davis, married fellow “West Side Story” performer Tony Mordente in 1957. The marriage ended in divorce. Their daughter, Lisa Mordente, also became a performer who occasionally appeared on Broadway, garnering a Tony nomination in 1982 for “Marlowe.”

“Our hearts go out to everyone who loved her,” GLAAD said in a statement. “Rivera spent much of her long career advocating for LGBTQ people and people living with HIV and AIDS.”

Metropolitan Opera music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, who coached Cooper for the movie and led music for the soundtrack, will conduct the performance in his New York Philharmonic debut and join the conversation, the orchestra said Wednesday.

The program will include excerpts from “West Side Story,” “Candide,” “On the Town,” “Trouble in Tahiti,” “A Quiet Place,” “Chichester Psalms” and Bernstein’s Symphony No. 2 “The Age of Anxiety” and Symphony No. 3 “Kaddish.”

“Maestro” was nominated for seven Oscars, including for best picture and best actor, for Cooper.

Fourteen beloved Broadway productions will be included in this year’s Kids’ Night on Broadway — where kids 18 and under can attend participating shows for free.

Tickets for this year’s Kids’ Night (happening on Feb. 13) are not on sale yet, but interested adults can sign-up for The Broadway Fan Club to be the first to learn when they’re available for purchase. Note on the list of shows below, two of the productions will be honoring Kids’ Night on different dates.

Kids get into any one of the 14 available shows when accompanied by a full-paying adult.

The night promises more free fun for kids and their families. There will also be talkbacks, sing-alongs, art projects and more activities to celebrate the night of theater.

Theater staff will also be handing out “My First Broadway Show” commemorative stickers that kids can add to their show’s Playbill to honor the occasion.

Participating shows include:

• A Beautiful Noise, The Neil Diamond Musical
• Aladdin
• & Juliet (dated Feb. 15)
• Back to the Future: The Musical
• Chicago
• Hamilton
• Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
• Kimberly Akimbo
• The Lion King
• MJ The Musical
• Moulin Rouge! The Musical
• SIX (dated Feb. 14)
• Spamalot
• Wicked

New York City Restaurant Week 2024 kicked off Tuesday, offering bargain prix-fixe dining deals for lunch and dinner at more than 600 restaurants across the five boroughs.

Here are the delectable details. Note: The deals don’t apply on Saturdays. They are optional for participating restaurants on Sundays, so you may want to call ahead.

NYC Restaurant Week 2024

NYC Restaurant Week offers prix-fixe two-course lunches and three-course dinners for $30, $45 and $60 at more than 600 restaurants across all five boroughs. It’s easy to sort your searches, filtering by location, cuisine and “weeks participating,” since the latter might vary by location.

You can also search by “meals offered,” “accessibility” and “ownership.” If thematics are your thing, there are a number of those as well: “James Beard Honorees,” “Wine Spectator Winners,” “NYC Restaurant Week Classics” and “Best of the Boroughs,” among other lists. See all participating restaurants here.

NYC Broadway Week 2024

Which theater-goers don’t love a two-fer? Actually, who doesn’t love a two-fer of any kind?

NYC Broadway Week also kicks off Jan. 16, offering 2-for-1 tickets to 23 shows.

Those include Wicked, Aladdin, Six the Musical, Chicago and Back to the Future, among others.

Score your 2-for-1s right here. Not sure what you want to see? Sort by comedy, drama, kid-friendly and more here.

NYC Must-See Week

This program offers 2-for-1 tickets at more than 60 museums, attractions, performing arts and tours. Participants include Carnegie Hall, Citi Field Tours, Jazz at Lincoln Center, Kings County Distillery, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York Botanical Garden, Summit One Vanderbilt, The Metropolitan Opera and more. Details here.

NYC Hotel Week

NYC Hotel Week offers 24% off standard retail rates now through February 6 at more than 160 hotels across all five boroughs. More information here.

Producers said Wednesday that they’ll wrap up the experience on Jan. 28 after 13 years and having welcomed more than 2 million visitors to the art installation-meets-theater-and-dance piece with elements of both Shakespeare and Alfred Hitchcock.

“Thirteen years ago, we could never have imagined the astonishing journey this show has been on. It’s had an incalculable impact on us all and will live on in our hearts, seep through our skin and sleep in the deepest parts of our imaginations,” producers Felix Barrett and Maxine Doyle said.

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Created by the British theater troupe Punchdrunk, visitors to the fictional 100,000-square-foot McKittrick Hotel are handed Venetian-style masks to wear and are encouraged to explore. About 25 performers act out mostly wordless scenes inspired by Shakespeare’s play while dressed in 1930s outfits and giving off a film noir vibe and an “Eyes Wide Shut” feel. It became a draw for tourists and a blueprint for more immersive experiences in the city.

Over the years, the space became a multi-venue dining, nightlife and entertainment destination, with a rooftop garden restaurant and stages that attracted sets by everyone from Mumford and Sons and Sting to Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Brandi Carlile, Dua Lipa and Josh Groban.

For the intrepid, about 100 rooms have been carved out over several floors — some as small as a child’s bedroom and others as large as a ballroom. The outside has also been brought inside, with a gritty cemetery and a massive forest included in the mix. Guests are encouraged to rummage about the infirmary, taxidermist’s place, padded room, libraries, apothecaries, laundry and even a detective agency. Open the drawers, read the books in the shelves: Each room is decorated with no detail unspared. They even seem to have their own odor.

A production in Shanghai is in its seventh year.

The singer-songwriter whose hits include “Karma Chameleon” and “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me” will play Moulin Rouge club owner Harold Zidler in the jukebox adaptation of Baz Luhrmann’s hyperactive 2001 movie.

He starts Feb. 6 and ends May 12 at Broadway’s Al Hirschfeld Theatre, taking over the role from Tituss Burgess.

The show about the goings-on in a turn-of-the-century Parisian nightclub has been updated with tunes like “Single Ladies” and “Firework” alongside the big hit “Lady Marmalade.” It won 10 Tony Awards in 2021, including best new musical.

Boy George was last represented on Broadway in 2003 with “Taboo,” for which he wrote music and lyrics. Critics largely disliked the show, which told some of his life story. He also performed in that show, but did not play himself.

Producers of the show announced the date and new location Wednesday. Last year, the telecast was broadcast from the United Palace Theatre, in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan, many miles from Times Square and the theater district.

