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9 unusual facts about Tony Award


Dick Anthony Williams

Williams won the 1974 Drama Desk Award for his performance in What the Wine-Sellers Buy, for which he was also nominated for a Tony Award, and was nominated in 1975 for both a Tony and a Drama Desk Award for his performance in Black Picture Show.

Dorothy Jeakins

Jeakins also worked on stage productions, including South Pacific (in which Motley was the principal costume designer), King Lear, Winesburg, Ohio and The World of Suzie Wong (for which she received her third Tony nomination), and such television productions as the 1957 production of Annie Get Your Gun, and Mayerling .

Dubliners

In 2000, a Tony Award-winning musical adaptation of The Dead was written by Richard Nelson and Shaun Davey, directed by Richard Nelson.

Jean Harris

In the 1997 Seinfeld episode "The Summer of George", Raquel Welch plays herself playing Jean Harris in a fictional Tony Award-winning musical about the murders called Scarsdale Surprise.

John Ardoin

Callas at Juilliard (1988) focuses on her master classes given in New York in the 1970s and it inspired playwright Terrence McNally to write the Tony Award-winning play Master Class.

Kevan Frost

This earned him and his co-composer a nomination for a Tony Award for "Best Original Score" and a Drama Desk Award nomination for "Outstanding Music".

Shirley Dean

Recognition for bringing the Arts and Theater District to life in Downtown Berkeley by establishing a public-private partnership with the Tony Award-winning Berkeley Repertory Theatre and bringing in the JazzSchool, Aurora Theater, and Nevo Center for the Performing Arts in one of Berkeley’s oldest buildings.

Slippery Slope

Slippery Slope is a 2006 independent film starring Tony Award-winning actor Dan Fogler.

Toronto Fringe Festival

Several productions originally mounted at the Fringe have later been remounted for larger audiences, including the Tony Award-winning musical The Drowsy Chaperone.


Adriane Lenox

Adriane Lenox (born September 11, 1956) is an American stage and film actress whose performance in the play Doubt: A Parable garnered her the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play in 2005.

Alabama Shakespeare Festival

Tony Award–winning actor Norbert Leo Butz and Emmy Award–winning actor Michael Emerson were two of the program's most successful alumni.

Alan Siegel

Siegel remains active in the community and serves on numerous boards and cultural organizations, including the American Theatre Wing, where he is a Tony Award voter.

Barbara Johnson Tucker

In 1969, Tucker ventured to NYC for one year and landed the only singing role in the 60-member cast of the Tony award winning dramatic theatre play "The Great White Hope" which starred James Earl Jones.

Barry Michael Harman

He wrote and directed the Broadway musical Romance/Romance, which starred actor Scott Bakula and actress Alison Fraser, and which received five Tony Award nominations (including Best Musical, Best Lyrics and Best Book), four Outer Critics Circle Awards and a Drama Desk nomination for Best Lyrics.

Camille Thoman

In 2006, she directed Falling Objects, starring Tony nominee Mireille Enos, Oscar winner Timothy Hutton and Oscar nominee Melissa Leo.

Charlotte von Mahlsdorf

Since its initial run on- and off-Broadway the play has garnered every major theatre award including the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, Tony Award, the Drama Desk Award, Drama League Award, the Lucille Lortel Award, and the Lambda Literary Award for Drama.

Christopher Chadman

Christopher Chadman (born circa 1948 - died April 30, 1995) was an American dancer and choreographer who was nominated for Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle Awards and was the winner of the Fred Astaire Award for his choreography for the 1992 revival of Guys and Dolls.

Colette Brosset

She appeared on Broadway in 1959 in La Plume de Ma Tante, and was, along with the rest of the entire cast (Pamela Austin, Roger Caccia, Yvonne Constant, Genevieve Coulombel, Robert Dhéry, Michael Kent, Jean Lefevre, Jacques Legras, Michael Modo, Pierre Olaf, Nicole Parent, Ross Parker, Henri Pennec) awarded a Special Tony Award 1959 for contribution to the theatre.

Cristin Milioti

Cristin Milioti (born August 16, 1985) is an American actress known for her work in Broadway theatre productions such as That Face, Stunning and the Tony-winning Once.

Danny Daniels

He won a Tony Award and an Astaire Award in 1984 for The Tap Dance Kid and received three more Tony nominations for High Spirits, Walking Happy, and the 1967 revival of Annie Get Your Gun.

Eddie Foy, Jr.

He also appeared in At Home Abroad, The Cat and the Fiddle, The Red Mill, The Pajama Game, Donnybrook!, and Rumple, for which he received a Tony Award nomination as Best Actor in a Musical.

