I am writing this from a hotel room in Manhattan that I am pretty sure is in Manhattan, though the mini-bar prices suggest I may have accidentally crossed into Zurich. Meadow flew me here last week on what I can only describe as a mission from God — or, more accurately, a mission from Meadow, which is like God but with more nicotine and anxiety. He got me a Third Mezzanine ticket to the 79th Annual Tony Awards, told me not to lose it, and then immediately asked if I still had my passport. I do. My jacket, though, is in Vienna. This is not relevant. This is extremely relevant.
The point is: I was there. Sort of. I was there in the way that a telescope is "there" when it's pointed at Jupiter. I could see the stage. I could see the lights. I could see what I am 90% certain was the back of Nathan Lane's head, though from the Third Mezzanine everyone's head looks like a very expensive thumb. I am not complaining. The Third Mezzanine is a spiritual place. It is where dreams go to dehydrate. I loved it. I wept twice.
Pink hosted, by the way. P!nk. The one who sings. She opened with a "Lady Marmalade" parody that featured Megan Thee Stallion, Neil Patrick Harris, and Dylan Mulvaney, and I am not making any of that up. I was sitting next to a man who claimed he produced Rent in 1996, and when Pink descended from the ceiling on what appeared to be a harness made of pure karma, he whispered, "This is theater," and I whispered back, "I'm just texting her," and then I showed him my phone, which was open to a blank Notes app. He moved seats. I considered this networking.
But we are not here to discuss my social failures. We are here to discuss the Tony Awards, which were, by every measurable standard, completely unhinged.
Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman — produced by Scott Rudin, who I am told left the industry due to bullying allegations and then, apparently, just bullied his way back in — led the night with six wins. Six. That's more wins than I have functioning credit cards. Joe Mantello won Best Direction, Laurie Metcalf won Featured Actress in a Play, and the production also scooped up Scenic Design, Lighting Design, and Sound Design, which means Death of a Salesman essentially won the Tony equivalent of a full home renovation. The show is about a man disintegrating under capitalism, and honestly, after seeing how many awards it took home, I believe it. Capitalism loves a comeback story. Scott Rudin loves a comeback story. Broadway loves a comeback story. I, personally, have been on a comeback since Austria, which is going great.
Laurie Metcalf gave a speech that made me cry into my Playbill. She was luminous. She was devastating. She made me want to call my mother, but my mother thinks Broadway is a type of bread, so I texted Pink instead. I wrote: "you killed it queen." She has not responded. She will not respond. She is Pink. I am Bradley. This is a restraining order in musical form.
But the real story — the story story — is John Lithgow.
John Lithgow, age eighty, won Best Actor in a Play for Giant, a drama about Roald Dahl's antisemitism, which is not a sentence I expected to type when I woke up this morning, but here we are. At eighty, Lithgow became the oldest man ever to win a competitive acting Tony. The previous record was held by Roy Dotrice, who was seventy-seven. Lithgow beat him by three years, which in Tony years is approximately a geological epoch. He also set the record for the longest gap between competitive acting Tony wins: fifty-three years. His first was in 1973, for The Changing Room. Fifty-three years. That's longer than I've been alive. That's longer than most marriages. That's longer than the Soviet Union.
He beat Nathan Lane, who was chasing his fourth Tony. Nathan Lane. The man is a national treasure. And he lost to a man who was already a national treasure when I was born. Lithgow's acceptance speech was so elegant, so genuinely moving, that half the Third Mezzanine started clapping and the other half started googling "how old is John Lithgow" and then immediately felt bad about it. He talked about his Broadway debut, about the Royal Court Theatre, about bookending his career with two Tonys separated by five decades of ecstatic moments on stage. I cried again. The man next to me — not the Rent guy, a different guy, this one claimed he invented the concept of understudies — leaned over and said, "That's what it's all about." I said, "I'm just texting him." I was not just texting him.
Schmigadoon! won Best Musical, which means Lorne Michaels now has a Tony, and I don't know how to feel about that. Is Lorne Michaels allowed to have a Tony? Is there a law? The show also won Best Book, Best Original Score, and Best Orchestrations, which gives it four wins total — tied with The Lost Boys and Ragtime, because apparently the Tony Awards this year decided that everyone gets a trophy except the shows that didn't win, which is how awards work, but still. Schmigadoon! is very charming. It's very meta. It knows it's meta, which makes it extra meta, which I respect but cannot explain to my therapist. The choreography looked like beautiful, synchronized ants.