Next year’s location — the David H. Koch Theater — is the home of New York City Ballet and in the same sprawling building complex as Lincoln Square Theater, which houses the Broadway venue Beaumont Theater.

The Tony eligibility cut-off date for the 2023-2024 season is April 25, and nominations for the 2024 Tony Awards will be announced April 30.

The awards are presented by The Broadway League and the American Theatre Wing.

This year, catch Broadway hits from the most recent Tony winner for best musical “Kimberly Akimbo,” to classics like “Wicked,” “The Lion King” and “Hamilton.” Every single musical on Broadway, except the very first performances of two of Broadway’s newest shows, is included on this list.

In order to claim this offer, you must purchase two tickets. The tickets that will be put on sale are likely ones the show finds the hardest to sell: balcony, mezzanine and side seats. There is an option to upgrade to better seats for $125 for tickets that normally would be significantly more expensive.

In addition to Broadway Week, a similar time is coming up for Off-Broadway shows as well. The next Off-Broadway week will extend from Oct. 3 to Oct. 15.

Here is a list of eligible Broadway shows:

• & Juliet
• Aladdin
• A Beautiful Noise – The Neil Diamond Musical
• Back to the Future: The Musical
• The Book of Mormon
• Chicago
• The Cottage
• Hadestown
• Hamilton
• Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
• Here Lies Love
• Jaja’s African Hair Braiding
• Kimberly Akimbo
• The Lion King
• MJ The Musical
• Moulin Rouge! The Musical
• Once Upon a One More Time
• Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch
• Six: The Musical
• The Shark is Broken
• Shucked
• Some Like It Hot
• Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
• Wicked

When Jay-Z and Alicia Keys filmed the video for “Empire State of Mind,” their valentine to New York City, they naturally ended up in Times Square, singing on illuminated red glass steps. It was no mere set: It was two New York icons standing on another.

Their stage was the top of the TKTS booth, which has become part of the city’s visual and financial DNA and a key part in keeping Broadway going. This week that booth is celebrating its 50th birthday, with the city celebrating on Wednesday with songs and speeches.

“It is so intrinsically linked with the city,” says Victoria Bailey, executive director of the non-profit TDF, formerly known as the Theatre Development Fund, which runs the booth. “It has kind of always been a symbol.”

It’s a discount ticket booth where same-day Broadway and off-Broadway shows can be more affordable for those who balk at prices pushing past $300 a seat for some musicals. About 30% of the people who line up are first-time Broadway theatergoers.

Thousands of tickets are sold at the booth every day as the various commercial theater box offices calculate how many full-price tickets they can sell and then send the rest to TKTS. The theater gets all the ticket revenue and TDF gets a $7 service fee per ticket, which helps fund its education, community and outreach programs.

Some 68.6 million tickets have been sold from the booth during its 50 years, with more than $2.6 billion going back to the shows. Despite the rise of online rivals and apps hawking discounted theater tickets, lining up at the booth is as fundamental as cooing over the Statue of Liberty or taking a photo with a nearby costumed Elmo.

The current glass-enclosed booth opened in 2008, part of an $18 million renovation project that evokes a Greek amphitheater or Rome’s famous Spanish steps, where visitors can sit on the 27 steps and watch the street scene. Jay-Z and Keys may have had the steps to themselves in their video, but it is ordinarily a very crowded place.

“There’s so many people that keep coming back even after the pandemic and will stand on that line to come and see shows. And they thank us. That’s something that didn’t happen as often before. But it happens more now, and I love it,” says Ann Ramirez, a TKTS supervisor.

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TDF created satellite TKTS booths in Brooklyn, at the World Trade Center and in Lincoln Center, as well as helped develop booths in Boston, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Denver, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Toronto, London and Sydney.

The first booth was a temporary experiment that stuck in Times Square. It opened for business on June 25, 1973, using an abandoned trailer donated by the Parks department with holes punched in it for ticket windows. The neighborhood was different then — seedy and dangerous.

“Broadway was falling apart then,” says Robert Mayers, who with business partner John Schiff designed the booth and the logo. “They wanted to do an experiment because the area was in disrepair.”

Mayers and Schiff were given just $5,000 for the capital budget, and they rented scaffolding to go around the booth. They wove a translucent plastic fabric with the iconic logo among the bars and clamped spotlights on the frame.

“It’s a very theatrical kind of vocabulary,” says Mayers. “We looked at it as a giant kite. It was supposed to be light hearted, related to the theater and make a visual statement in a very busy place.”

They thought it would stay up for a year or two, at best. Instead, it won design awards and lasted decades. Their influence can be seen in the abbreviated, vowel-less apps and company titles of today — Flickr to Unbxd and DNCE.

“I noticed whenever you see movies of the ‘70s or ’80s and they’re in New York, there’s always a scene in Times Square or Duffy Square where the camera goes by and you see the TKTS booth. I always get a kick out of that,” says Mayers.

If the booth was an attempt to stabilize the neighborhood, it is a still a sign that the city is open for business — important steps after events like 9/11, Superstorm Sandy and the coronavirus pandemic.

“You talk to ushers, you talk to wardrobe people, you talk to the people backstage and they talk about the booth as the thing that has over the years kept them employed,” said Bailey, who went to there for tickets in college and later sent tickets to the booth as a Broadway general manager.

These days, visitors make their picks from a list of shows on continually updating electronic boards. TDF also has a free phone app that lists its offerings in real time.

Staffers are on hand to help in red jackets or T-shirts with the TKTS logo and the printed slogan “Got questions?” They’re theater fans, having seen all the shows on offer and aware of the best and worst seats in the city’s various theaters. Most patrons get through the line in less than 45 minutes, longer on holidays.

The advice is to be flexible — have decided on two or three possible shows by the time you get to the window. Bailey notices that people in line often help each other out with recommendations and swap info on shows.

Tickets to mega-hits like “Hamilton” and “Wicked” typically won’t appear at the booth since they don’t need to offer discounts. New shows often do until they become a hot ticket, like after a Tony Award win or favorable reviews. But, eventually, most shows end up listed at the booth.

“There comes a point in the evolution of a show when they need help,” says Bailey, who earned a Tony this year for her work helping theater. “Shows like ‘A Chorus Line,’ ‘The Wiz,’ ‘Chicago,’ ‘The Phantom of the Opera,’ those shows ran extra years because of the booth.”