Ellis Rabb

His later directing work included a 1973 production of A Streetcar Named Desire, starring Rosemary Harris (to whom he was married from 1959–1967), James Farentino, and Patricia Conolly; a memorable production of The Royal Family in 1975 for which he won both a Tony Award and a Drama Desk Award, and a 1983 revival of You Can't Take It With You with Jason Robards and Colleen Dewhurst.

Emily Skinner

Skinner's role as one half of a pair of Siamese twins in Side Show earned her critical acclaim and a Tony Award nomination shared with co-star Alice Ripley.

Ford Center for the Performing Arts Oriental Theatre

The Oriental hosted a production of the 2009 Tony Award winner for Best Musical Billy Elliot starring, among others, Cesar Corrales as Billy Elliot from March 18 to November 28, 2010.

Frederic B. Vogel

Having invested in over fifty Broadway and Off-Broadway productions, Vogel co-produced the Tony Award-nominated Marlene, and co-produced the Lucille Lortel Award winning "Shakespeare’s R&J" Off-Broadway, R.T. Robinson’s The Cover of Life in the fall of 1994 at the American Place Theater, as well as co-produced the Off-Broadway musical Lust in June 1995.

Illya Darling

Attendance was fueled by the star wattage provided by Melina Mercouri in the title role (who was nominated for a Tony Award for her performance and had starred in the film), which managed to overcome the mostly lukewarm to negative reviews.

Jack Cassidy

Cassidy achieved his greatest success as a musical performer on Broadway, appearing in Alive and Kicking, Wish You Were Here, Shangri-La, Maggie Flynn, Fade Out - Fade In, It's a Bird...It's a Plane...It's Superman, and She Loves Me, for which he won a Tony Award.

Jim Lewis

Jim Lewis (librettist), nominated for a Tony award in 1996 for the libretto of Chronicle of a Death Foretold

Joe Langworth

From 1990 - 2005, Langworth appeared in a number of major Broadway musicals, including the closing company of the original production of A Chorus Line, the Tony Award-winning production of Ragtime with Audra McDonald, Marin Mazzie and Brian Stokes Mitchell, and the 2001 revival of Stephen Sondheim's Follies.

Judyann Elder

She began her professional career in New York off-Broadway as a founding member of and resident actor with the Tony Award-winning Negro Ensemble Company.

Kwaku Sintim-Misa

He was also featured in the popular American crime series Law & Order and on the drama series Medal of Honor Rag (by the Tony Award winning director Lloyd Richards.) "KSM" became the first African to stage an original Off-Broadway play when he produced Thoughts of a Confused Black Man, an immensely popular one-man show that raised compelling questions about race in the United States.

Lara Teeter

His third effort proved to be the charm, for the 1983 revival of On Your Toes won him critical recognition and a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actor in a Musical, in the role originally played by Ray Bolger in 1936.

Lauren Lucas

Lucas also contributed to the Broadway adaptation of the film Urban Cowboy, and one of her cuts for the play was nominated for a Tony award.

Marty Pollio

Among other credits, Pollio was a movement instructor for the Tony Award winning company of National Theatre of the Deaf.

Matthew Stocke

Throughout his career, Stocke has made numerous appearances on the Tony Awards and The Today Show and has made guest appearances on the television shows "30 Rock", "The Sopranos", "Conviction", "Law & Order", "Law & Order: SVU", and "Chappelle's Show".

Peter Feller

Peter Feller is a Tony Award winning American theatrical set builder who worked primarily on Broadway.

Phoenix College

Other prominent alumni include film star Nick Nolte, Tony Award-winning actor Stephen Spinella, actor Peter Billingsley, daytime television star Jaime Lyn Bauer, Pop/Rhythm & Blues singer CeCe Peniston, artist Eric Fischl, and AAGPBL pioneer Charlotte Armstrong.

Phyllis Newman

Additional theater credits include Bells Are Ringing, Pleasures and Palaces, The Apple Tree, On the Town, The Prisoner of Second Avenue, Awake and Sing!, Broadway Bound, and Subways Are For Sleeping, for which she won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical, beating out Barbra Streisand in I Can Get It for You Wholesale.

Samuel E. Wright

Wright was nominated for a Tony Award in 1984 for Best Featured Actor in a Musical for his performance in The Tap Dance Kid, and again in 1998 for Best Featured Actor in a Musical as the original lead actor for Mufasa in The Lion King, the Broadway version of Disney's animated classic of the same name.

Stephen Douglass

He was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Actor for his performance as Joe Hardy in Damn Yankees, and he originated the role of Ulysses in Jerome Moross and John Latouche's The Golden Apple.

Stephen Kunken

For his turn as CFO Andrew Fastow in Lucy Prebble's Enron, he received a Tony Award nomination for Featured Actor in a Play.

