Tony time
The Tony Awards, for excellence in the Broadway theater, will be broadcast on CBS at 8 p.m. June 12 (tape-delayed for the West Coast). Neil Patrick Harris, a witty guy with a nice singing voice, will host. About 20 celebrities will appear as presenters. As of press time, three Jewish celebs have confirmed: Joel Grey, 79; Matthew Broderick, 49; and Daniel Radcliffe, 21. (The latter two are the sons of Jewish mothers and identify as Jewish.)
All three men are “connected” — sort of. Broderick was once engaged to Jennifer Grey, Joel’s daughter, and Radcliffe is currently starring in a Broadway revival of “How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying,” playing the same role that Broderick played in a 1995 revival. Interestingly, Robert Morse, who created the role in 1961, is scheduled to appear at the Tony Awards — so I suspect that a special “How To” number or comic bit, featuring all three actors, is going to happen.
Playwright Eve Ensler, 58, (“The Vagina Monologues”), whose late father was Jewish, is to receive the Isabelle Stevenson award. The award began in 2009 and is presented to “an individual from the theater community who has made a substantial contribution of volunteered time and effort on behalf of one or more humanitarian, social service or charitable organizations.” In 1998, Ensler co-founded V-Day, a global activist movement to stop violence against women and girls.
Chicago’s Lookingglass Theatre Company is this year’s winner of the Regional Theater Tony. It was co-founded by and is heavily subsidized by actor David Schwimmer, 44.
And the nominees are …
Below are the Jewish Tony nominees I am aware (not included are producers or technical award nominees).
Best original musical score (music and/or lyrics): John Kander, 84, and the late Fred Ebb for “Scottsboro Boys,” a show about a famous racial injustice case. Also nominated for best score is Alan Menken, 61, (music only) for “Sister Act,” and David Yazbek, 51, (words and music) for “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.” Also nominated in this category is Matt Stone, 40, (“The Book of Mormon”). This satirical but not mean musical about Mormon missionaries features lyrics (but not music) by Stone and Trey Parker, the creators of the animated TV show “South Park.” Stone and Parker are also nominated for best book (story) of a musical. (Stone and Yazbek are the sons of Jewish mothers and non-Jewish fathers.)
Josh Gad, 30, who was raised Orthodox, is nominated for best actor in a musical (“The Book of Mormon”). Among the nominees for best featured actress in a play are Ellen Barkin, 57, (“The Normal Heart,” a play about the AIDS epidemic by Larry Kramer) and Judith Light, 62, (“Lombardi,” about the famous football coach). Grey is co-nominated (with George C. Wolfe) for best direction of a play (“The Normal Heart”).
Art imitates life
Fran Drescher, 53, (“The Nanny”) returns to series TV as the star of the TVLand cable show “Happily Divorced” (starting June 15 at 10:30 p.m.). The press description says: “Inspired by Drescher’s real life experience” and “follows Los Angeles florist Fran, whose 18-year marriage ends suddenly when her husband announces he’s gay. And if that weren’t enough, he can’t afford to move out. They figured out how to be ‘Happily Divorced,’ but her being single and his being gay, while living under one roof, is a whole other story.”
The show is co-written and co-produced by Peter Marc Jacobson, 53, who also co-created and co-wrote “The Nanny.” He and Drescher were high-school sweethearts.