On a recent day, the booth had 50% discounts for “Camelot,” “A Beautiful Noise, the Neil Diamond Musical,” “Good Night, Oscar,” “Grey House,” “New York, New York,” “Once Upon a One More Time,” “Hadestown” and “Chicago.” Tickets for “The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window” with Oscar Isaac and Rachel Brosnahan were as little as $50.

Unlike other paid ticket sellers wandering around Times Square pushing one particular musical or play, TKTS representatives aren’t allowed to recommend a single show but instead offer a range of options appropriate to the visitor — family friendly, dramatic, light, scary.

Once at the window, ticket sellers quickly scan a blueprint of the theater for available seats and offer visitors options, like couples can sit apart with an unobstructed view or sit together with a “partial view” and risk missing something onstage.

In addition to catching shows herself, Ramirez loves seeing her regulars and learning what they’ve liked and what they haven’t.

“This is where we get a lot of information,” she says. “They will come back and tell me all the business, tell me who was in it, who was bad, who was good. Was it good, Was it not?”

Data from The Broadway League released Tuesday shows many of the musicals and plays featured on the June 11 awards show benefited financially from getting valuable exposure in front of millions.

The top Tony winner, “Kimberly Akimbo,” about a teen who ages four times faster than the average human, won five awards including best new musical and grossed $695,405 over eight performances following the telecast, an increase of $169,229 over the previous week.

Tom Stoppard’s “Leopoldstadt,” which explores Jewish identity with an intergenerational story, won the best new play Tony and did even better: It earned $273,804 more than the week previously, ending up with $924,033 in the week after the Tonys.

The Hollywood writers’ strike left the storied awards show without a script but the Writers Guild of America allowed the show to go on without a picket line.

“& Juliet,” which reimagines “Romeo and Juliet” and adds some of the biggest pop hits of the past few decades, took in $205,694 more over the previous week, ending with a very healthy $1,339,854 after a rousing telecast performance and zero Tonys. while ”Shucked,” a surprise lightweight musical comedy celebrating corn and featuring newly minted Tony winner Alex Newell, earned $162,233 more than the previous week, finishing with a respectable $862,188.

“Some Like It Hot,” a musical adaptation of the cross-dressing comedy film, only saw a modest $103,039 increase despite J. Harrison Ghee’s historic win, and “New York, New York,” a love letter to Manhattan inspired by the 1977 film directed by Martin Scorsese, took in $141,105 over the previous week to a final $995,844 gross.

“Prima Facie,” which stars best actress winner Jodi Comer saw a bump of $161,576 to help it cross the $1 million threshold. Producers earlier Tuesday announced that the show had recouped its $4.1 million capitalization costs after 10 weeks and the show had set an eight-performance per week house record for the Golden Theatre with $1,107,829.

The telecast featured performances from all the nominated musicals and Will Swenson — starring on Broadway in a Neil Diamond musical — led the audience in a vigorous rendition of “Sweet Caroline.” Lea Michele of “Glee” and now “Funny Girl” fame also performed a soaring version of “Don’t Rain on My Parade.” The data was mixed on the last two entries: The Neil Diamond musical actually saw its take drop by almost $91,000 despite the exposure, while Michele’s show earned $1 million over the pre-Tony week, when Michele was absent.

Not all the numbers pointed to a telecast bump. “Parade,” a doomed musical love story set against the real backdrop of a murder and lynching in Georgia in pre-World War I, got a $108,734 increase to end last week with $1,168,463 after earning best revival of a musical and a Tony for director Michael Arden. But “Peter Pan Goes Wrong,” a farce that wasn’t featured at the awards show, go the same increase — $109,853.

The good news for many shows was tempered by some sad, including the imminent closing notices for two shows — “Life of Pi,” about a shipwrecked teenager who spends hundreds of days afloat in the Pacific in the company of a Bengal tiger, and “Fat Ham” — James Ijames’ adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” set at a Black family’s barbecue in the modern South.

The $500 million building, the next-to-last element of the World Trade Center redevelopment to open following the 2001 terrorist attacks, announced its inaugural season Wednesday.

“Cats” will appear in June and July 2024 directed by Zhailon Levingston and Bill Rauch, with choreography by Arturo Lyons and Omari Wiles.

The musical will have reimagined staging set in Harlem’s drag Ballroom Culture. Bill Rauch, PAC’s artistic director, said Ballroom Culture will come across in the casting, staging and design.

“Certainly Ballroom beats will affect how some of the songs are orchestrated,” he said.

Lloyd Webber’s “The Phantom of the Opera” closed on April 16 at the Majestic Theater after 13,981 performances, leaving the legendary composer with no shows on Broadway for the first time since 1979. The original “Cats” production ran for 7,485 performances from 1982-2000, and a revival in 2016-17 ran for 593.

The PAC, designed by Joshua Ramus of REX, is to open with a ribbon-cutting on Sept. 13. A five-night opening called “A Concert Series to Welcome the World,” with pay-as-you-wish seating, begins Sept. 19 with “NYC Tapestry: Home as Refuge” that includes Laurie Anderson, Raven Chacon, Natalie Diaz and Angélique Kidjo, among others.

“Watch Night,” a multidisciplinary piece composed by Tamar-kali, co-conceived, directed and choreographed by Bill T. Jones, runs from Nov. 3-18 and melds spirituals, opera and poetry. Luna Pearl Woolf’s “Number Our Days” a multimedia oratorio, runs from April 12-14. “An American Soldier,” the Huang Ruo opera that premiered at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., in 2014, gets its New York premiere from May 12-19.

Among theater options, Laurence Fishburne premieres a one-man show “Like They Do in The Movies” from March 10-31. An evening with Brian Stokes Mitchell is scheduled for Oct. 5 and Anthony Roth Costanzo has a cabaret show Dec. 20.

The PAC is clad in translucent, veined Portuguese marble that creates amber light in the day and glows at night. It features three performance spaces that can be used separately or combined: the John E. Zuccotti Theater (seating 450), the Mike Nichols Theater (250), and the Doris Duke Foundation Theater (99).

With proscenium, thrust and in-the-round formations, there are 60 stage-audience arrangements of 90-950 seats. The space, launched with a $75 million gift from Ronald Perelman in 2016, includes a restaurant led by chef Marcus Samuelsson and designed by David Rockwell and the Rockwell Group. A lobby stage is open to the public for free performances.

