2012 Tony Predictions: Best Featured Actress

Now we get to the meat of the Tonys, the acting awards.  Given the sheer volume of eligible work, someone always gets snubbed when the nominations are handed out, and even then there are still several deserving candidates for each statuette.  Before reading any father, please remember my two caveats:  1) I have not seen all of the nominated shows; and 2) I am predicting who will win, which may be different from who should win, especially in the acting categories.  As always, I will point out those discrepancies in the body of the article.

Since any gentleman knows that its ladies first, here are my predictions for the Best Supporting Actress categories.

Best Featured Actress in a Play

Nominees:  Linda Emond, Death of a Salesman; Spencer Kayden, Don’t Dress for Dinner; Celia Keenan-Bolger, Peter and the Starcatcher; Judith Light, Other Desert Cities; Condola Rashad, Stick Fly

Right off the bat, I think we can count out Spencer Kayden and Condola Rashad.  Kayden is the only bright spot in a critical and commercial failure, and if it weren’t produced by the not-for-profit Roundabout Theatre Company I’m sure Don’t Dress for Dinner would have already posted a closing notice.  Rashad could be called a dark horse candidate, but while critics loved her, Stick Fly as a whole didn’t make much of an impression and closed months ago.  One of the biggest advantages a Tony nominee can have is being in a currently running show, which leaves Rashad with an uphill battle that I doubt she can win.

While I have not personally seen Peter and the Starcatcher, my understanding is that all of the actors play multiple roles, which always impresses Tony voters and is a major plus for Celia Keenan-Bolger.  Unfortunately, Peter isn’t as “serious” a work as Death of a Salesman or Other Desert Cities, which probably negates any advantage the multiple role trick gave her.  In straight plays, Tony voters tend to reward dramatic acting or its exact opposite, full-on farce; anything in-between like Peter goes underappreciated.

If we rule out Keenan-Bolger, we are left with Judith Light and Linda Emond, with the edge definitely going to the latter.  Emond is clearly the female lead in Salesman, with all of the accompanying stage time and character development, giving her more and better material to work with than her fellow nominees.  This same situation led Nikki M. James to a somewhat surprising but wholly deserved Featured Actress in a Musical win last year, and I expect a similar outcome for Emond.  And lest you think it all comes down to politics, I have seen Salesman and can assure you she is devastatingly good, easily holding her own against Phillip Seymour Hoffman and making even the play’s most famous lines sound fresh and alive.

Will & Should Win:  Linda Emond, Death of a Salesman

Best Featured Actress in a Musical

Nominees:  Elizabeth A. Davis, Once; Jayne Houdyshell, Follies; Judy Kaye, Nice Work If You Can Get It; Jessie Mueller, On a Clear Day, You Can See Forever; Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Ghost the Musical

For me, this is a somewhat odd list of nominees.  It’s not that I think any of the included ladies are bad, but I don’t quite understand what some of them did to edge out other equally fine performances.  For instance, as hilarious as she was singing “Broadway Baby,” was Jayne Houdyshell really that much better than her Follies costars Elaine Page or Terri White?  And how did Elizabeth A. Davis, even with her striking good looks and beautiful singing voice, get herself nominated when the rest of the ensemble of Once went unrecognized?  I suspect I am not the only one who feels this way, and it is a sentiment that will probably prevent either of them from leaving the Beacon theatre a winning next Sunday.

Now, I hesitate to say I don’t want Da’Vine Joy Randolph to win, but…I don’t want her to win.  I haven’t seen her in Ghost, and the problem is I don’t need to in order to know exactly what her performance is like.  I’m sure she’s sassy, fires off a succession of one-liners, and sings the hell out of her big, gospel-tinged solo.  Add in one or two “serious” moments masquerading as character depth, and you have the same performance given by almost every featured black actress in the past ten years.  It’s such a cliché that someone even wrote a song about it, although in fairness to the writers of Ghost they at least had the decency to make Randolph’s character integral to the plot.  But it still isn’t the sort of thing that should be rewarded with Tony Awards, especially because such a win will only encourage musical theatre writers to continue using this stereotype rather than creating roles of substance for black women.

Judy Kaye is perfectly fine in Nice Work If You Can Get It, but I don’t think this role will net the Tony Award-winner a second statuette.  The show as a whole is too run-of-the-mill, and Kaye doesn’t do enough to rise above that.  On the other hand, Jessie Mueller did rise above her subpar show and gave one of the most praised supporting turns of the season.  Everyone who actually saw On a Clear Day agrees that Mueller’s big number was the highlight of the evening and a genuine showstopper.  Plus, Broadway loves a Cinderella story, and what could be more fairy tale-esque than a young woman playing the lead in her Broadway debut, stealing the show, and winning a Tony for it?