Stephen Oremus

His orchestrations (with Larry Hochman) for The Book of Mormon won him a Tony Award in 2011, for Best Orchestrations.

Ted LeFevre

LeFevre was the associate to Bob Crowley for the 2000 production of Elton John and Tim Rice's Aida, which won a Tony Award for "Best Scenic Design".

The Belle of Amherst

Harris, who portrayed fifteen different characters in the play, won the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play, earned a Drama Desk Award nomination for Unique Theatrical Experience, and won a Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Recording.

The Mary Tyler Moore Hour

Moore announced plans to return in a new sitcom in the fall of 1980, but instead turned to Broadway, where she starred in a revival of Whose Life Is It Anyway? (winning a special 1980 Tony Award for her performance of a role originally played by Tom Conti), and then went back to Hollywood, where she played the emotionally crippled mother in the acclaimed film Ordinary People, directed by Robert Redford.

Tony Humrichouser

In 1999 Humrichouser moved to Providence, Rhode Island and attended the esteemed Trinity Repertory Conservatory where he acted with the Tony Award winning Trinity Repertory Company.

Valery Panov

On Broadway in 1983-84, Galina Panova succceeded Natalia Makarova, also a Russian ballerina who had defected, in the Broadway revival of On Your Toes, for which Makarova had won a Tony Award.

Whisper House

The album, Sheik's first in the wake of success from composing music for the Tony award-winning musical Spring Awakening, contains selections from an original stage musical of the same name, with book and additional lyrics by Kyle Jarrow.


see also

Beatrice Straight

Most of her theatre work was in the classics, including Twelfth Night (1941), Macbeth, and The Crucible (1953), for which she won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play.

Big Man in Town

The song is also featured in the Tony-award winning musical Jersey Boys.

Bruce Barthol

Upon his return to the Bay Area, Barthol formed Energy Crisis with some ex-members of the Cleanliness and Godliness Skiffle Band before becoming the musical director for the Tony Award winning San Francisco Mime Troupe in 1976.

Bunnell, Florida

Bill T. Jones (choreographer) - Tony Award Winner for choreography in two musicals, "Spring Awakening" and "Fela".

Charmaine Clamor

Records in North America under Michael Konik's independent recording company FreeHam Records, which includes the Tony-Award winning Blues great, Linda Hopkins.

David Rabe

He won the Tony Award for Best Play in 1972 (Sticks and Bones) and also received Tony award nominations for Best Play in 1974 (In the Boom Boom Room), 1977 (Streamers) and 1985 (Hurlyburly).

Dennis Grimaldi

Under the tutelage of the Tony Award winning Russian actress Eugenie Leontovich, Dr. John Reich and Dr Charles McGaw; graduated on scholarship from The Theatre School of DePaul University Goodman School of Drama), also studied at The University of Indiana.

Donald Holder

Golden Boy (2013) - Tony Award Nominee, Outstanding Lighting Design of a Play

Donald McKayle

Doctor Jazz, 1975 (Tony Award nominee for Best Choreography)

Eva Aridjis

Tony Award winner Frank Wood describes Aridjis as "one of those extremely intelligent but-not-dependent-on-irony people."

Eve Ensler

Tony Award - In 2011, Eve Ensler was awarded the Isabelle Stevenson Award at the 65th Tony Awards, which recognizes an individual from the theater community who has made a substantial contribution of volunteered time and effort on behalf of humanitarian, social service, or charitable organizations.

Gemze de Lappe

In Spring 2011, the University of North Carolina School of the Arts presented an accurate recreation of the original Broadway production of Oklahoma! De Lappe recreated the original choreography, two-time Tony Award nominated actor Terrence Mann directed, and John Mauceri, the school's chancellor and former director of the Hollywood Bowl orchestra and Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra.

Holly Cruikshank

She is known for her role as Brenda in the Billy Joel/Twyla Tharp musical Movin' Out, and has also danced lead roles in two other Tony-award winning Broadway musicals: Fosse and Contact.

James Kirkwood, Sr.

Many years later his son, James Jr., would become a successful writer, winning both a Tony Award and a Pulitzer Prize for A Chorus Line.

Jazzmobile

He has appeared on Broadway as the pianist for the Tony Award winning Broadway musical, "Black and Blue" and recorded on Spike Lee's movie, "Mo' Better Blues."

Josephine Premice

Her next Broadway appearance garnered her a second Best Featured Actress in a Musical Tony Award nomination for her role in A Hand Is on the Gate, where she performed African American poetry works alongside James Earl Jones, Cicely Tyson, and Gloria Foster.

Julie White

She won the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play for her performance, over fellow nominees Angela Lansbury, Vanessa Redgrave, Swoosie Kurtz and Eve Best.