The flexible space is similar but different from The Shed, which opened in 2019 at the Hudson Yards Development, and the Park Avenue Armory, which has presented arts programming since 2007.

“The Shed and the Armory work perfectly for big things,” said PAC chairman Mike Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor, who contributed $130 million. “This, the scale is different. You can have a 20-person audience and a 20-person performance, and you can do that here. Number two, it is to some extent a different audience. This is downtown, that’s midtown. Lots of places to go midtown. Love ‘em all. Supported them all, probably. Visited them all. Go to them all. But downtown has never really had a lot of that. And if you think about it, you’ve got the Staten Island Ferry, you’ve got subways from four boroughs coming over, you’ve got the PATH tube from New Jersey. People can get here.”

The last building of the redevelopment, 2 World Trade Center, is projected to open in 2027.

“Kimberly Akimbo,” with songs by Jeanine Tesori and a book by David Lindsay-Abaire, follows a teen with a rare genetic disorder that gives her a life expectancy of 16 navigating a dysfunctional family and a high school romance. Victoria Clark, as the lead in the show, added a second Tony to her trophy case, having previously won one in 2005 for “The Light in the Piazza.”

Producer David Stone credited the musical’s writers for penning a magic trick, calling “Kimberly Akimbo” a “musical comedy about the fragility of life, so healing and so profound and joyous that is almost impossible.” The musical took home a leading five awards, including best book and score.

Earlier, Tony Awards history was made when Newell and Ghee became the first nonbinary people to win Tonys for acting. Last year, composer and writer Toby Marlow of “Six” became the first nonbinary Tony winner.

“Thank you for the humanity. Thank you for my incredible company who raised me up every single day,” said leading actor in a musical winner Ghee, who stars in “Some Like It Hot,” the adaptation of the classic cross-dressing comedy film. The soulful Ghee stunned audiences with their voice and dance skills, playing a musician — on the run from gangsters — who tries on a dress and is transformed.

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Newell, who plays Lulu — an independent, don’t-need-no-man whiskey distiller in “Shucked” — has been blowing audiences away with their signature number, “Independently Owned.” They won for best featured actor in a musical.

“Thank you for seeing me, Broadway. I should not be up here as a queer, nonbinary, fat, Black little baby from Massachusetts. And to anyone that thinks that they can’t do it, I’m going to look you dead in your face that you can do anything you put your mind to,” Newell said to an ovation.

Tom Stoppard’s “Leopoldstadt,” which explores Jewish identity with an intergenerational story, won best play, also earning wins for director Patrick Marber, featured actor Brandon Uranowitz and Brigitte Reiffenstuel’s costumes.

The British-Czech playwright, who now has five best play Tony Awards, joked he won his first in 1968 and noted that playwrights were “getting progressively devalued in the food chain” despite being “the sharp ends of the inverted pyramid.”

Second-time Tony Awards host Ariana DeBose opened a blank script backstage before dancing and leaping her way to open the main show with a hectic opening number that gave a jolt of electricity to what is usually an upbeat, safe and chummy night. The writers’ strike left the storied awards show honoring the best of musical theater and plays without a script.

Before the pre-show began, DeBose revealed to the audience the only words that would be seen on the teleprompter: “Please wrap up.” Later in the evening, virtually out of breath after her wordless opening performance, she thanked the labor organizers for allowing a compromise.

“I’m live and unscripted. You’re welcome,” she said. “So to anyone who may have thought that last year was a bit unhinged, to them, I say, ‘Darlings, buckle up.’”

Winners demonstrated their support for the striking writers either at the podium or on the red carpet with pins. Miriam Silverman, who won the Tony for best featured actress in a play for “The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window,” ended her speech with: “My parents raised me to believe in the power of labor and workers being compensated and treated fairly. We stand with the WGA in solidarity!”

Jodie Comer, the three-time Emmy nominated star of “Killing Eve” won leading actress in a play for her Broadway debut, the one-woman play “Prima Facie,” which illustrates how current laws fail terribly when it comes to sexual assault cases.

Sean Hayes won lead actor in a play for “Good Night, Oscar,” which dramatizes a long night’s journey into the scarred psyche of pianist Oscar Levant, now obscure but once a TV star.

“This has got to be the first time an Oscar won a Tony,” Hayes cracked.

Suzan-Lori Parks’ “Topdog/Underdog,” a Pulitzer Prize-winning play about sibling rivalry, inequality and society’s false promises, won the Tony for best play revival. She thanked director Kenny Leon and stars Corey Hawkins and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II: “They showed up to be large in a world that often does not much want the likes of us living at all.”

Bonnie Milligan, who won for best featured actress in a musical for “Kimberly Akimbo,” also had a message to the audience: “I want to tell everybody that doesn’t maybe look like what the world is telling you what you should look like — whether you’re not pretty enough, you’re not fit enough, your identity is not right, who you love isn’t right — that doesn’t matter.”

“’Cause just guess what?” she continued, brandishing her award. “It’s right, and you belong.”

Many of the technical awards — for things like costumes, sound, lighting and scenic design — were handed out at a breakneck pace during a pre-show hosted by Skylar Astin and Julianne Hough, allowing winners plenty of airtime for acceptance speeches but little humor.

The pre-show telecast on Pluto featured some awkwardly composed shots and some presenters slipped up on certain words. The tempo was so rapid, it ended more than 10 minutes before the main CBS broadcast was slated to start.

John Kander, the 96-year-old composer behind such landmark shows as “Chicago,” “Cabaret” and “The Scottsboro Boys,” was honored with a special lifetime award. He thanked his parents; his husband, Albert Stephenson; and music, which “has stayed my friend through my entire life and has promised to stick with me until the end.”

Jennifer Grey handed her father, “Cabaret” star Joel Grey, the other lifetime achievement Tony. “Being recognized by the theater community is such a gift because it’s always been, next to my children, my greatest, most enduring love,” the actor said.

Echoing the there of antisemitism, “Parade” — a doomed musical love story set against the real backdrop of a murder and lynching in pre-World War I Georgia that won Tonys as a new musical in 1999 — won for best musical revival, with Michael Arden winning for best musical director.

“’Parade’ tells the story of a life that was cut short at the hands of the belief that one group of people is more valuable than another and that they might be more deserving of justice,” Arden said. “This is a belief that is the core of antisemitism, white supremacy, homophobia and transphobia and intolerance of any kind. We must come together. We must battle this.”

