What Ever Happened to the Tonys?
Pour out a tiny glass of Champagne for the fate of the glitzy awards show in the coronavirus pandemic. We’re right in the middle of the year’s delayed awards season, and seemingly no aspect of the entertainment industry has figured out how to do their show right. The Grammys , usually held in January, were delayed until this weekend. The Oscars won’t happen till April . The Emmys were one big video call and the Golden Globes were an especially glitchy one . But in terms of sheer confusion, the Tony Awards have everyone beat. It took until March 1 — 354 days after Broadway shut down — for the theater industry to start voting on the best of the 2019–20 season that COVID cut short, and there’s still no planned ceremony in sight.
It’s a farcical situation, one that speaks to the way the theater industry has been upended by the pandemic. This Tonys was supposed to happen last June. Voters are being asked to remember work they saw as much as a year and a half ago. Winners will be kept under wraps until the awards ceremony, […]