Speaking of Ragtime: four wins, including Best Revival of a Musical, Lead Actor (Joshua Henry), Lead Actress (Caissie Levy), and Sound Design. Joshua Henry and Caissie Levy both winning lead acting Tonys for the same musical is the kind of dominance that makes you rethink your life choices. I once played a tree in a community production of Into the Woods and forgot to move during my big scene. They left me there for the rest of the act. I was a very still tree. Joshua Henry is not a tree. Joshua Henry is a star.
The Lost Boys — which entered the night tied with Schmigadoon! for the most nominations at twelve — also took home four wins, including Featured Actor in a Musical for Ali Louis Bourzgui, who beat André De Shields. Let me repeat that: a newcomer beat André De Shields. André De Shields, who is also eighty, who won a Tony for Hadestown in 2019, who was nominated again this year for Cats: The Jellicle Ball as Old Deuteronomy — which, if you think about it, is perfect casting because André De Shields is Old Deuteronomy, he is the wise elder of the tribe, and yet he lost to a punk rock vampire. Broadway is chaos. Broadway is beautiful. I love it here.
Shoshana Bean also won Featured Actress in a Musical for The Lost Boys, and honestly, if you had told me twenty years ago that a show about teenage vampires would be a serious Tony contender, I would have assumed you were describing my high school diary. I would have been correct. Dane Laffrey won for Scenic Design, and Jen Schriever and Michael Arden won for Lighting Design, which means The Lost Boys also won the award for "Most Likely to Make Your Pupils Operate on Different Schedules."
Liberation won Best Play, which was its only win of the night, and I am obsessed with that energy. You come in, you take the biggest prize in your category, and then you leave. No clutter. No excess. Just one trophy and a quiet Uber home. Bess Wohl wrote it. I did not see it. I was in Vienna when it opened losing my jacket. I was becoming the man I am today.
Other notable winners: Alden Ehrenreich won Featured Actor in a Play for Becky Shaw, which is significant because I have been told by no fewer than three people in this hotel bar that he is "having a moment." Lesley Manville won Lead Actress in a Play for Oedipus, proving that Greek tragedy is alive and well and still absolutely nobody's fault but everyone's fault. Cats: The Jellicle Ball won three awards, including Best Direction of a Musical for Zhailon Levingston and Bill Rauch, and Best Choreography for Omari Wiles and Arturo Lyons. Qween Jean won Costume Design, becoming the first openly trans person to win a Tony in that category, and the entire theater — even the Third Mezzanine, where we are typically treated as decorative mold — stood up and screamed. It was one of those moments where you remember why you put up with the theater. The drama. The community. The sheer, unapologetic nerve of putting people in cat costumes and calling it art. I've been doing this with my personality for thirty years.
There was also a performance celebrating the anniversary of The Book of Mormon, and Josh Gad and Andrew Rannells reprised their roles, and from where I was sitting they looked like two very talented pixels, but the crowd went wild, so I assume it was good.
I should mention that I attended a pre-celebration party last night where I was definitely invited and definitely not someone's plus-one's plus-one. I saw a famous person. I will not say who, but they rhyme with Al Chinos sorta. I will say that they were wearing a hat. I asked them if they liked Giant and they said, "I haven't seen it," and I said, "I'm just texting John Lithgow about it," and then I walked away very quickly and spilled something on myself that was, notably, pink, which felt like a message I was not prepared to receive. This is my process. This is my brand.
The night ended with me walking back to my hotel through Midtown at 1:00 AM, clutching my Playbill like it was a passport, which it basically is, because without documentation you are nothing in this city, and I am nothing in most cities, but especially this one. I looked up at the marquees. I thought about John Lithgow, fifty-three years between Tonys, still standing on a stage and meaning every word. I thought about Nathan Lane, who lost but will be back, because Nathan Lane is always back. I thought about Pink, hosting with the energy of someone who had already done three CrossFit workouts that morning and was prepared to suplex a producer if the orchestra played her off too soon, which she would have won, and which I would have cheered.
And I thought about myself, in the Third Mezzanine, breathing the same air as history, as far away from the stage as you can be while still technically inside the building. I was there. I saw it. I will remember it until I forget it, which, given my track record with passports, could be any day now.
Broadway, I texted Pink. Broadway.
She did not reply.
Bradley Snipes is an Entertainment & Pop Culture Correspondent at IRREVERENT. He is currently in New York, or possibly Los Angeles, or possibly a sound bowl circle in Vienna. His passport is safe. His jacket is not.