The telecast featured performances from all the nominated musicals and Will Swenson — starring on Broadway in a Neil Diamond musical — led the audience in a vigorous rendition of “Sweet Caroline.” Lea Michele of “Glee” and now “Funny Girl” fame also performed a soaring version of “Don’t Rain on My Parade.”

It all took place at the United Palace Theatre, in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan — a new venue for the ceremony, many miles from Times Square and the theater district.

“Thank you all for coming uptown. Never in my wildest dreams, truly,” Lin-Manuel Miranda joked onstage. He, of course, wrote the musical “In the Heights,” set in Washington Heights.

___

AP National Writer Jocelyn Noveck contributed to this report.

__

The Hollywood writers’ strike has left much of Sunday’s telecast with unknowns. There will be performances from the nominated musicals, pre-recorded montages of the plays and acceptance speeches. Everything else seems up in the air.

Striking members of the Writers Guild of America have agreed not to picket but won’t allow its writers to work on the Tonys, leaving Broadway’s biggest night without an established script. Any banter will have to be impromptu.

But if any group of people are best equipped to handle the stress from a live event, it’s the Broadway community. Going on without a net just doesn’t scare them.

“I think the theatrical community is the one artistic community that is absolutely capable of pulling off a show like this and not having it feel like, ‘Oh, I’m so scared and nervous!’” says Wayne Brady, who has been on Broadway in “Kinky Boots” and “Chicago” and will be leading a new “The Wiz.” It’s like, ‘No, this is what we do. This is what we do.’ And I can’t wait to see it.”

Ariana DeBose’s second stint as host is likely to be far different from last year. The Academy Award winner and Tony Award nominee will be tasked with gluing it all together.

There’s plenty of time to eat up: A 2 1/2-hour pre-show on Pluto TV from 6:30-8 p.m. EDT hosted by Julianne Hough and Skylar Astin, and then the three-hour main event led by DeBose on CBS and Paramount+ starting at 8 p.m. EDT/5 p.m. PDT.

Performances are slated from the nominated casts of “Camelot,” “Into the Woods,” “& Juliet,” “Kimberly Akimbo,” “New York, New York,” “Parade,” “Shucked,” “Some Like It Hot” and “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.”

In addition, Joaquina Kalukango, the winner of last year’s Tony for best performance by a leading actress in a musical, will sing, as well as casts from “A Beautiful Noise” and “Funny Girl.” That means there’ll be plenty of star power, from Josh Groban to Lea Michele.

A total of 26 Tony Awards will be handed out for a season that had 40 new productions — 15 musicals, 24 plays and one special engagement. It was the first full season since Broadway returned from the COVID-19 shutdown.

“Some Like It Hot,” a musical adaptation of the cross-dressing movie comedy that starred Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon, goes into the night with a leading 13 Tony Award nominations.

Broadway shows rely on the Tony Award telecast for exposure, and this year the need is even heightened, with a drop in tourism leaving many shows lighter at the box office than usual.

Stark Sands, who has twice been nominated and will attend this year as part of the musical “& Juliet,” calls the telecast “an annual national commercial for Broadway.”

“We know how much it means in ticket sales even if you don’t win — just the performance on national television in front of that 3 or 4 million people that are watching,” he says.

“I’m bummed that it’s not going to be the Tonys that we know, but I’m grateful that they got it over the line and that we will have those very clickable moments of the performances.”

Even the location this year — the United Palace Theatre, in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan — is a new one for the ceremony, many miles from Times Square and the theater district. A morning telecast rehearsal — usually open to the public — has been nixed. The red carpet will be photos only and a list of presenters has not been released.

The strike has darkened late-night TV shows like “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert “and “Saturday Night Live” and delayed the making of scripted TV shows.

The big first awards show during the current strike was the MTV Movie & TV Awards, which had no host and relied on recycled clips and a smattering of pre-recorded acceptance speeches. The strike has also disrupted the PEN America Gala and the Peabody Awards.

Producers may take tips from the 1988 awards, which were also broadcast during a Writers Guild of America walkout. Host Angela Lansbury started the show with an impromptu personal story that connected many of that season’s shows as dancers from them appeared behind her.

Among the stars appearing that night were Bernadette Peters, Matthew Broderick, Joel Grey, Gregory Hines, Madonna, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Mandy Patinkin, Chita Rivera and Kathleen Turner. Performances included songs from “Anything Goes,” Sarafina“ and “Into the Woods” and a salute to director and choreographer Michael Bennett, who had died the year before.

The performances were longer than time allotted in recent years and the presenters or winners didn’t use prompters. There was a rawness to the telecast, with presenters talking over each other and some poorly framed shots. “The Phantom of the Opera” won best new musical.

There are connections to that night 35 years ago. On Sunday, “Into the Woods” is a nominee, Grey will be honored with a special Tony for lifetime achievement, and audiences this season said goodbye to “The Phantom of the Opera.”

The actor who plays Kendall Roy in the HBO television series “Succession” has signed on to play a man who tries to expose water contamination in a Norwegian spa town in Henrik Ibsen’s 1882 play “An Enemy of the People.”

The play — with a rewrite from Amy Herzog, whose adaptation of Ibsen’s “A Doll’s House” just won a Tony nomination — will premiere on Broadway in early 2024 at a theater to be revealed later, producers said. The rest of the cast will be announced later. Sam Gold, who won a Tony directing “Fun Home,” will helm the revival.

It will be Strong’s second time on Broadway. He was in “A Man for All Seasons” in 2008 with Frank Langella and Patrick Page. Since then, his work on “Succession” has earned him an Emmy and a Golden Globe.

Strong will play a public-minded doctor in a small town who discovers the water supply for the public spa is contaminated and may have made tourists — the community’s economic lifeblood — ill. But his efforts to clean up the mess pit his ethics against political cowards and the media, leaving his family suffering.

The Hollywood Reporter says the Writers Guild of America denied the production a waiver that would have allowed the show to air on CBS and stream on Paramount+ amid the ongoing writers’ strike.

A meeting is reportedly scheduled by the Tony Awards Management Committee for Monday to discuss possible next steps forward.

The waiver decision follows two weeks of a writers’ strike throughout much of the entertainment industry as members of the guild seek better pay and advancement opportunities, among other issues, from the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

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There are two options reportedly being discussed among the show’s producers: hold a non-televised ceremony on the same date or postpone the show until the strike ends.

