A Return to the Tonys
After a 19-year Break, This Erstwhile Theater Reporter Revisits the Stage's Biggest Night. This Time With Cocktails!
From 1998 to 2006, I was editor-in-chief of Playbill On-Line, the theater news website. During that span, I spent every Tony Awards night not at home, comfortably enjoying the ceremony from my living room; not on an aisle seat at the actual event; but in the awards press room, reporting on the proceedings in real time.
When I joined Playbill, and was first told I was going to represent the publication at the Tonys, I was excited. It was only later that I realized it was a sucker’s honor—an extra evening of work for no extra pay; while simultaneously being robbed of the opportunity to watch the actual action.
The American Theater Wing, which runs the Tonys, was old-fashioned back then. (Probably still is.) It insisted that the members of the press dress in black tie for the evening. They did this fully knowing that journalists are pitiful paupers and renting and/or buying a tuxedo is an onerous burden. This rule forced me to acquire my first tux, an item of clothing I would end up wearing exactly one night a year. I think I bought it at Sym’s, a discount men’s closing warehouse that used to stand near the tail end of Manhattan.
It was amusing to see all my colleagues in theater reportage dressed in formal wear. These were men—and it was mostly men—who usually arrived at press performances looking like unmade beds. I remember Claude Brodesser, the reporter for Variety at the time, bitterly complaining that cummerbunds were a plot to make men look fat.