For me,
this was a Tonys without any real instant “wow” moments, no performances that I
spent the next day rewatching a minimum of 10 times (hello, Sydney Lucas in Fun Home!) However, there were still some good
performances here, some of which I wasn’t really expecting.
Oklahoma!
As I said
in my review of the ceremony, I’ve never liked Oklahoma! It could be in
part because I’ve only seen high school productions of dubious quality, but
it’s never grabbed me. So imagine my
surprise when this wound up being one of my favorite performances of the night,
enough so that I want to figure out more about this Circle in the Square
production. Ali Stroker, who won a Tony
shortly after, killed on “I Cain’t Say No,” and the cast’s performance of the
title number was energetic, well-sung, and sort of lived-in – you really got a
feel for the community the characters were living in as they sang it.
Hadestown
The show
I was most looking forward to. I can’t
deny that the Hadestown number was
great, led by Tony winner Andre de Shields and featuring cool-as-hell
choreography and atmospheric lighting that instantly brought us into
Hadestown. I loved the haunting quality
of Orpheus’s “wait for me” refrain. As
much as I enjoyed it, though, it also provoked a strong sense of wanting to see
more. Which, I suppose, is the number
doing its job – when I start poking around online for other clips of the cast
performing, it’ll be because of the performance they gave here.
Beetlejuice
I was not prepared to enjoy the Beetlejuice performance as much as I did
(I’d put it at SpongeBob levels of
surprise from last year’s Tonys.) But it
was great! The song was fun with tons of
winking lyrics (some of which had clearly been jazzed up with references
specific to the ceremony,) and Alex Brightman was terrific. It occurs to me that he’s now starred in two
musicals based on movies that largely hinged on the unique energy of their male
leads (the first being School of Rock,)
and each time, I’ve been impressed at how well he’s captured that spirit
without just doing an impression of Jack Black or Michael Keaton. Maybe I should stop doubting him!
Ain’t Too
Proud
Another
one I wasn’t expecting. I couldn’t tell
you much about the Temptations and their music, so I wasn’t really predisposed to
be into this (and biomusicals that frame a lot of the numbers as in-show
performances aren’t really my thing,) but I thought the cast did great
here. All the guys sounded incredible,
the dancing was fantastic (the show took home the award for Best Choreography,)
and everyone had energy to burn. Just a
great time all around.
“James Corden, Sara Bareilles & Josh Groban
in the Bathroom”
Really
fun. Like I said, I haven’t heard much
of Be More Chill yet, but this parody
definitely had me wanting more. Even
though I didn’t know the song it was based on, it was still funny, with James
Cordon and last year’s hosts Sara Bareilles and Josh Groban working out their
insecurities about hosting the Tonys during a bathroom freakout. All three sounded really good here, and some
of the rhymes were delightfully fun – I especially liked, “Afraid I’ll make a
stage gaffe / In front of Laurie Metcalf.”
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