The Tony Awards is now the second live awards show impacted by the writers’ strike. On Sunday, the MTV Movie Awards shifted to a pre-taped format and host Drew Barrymore opted to skip her duties in solidarity with the writers.

Traditionally held in Radio City Music Hall, this year’s Tony Awards was set to take place at the United Palace in Washington Heights. Ariana DeBose would return as host.

“Summer for the City” kicked off for the first time last year, offering dozens of free, live performances and family events for New Yorkers to engage in. This year, the festival is back for round 2 to celebrate the city’s communities through multi-cultural art.

Starting this June, Lincoln Center will transform its entire campus for three months under the Visual Director Clint Ramos, infusing the outdoor spaces with botanical inspiration, al fresco dining, neon lights and a vibrant art installation with 200 flamingos near the Paul Milstein Reflecting Pool. Nearby the pool, the giant 10-foot disco ball returns from last summer’s silent disco under the moonlight.

According to Lincoln Center, the inaugural season welcomed over 300,000 audience members — more than 75% of whom had never before attended a presentation at the venue.

“We were thrilled to welcome so many New Yorkers and audiences new to campus last summer with hundreds of free shows, and we are doubling down on that welcome with this year’s programming and schedule,” said Shanta Thake, Ehrenkranz Chief Artistic Officer, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, to NBC New York.

With a city as diverse as New York, there is something for everyone to enjoy with genres like K-pop, jazz, salsa, merengue, Broadway and more, including a rendition of Company entirely performed by actors using American Sign Language.

The campus plans to honor Hip-Hop’s 50th Anniversary by celebrating the cultural influence of the genre, including a live mixtape with Brooklyn DJ J.PERIOD performed with artists Rakim and Big Daddy Kane.

“This summer, we have a real understanding of how all our spaces work at full capacity and we’ve programmed multiple evenings throughout the summer that have simultaneous, overlapping shows—whether on The Dance Floor, in Damrosch Park, in the new David Geffen Hall, or in The Underground—bringing all of these different New Yorkers together in the same space,” said Thake.

In addition to the music and dance segments, couples are invited to celebrate love, relive their wedding day or get hitched during a ceremony brought together by Tony, Grammy, and Olivier award-winning director Scott Wittman.

While most of the performances will be free, select indoor options will have Choose-What-You-Pay tickets built from last season’s model with a $5 minimum. There is a Fast Track line to give those who register early for shows priority access to events before general admission, which is first-come, first-serve.

“Phantom” ends its historic 35-year run on Sunday on a high note: the musical has been the highest grossing show on Broadway for the past 12 weeks. Tickets for its final performances went for as much as $4,000.

Initially, the beloved musical was set to take its final bow on Feb.18, soon after celebrating its 35th anniversary, but producers managed to extend the run for an additional eight weeks to April 16.

The longest-running show in Broadway history, “Phantom” opened at the Majestic Theatre on 44th Street in January 1988 and has played more than 13,000 performances to date. The closing performance will be No. 13,981.

Winner of seven Tony Awards, including Best Musical, producers say the musical has been seen by 20 million people and grossed more than $1.4 billion.

Two days before the final curtain call, Andrew Lloyd Webber was awarded a key to the City of New York City by Mayor Eric Adams.

“I think it’s very, very rare in a musical, very, very rare, for all of the ingredients to come together in the same way that Phantom did. The production, the lighting, the choreography.” Webber told NBC’s Lester Holt.

The legendary composer said the show costs about $1 million a week to run, which, combined with dwindling ticket sales, contributed to its closing.

It’s estimated the production created 6,500 jobs in New York City, including those of 400 actors, some of which have been in the musical since opening night.

The final cast for Sunday’s performance includes Ben Crawford (The Phantom), Emilie Kouatchou (Christine) and John Riddle (Raoul), with Nehal Joshi (Monsieur André), Craig Bennett (Monsieur Firmin), Raquel Suarez Groen (Carlotta), Maree Johnson (Madame Giry), Carlton Moe (Piangi), Sara Esty (Meg Giry) and Julia Udine (Christine at certain performances).

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“I painted my dressing room pink so that it’s a very bright and warm and joyful place to be, so that I can leave what happens on the stage on the stage,” he says.

Platt deserves all the joy he can grab while playing the doomed lead anti-hero in the musical “Parade,” adapted from a true story that took place in Atlanta just before World War I.

He plays Leo Frank, a Brooklyn-born Jewish factory manager falsely accused of murdering a young girl. He is tried and convicted, has his death sentence commuted but then is lynched by a Southern mob who dislikes his religion and Northern values.

“It’s really a human story about how people — because of the traumas of their past — can’t escape the prejudice of their present,” says the show’s director, Michael Arden.

The musical is being revived on Broadway just as the nation endures another wave of anti-Semitism, which has brought darkness even to the theater’s front door. The show’s first preview was marred by a few neo-Nazi protesters outside.

That has only proven to Platt and the rest of the “Parade” team that bringing this musical back in front of an audience is the right thing to do in the face of bigotry and bullying.

“I think both in terms of specifically anti-Semitism and in terms of just the horrors of social media and online mob mentality, it feels all too contemporary,” Platt says. “I think everybody could feel very palpably that this was the piece for right in this very moment and that there was really a reason to be doing it.”

This is Platt’s first return to Broadway since his star-making turn in “Dear Evan Hansen,” which earned him a Tony and a Grammy and propelled his career to TV shows like “The Politician” and a record deal with Atlantic Records. The new musical opens March 16 at at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre.

Platt calls “Parade” a “hidden gem” in musical theater and grew up listening to its songs. It was mostly well-received by critics in 1998 when it first arrived — and later won Tonys for best book and score — but closed within a few months, despite a story by “Driving Miss Daisy” writer Alfred Uhry and music and lyrics by multiple Tony-winner Jason Robert Brown. Platt says it was ahead of its time.

“I think maybe people just weren’t ready to hear it at that point,” he says. “There’s a lot of gray in the show, and it’s also a piece that holds racism and anti-Semitism in the same conversation and highlights that they are both products, particularly in America, of the same system of white supremacy.”

Behind the legal drama, there is a second — the story of two people, Frank and his wife, Lucille, whose relationship gets stronger as their lives get more difficult. Micaela Diamond stars here as Lucille, and it is the first time Jewish actors have led a professional production of “Parade” of this scale.