Kermit Bloomgarden

Command Decision (1947) written by William Wister Haines, followed, with Paul Kelly sharing the Best Actor Tony Award that year for his performance and James Whitmore earning the Tony for "Best Performance by a Newcomer".

L. Scott Caldwell

Born Laverne Scott in Chicago, she started her career in 1978 as a member of the famed Negro Ensemble Company, making her Broadway debut two years later in the Tony Award nominated play Home.

Long Wharf Theatre

More than 30 Long Wharf productions have been transferred to Broadway or Off-Broadway, including Durango, Wit, (winner of a Pulitzer Prize), The Shadow Box (Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award/Best Play winner), Hughie, American Buffalo, Requiem for a Heavyweight, Quartermaine's Terms (Obie Award winner for best play), The Gin Game (Pulitzer Prize winner), The Changing Room, The Contractor and Streamers.

Louis Jenkins

Actor Mark Rylance recited works by Jenkins in lieu of formal acceptance speeches after winning a Tony Award and a Drama Desk Award for the play Boeing-Boeing (in 2008) and after winning his Tony Award for the play Jerusalem (in 2011).

Moses Mielziner

Leo Mielziner would marry Ella Friend McKenna and become the father of five-time Tony Award winning stage designer, Jo Mielziner and of the noted actor and MGM Story Director, Kenneth MacKenna.

Nederlander Theatre

A wide variety of shows have been presented at the venue, including the Mercury Theatre production of William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Edmond Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac, Noël Coward's Private Lives, Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and the Tony award winning Rent.

Notre Dame Queer Film Festival

The film adaptation of Angels in America was shown on the evening of February 11 and afternoon of February 12 while Love! Valour! Compassion! screened on that evening with a question and answer session by director and Tony award-winner Terrence McNally.

Old Log Theater

Both he and his wife, Marissa, are theater enthusiasts and producers who have been on the boards of several local theatre organizations and are invested in productions such as "Lend Me a Tenor" in London's West End and Tony award winning"Peter and the Starcatcher" on Broadway.

Riverside, Texas

Two famous natives of Riverside are singer-actress Jennifer Holliday (born 1960), best known for her creation of the role of Effie in the successful Tony-award winning Broadway musical "Dreamgirls"; and Eugene C. Barker, Texas historian (born 1874).

Robert Bilheimer

At the Manitoba Theatre Centre, he was Tony Award-winner Len Cariou’s Associate Artistic Director, and was named Director of the Year by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

Robert Shaw Cameron

He has also appeared in numerous theatre productions and several new plays by Tony award nominated playwright Bryony Lavery.

Rouben Ter-Arutunian

A Passage to India (1962) Tony Award Best Scenic Design (nominee)

Salvatore Dell'Isola

His other Broadway musicals were South Pacific (1949); Me and Juliet (1953); On Your Toes (1954 revival); Ankles Aweigh (1955); Pipe Dream (1955), for which he was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Conductor and Musical Director; and Flower Drum Song, (1958), for which he won the Tony Award for Best Conductor and Musical Director.

Southwood Middle School

Alex Lacamoire, Tony award winning music director and conductor, whose credits include music director of both Wicked and In the Heights.

Susan Lyons

She is married to Tony Award winning theatre and film actor Jefferson Mays.

Ted LeFevre

He worked again with Crowley on Tom Stoppard's The Invention of Love at Lincoln Center in 2001; the show was nominated for a Tony Award and won the Drama Desk Award for "Best Design of a Play".

The Light Princess

It is adapted by Samuel Adamson; directed by Marianne Elliott, winner of the Tony Award for Best Directing in 2011, and has music and lyrics by Tori Amos.

The Nominations

It is the week of the Tony Award nominations, and Ana Vargas (Krysta Rodriguez) has sued Jerry Rand Productions and Derek Wills (Jack Davenport) for wrongful termination, threatening to publicize the suit.

The Two-Character Play

In May, 2011, Off-Broadway's Classic Stage Company (CSC) presented a one-night-only staged reading with Tony Award winner Alan Cumming and Tony nominee Jessica Hecht.

Theo Adams

The company invited and were joined in their performances by special guests Lorna Luft daughter of Judy Garland and Tony award-winner Frances Ruffelle.

Transport Group

In 2011, Transport Group's production of the Douglas Carter Beane/Lewis Flinn musical Lysistrata Jones transferred to Broadway and was nominated for a Tony Award.

Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992

Anna Deavere Smith was nominated for a 1994 Tony Award and recreated her role in the filmed production in 2000 directed by Marc Levin.

Wilson Jermaine Heredia

He starred alongside Harvey Fierstein (who won a Tony Award for writing the Book of the musical) as Albin/Zaza and Broadway veteran Christopher Sieber as Georges.

Woodbridge, Connecticut

Maury Yeston, Tony Award-winning Broadway composer and lyricist.