“I’m hopeful that this will be an opportunity for those who didn’t already appreciate it, to find it and for it to get some of the due that it maybe should have gotten in the first place,” Platt says.

What viewers will find is a complex portrayal of Frank, a fussy, often unpleasant man who dislikes the South and who complains about the food when he is first thrown in jail. That challenge attracted Platt.

“There’s some moral challenge and ambiguity,” says Platt. “I think it’s an important message when you’re representing anyone who’s been oppressed or victimized, let alone a real person, to say that just because somebody isn’t perfect and entirely virtuous, it doesn’t mean that they aren’t deserving of justice and truth.”

Arden grew up in Midland, Texas, listening to Broadway cast albums and was “just transported by the score” of “Parade.” He watched a video capture of the original show and saw a version mounted by the Donmar Warehouse in 2007.

“It is rare when we get an opportunity to go to the theater and truly be challenged to reflect on our own shortcomings in this way and kind of stir up the darkness of our past,” he says. “We must reexamine our past or else we repeat it.”

Arden hopes his direction has focuses on the intimacy of the marriage, and he has stripped the musical down, without a lot of set design and without a heavy hand.

“We’re sort of presenting this play as evidence for an audience to make up their own minds about something, as opposed to trying to necessarily fully paint the picture in a way that a film could or perhaps the original production attempted to,” he says.

It is a challenging, often wrenching show and Platt gets into character each night in his pink dressing room with some key items: A framed photo of Leo and Lucille Frank taken at their happiest.

“I think it helps me to remember that the main purpose here is to honor them and to show the love between them and the humanity between them as much, if not more, than the tragedy that befell them,” he says.

There’s also a photo of him and his fiance, Noah Galvin, and of his family, including one from his brother’s bar mitzvah. He calls them “reminders of where I come from and what I get to go home to, that Leo didn’t get to go home to.”

“As traumatic and and dark as this particular story is, my greatest joy in life is to be in the theater,” he adds. “Even going through something like this and emotionally finding my way through it, I do go home with such a fulfillment and satisfaction because this is really my dream.”

___

Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

Producers and the star of “Parade” are condemning antisemitism after a group of neo-Nazi protesters harassed theatergoers as they were lined up ahead of the show Tuesday. Someone who tried to video the protesters reportedly had their phone yanked away and thrown on to the street.  

A member of the audience posted a video the hate-filled demonstration outside the Bernard Jacobs Theater on West 45th Street and described the moments of fear.

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“I know they have the right to protest but I can still be bothered by it,” said Elena Kaplan.

Those who demonstrated yelled, carried banners and handed out fliers that claim the show glorifies pedophilia.

The protesters were targeting “Parade,” a musical about the true story of Leo Frank — a Jewish man lynched in 1915 after he was wrongfully convicted for the rape and murder of a 13-year-old girl. Later legal review confirmed that Frank had been wrongfully charged.

“The irony should not be lost on anyone that these antisemitic extremists decided to protest a play that details the true story of the lynching of an innocent Jewish man by an antisemitic mob and used it as an opportunity to spread conspiracy theories and hate,” the Anti-Defamation League said in a statement.

For one woman, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, the protesters gave her even more reason to support the production.

“I was going to get them anyway but it’s also my form of protest to say you don’t get to push me out of my own country,” said Nina Mogilnik. “It’s a hard thing to digest.”

Tony Award winner Ben Platt stars in the production and said in a video shared on Instagram “it was definitely very ugly and scary but a wonderful reminder of why we are telling this story and how powerful art and theater can be.”

Producers of the show went on to say that “if there is any remaining doubt out there about the urgency of telling this story in this moment in history, the vileness on display (Tuesday night) should put it to rest.”

NYPD officers were on the scene Tuesday night, but it was not clear if they would have special patrols again on Wednesday.

Justin David Sullivan declined eligibility, according to Playbill, refusing to be categorized as male or female.

Sullivan, who identifies as non-binary, stars in “& Juliet” at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre and plays a non-binary character.

“I was told that I had to choose [the category in which] I felt comfortable, and in that process, I struggled a lot,” Sullivan told Playbill. “I felt like I couldn’t choose. I didn’t feel right being in either category because it didn’t resonate with me. I decided the only thing that felt right to me would be to abstain from nomination consideration.”

Sullivan said part of the rationale for the decision was to empower other non-binary people and performers.

The Broadway League and The American Theatre Wing, who put on the Tony Awards, said in a statement that they are discussing how to make the awards categories more inclusive, but that it was too late to make any changes for this year's awards.

“We recognize that the current acting categories are not fully inclusive, and we are currently in discussion about how to best adjust them to address this,” the groups said. “Unfortunately, we are still in process on this and our rules do not allow us to make changes once a season has begun. We are working thoughtfully to ensure that no member of our community feel excluded.”

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WARNING: We’re halfway through New York City Restaurant Week 2023 (the winter one) already.

That means you’ve got just two weeks to enjoy more for less at nearly 500 restaurants across the five boroughs as part of the annual seasonal winter foodie special. Two-course lunch for under $30? Three-course dinner for $60?

We’re in. This year’s winter restaurant week wraps on Feb. 12 (because, of course, Valentine’s Day crowds spend big). NYC Broadway Week ends the same day. Did all the restaurants and shows already? How about NYC Must-See Week?

Here are the delectable details. (And don’t worry, NYC Restaurant Week 2023 continues over the summer. We’ll have more on that as we get closer, but for now, get the next two weeks of your life straightened out.(

NYC Restaurant Week 2023

NYC Restaurant Week offers prix-fixe two-course lunches and three-course dinners for $30, $45 and $60 at nearly 500 restaurants across all five boroughs. It’s easy to sort your searches, filtering by location, cuisine and “weeks participating,” since the latter might vary by location.

You can also search by “meals offered,” “accessibility” and “ownership.” If thematics are your thing, there are a number of those as well: “James Beard Honorees,” “Wine Spectator Winners,” “NYC Restaurant Week Classics” and “Best of the Boroughs,” among other lists. See all participating restaurants right here. You can also book reservations now.

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Which theater-goers don’t love a two-fer? Actually, who doesn’t love a two-fer of any kind?

NYC Broadway Week also kicked off Jan. 17, offering 2-for-1 tickets to 22 shows. New shows added this year include the following: & Juliet; A Beautiful Noise, the Neil Diamond Musical; Between Riverside and Crazy; Collaboration; Hamilton; Kimberly Akimbo; Pictures from Home; Some Like It Hot and Take Me Out.

Returning shows for 2023 include Aladdin, Chicago, Funny Girl, Hadestown, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Leopoldstadt, MJ The Musical, Moulin Rouge! The Musical, Six the Musical, The Book of Mormon, The Lion King, The Piano Lesson and Wicked.

Score your 2-for-1s right here. Not sure what you want to see? Sort by comedy, drama, kid-friendly and more here.

Remember, it’s your last chance to see a host of shows before the curtains close this month. See the list.

NYC Must-See Week

This program offers 2-for-1 tickets at more than 40 museums, attractions, performing arts venues and tours. Participants include Carnegie Hall, Citi Field Tours, Jazz at Lincoln Center, Kings County Distillery, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York Botanical Garden, Summit One Vanderbilt, The Metropolitan Opera and more. Details here.

NYC Hotel Week

NYC hotel week offers 23% off standard retail rates through Feb. 12 at more than 140 hotels across all five boroughs. New hotels on offer for 2023 include Hard Rock Hotel New York and Le Méridien New York, Fifth Avenue. Returning properties include The Hoxton, Williamsburg; Lotte New York Palace; The Beekman, A Thompson Hotel; The Langham, New York, Fifth Avenue; New York Marriott Marquis; The William Vale; The Opera House Hotel; The Rockaway Hotel; Hilton Garden Inn New York/Staten Island; and more. More information here.

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We all love discounts on our favorite things — and assuming food is one of those for you, we’ve got good news.

New York City Restaurant Week 2023 kicked off Tuesday, offering bargain prix-fixe dining deals for lunch and dinner at nearly 500 restaurants across the five boroughs.

Broadway Week also kicked off Jan. 17, featuring 2-for-1 theater tickets to nearly two dozen of the Great White Way’s greatest shows, including newbies “Take Me Out” and “A Beautiful Noise” and older favorites like “Wicked” and “The Lion King.”

And if that’s not enough, we’ve also got NYC Must-See Week, which offers 2-for-1 tickets at more than 40 museums, attractions, tours and performing arts venues, like Carnegie Hall, citywide. The official programs run through Feb. 12.

There’s a Hotel Week, too, that is already underway.

Here are the delectable details.

NYC Restaurant Week 2023

NYC Restaurant Week offers prix-fixe two-course lunches and three-course dinners for $30, $45 and $60 at nearly 500 restaurants across all five boroughs. It’s easy to sort your searches, filtering by location, cuisine and “weeks participating,” since the latter might vary by location.

You can also search by “meals offered,” “accessibility” and “ownership.” If thematics are your thing, there are a number of those as well: “James Beard Honorees,” “Wine Spectator Winners,” “NYC Restaurant Week Classics” and “Best of the Boroughs,” among other lists. See all participating restaurants right here. You can also book reservations now.

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NYC Broadway Week 2023

Which theater-goers don’t love a two-fer? Actually, who doesn’t love a two-fer of any kind?

NYC Broadway Week also kicks off Jan. 17, offering 2-for-1 tickets to 22 shows. New shows added this year include the following: & Juliet; A Beautiful Noise, the Neil Diamond Musical; Between Riverside and Crazy; Collaboration; Hamilton; Kimberly Akimbo; Pictures from Home; Some Like It Hot and Take Me Out.

Returning shows for 2023 include Aladdin, Chicago, Funny Girl, Hadestown, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Leopoldstadt, MJ The Musical, Moulin Rouge! The Musical, Six the Musical, The Book of Mormon, The Lion King, The Piano Lesson and Wicked.

Score your 2-for-1s right here. Not sure what you want to see? Sort by comedy, drama, kid-friendly and more here.

Remember, it’s your last chance to see a host of shows before the curtains close this month. See the list.

NYC Must-See Week

This program offers 2-for-1 tickets at more than 40 museums, attractions, performing arts and tours. Participants include Carnegie Hall, Citi Field Tours, Jazz at Lincoln Center, Kings County Distillery, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York Botanical Garden, Summit One Vanderbilt, The Metropolitan Opera and more. Details here.

NYC Hotel Week

NYC hotel week offers 23% off standard retail rates now through February 12 at more than 140 hotels across all five boroughs. New hotels on offer for 2023 include Hard Rock Hotel New York and Le Méridien New York, Fifth Avenue. Returning properties include The Hoxton, Williamsburg; Lotte New York Palace; The Beekman, A Thompson Hotel; The Langham, New York, Fifth Avenue; New York Marriott Marquis; The William Vale; The Opera House Hotel; The Rockaway Hotel; Hilton Garden Inn New York/Staten Island; and more. More information here.

More Fun in NYC

Manhattan Jan 10, 2023

Edge at Hudson Yards Opens NYC's Highest Ice Skating Rink — for a Limited Time

New York Jan 11, 2023

Bumper Cars on Ice Return to Bryant Park Friday

There’s an unusually large number of shows leaving in January, some due to limited engagements and others due to weak ticket sales.

Among the closing crop is “A Strange Loop,” which won over audiences and critics alike. The musical won a Pulitzer Prize and the Tony award for Best Musical. There are a handful of performances left before the show closes Jan. 15.

Audience favorite “Beetlejuice” ends its run on Broadway Jan. 8.

The show opened in 2019 at the Winter Garden Theatre, closed with the rest of Broadway after COVID-19 swept through New York City in 2020, and reopened at the Marquis Theatre last year.

A national tour of the show is going on now, with several international productions in the works.

Here are some of the productions closing in January:

• 1776 (1/8)
• Almost Famous (1/8)
• Beetlejuice (1/8)
• Into the Woods (1/8)
• Death of a Salesman (1/15)
• Mike Birbiglia: The Old Man and the Pool (1/15)
• The Music Man (1/15)
• Ohio State Murders (1/15)
• A Strange Loop (1/15)
• Topdog/Underdog (1/15)
• The Piano Lesson (1/29)

Off-Broadway audiences are mourning a number of high-profile departures as well.

After a run that spanned four decades and probably hundreds of trash cans, “Stomp” plays its final show at the Orpheum Theatre on Jan. 8.

The percussion and dance show first opened in Feb. 1994, with a run that’s included around 12,000 performances. And while the off-Broadway production is closing, “Stomp” will continue to tour.

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