Will & Should Win:  Jessie Mueller, On a Clear Day You Can See Forever

That’s all for now.  Check back soon to see which Featured Actors should be practicing their acceptance speeches.  And check out the rest of my Tony predictions here:

Score &Book

Direction& Choreography

Tony Watch: Assessing the 2011-2012 Broadway Season Part 6

I'm sure the play is very good, but if that's what the house in Clybourne Park looks like, I'm not sure why anyone would want to move into it.

Magic/Bird

From the same team behind last year’s Lombardi, this play about the rivalry between NBA stars Magic Johnson and Larry Bird seems destined to be an also-ran in a season so packed with new works.  With less enthusiastic reviews than Lombardi (which wasn’t exactly embraced by critics to begin with) and lacking a critical darling like Judith Light to raise its profile, Magic/Bird simply won’t be among this year’s Tony nominees.

Peter and the Starcatcher

Peter and the Starcatcher, a prequel to Peter Pan, is the essence of an Off-Broadway show.  Relying more on a gifted ensemble and strong script than grand spectacle, this play is by all accounts quirky, inventive, and creatively staged in a way that emphasizes old-fashioned stagecraft over flashy technology.  Like last season’s Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, Starcatcher was well reviewed Off-Broadway and similarly praised after its move uptown.  I also predict that it will be similarly ignored by the Tony voters, with the exception of one or two acting nominations.

This has less to do with quality and is more a reflection of Tony politics and preferences.  The voters tend to prefer their plays be high-minded adult dramas rather than family shows, and with so many of the former on the boards this season I don’t see Starcatcher cracking the more competitive categories like Best Play or Best Direction.  I do think Christian Borle’s scene-stealing turn as Black Stache makes him a definite contender for some Best Supporting Actor love, and in such a crowded season for new plays even one Tony nomination is a definite accomplishment.

One Man, Two Guvnors

Quite honestly, I am over the recent trend of West End transfers coming to Broadway and sweeping the Tony Awards.  While there is definitely quality in the execution of these productions, I have found many of them to be overrated, as if the New York theatrical community has so deeply absorbed the idea that the English are better actors than we are that they blindly endorse anything with a British pedigree.

But with so many strong American productions on Broadway this year, I think that trend will finally be broken.  While this farce it could find itself the token British Best Play nominee (there’s always at least one), it is by no means assured a place at the table, given the already mentioned Tony preference for drama over farce.  All that said, even the most jaded theatregoer would have trouble justifying the exclusion of leading man James Corden from the Best Actor category, thanks to his virtuosic performance in such a physically demanding role.

Clybourne Park

This play has Tony bait written all over it.  It is a contemporary drama (or dark comedy, depending on who you ask) that tackles a serious issue (race) with intelligence and a roundly praised acting ensemble, Clybourne Park also has the distinction of being last year’s winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.  In a tough category, that makes the show as close to a guaranteed Best Play nominee as there is this year.

The quality of the acting ensemble will either net the show a boatload of nominations or cancel one another out.  Of all the Tony categories, the acting nominations tend to be the most merit based, but it still helps if a performer is one of the best parts of their respected show.  When everyone is amazing, it sometimes results in no one getting nominated due to vote splitting.  The Best Direction of a Play category is so ridiculously competitive that I’ve given up trying to predict it, although anyone who can coax this many stellar performances out of a group of actors is certainly in the running.

A Streetcar Named Desire

Working on this iconic Tennessee Williams play is both a blessing and a curse.  On the one hand, the script is widely recognized as one of the greatest American plays ever written, with such layered characterizations and universal themes that it’s a veritable gold mine for serious dramatic actors.  However, the play is so well known that most critics have very specific ideas on how it should be handled, and the iconic characters have been played by some of the greatest actors who have ever lived, which makes living up to audience expectations for the work almost impossible.

It seems that this production, like most Streetcar revivals, didn’t fully satisfy critics.  Its inclusion among any of the Tony categories is a complete toss-up.  The strength of the material may get it included among the Best Revival nominees, but the apparent mishandling of that material could also keep it out of contention.  The lead actors all have roles that Tony voters gravitate toward, but it doesn’t sound like any of them have earned the right to join the prestigious company of confirmed greats like Jessica Tandy or Marlon Brando.  And who knows how Tony voters will react to director Emily Mann’s vision of an ethnically diverse production, given how much Williams’ plays rely on their Old South milieu for their themes and characterizations.  Some may feel casting black actors revealed new shades of meaning in this oft-studied work, but others may decide that race has little bearing on the material and is in essence stunt casting (this latter sentiment kept the recent all-black Cat on a Hot Tin Roof from being more of an awards contender).

Ghost the Musical

In a normal season, the critically lambasted Ghost would be such a long shot at any kind of award nominations that discussing it would be a waste of time.  But this is not a normal season, and given the lack of a Book of Mormon-esque critical and commercial success, anything could happen.  I personally don’t think Ghost can secure a Best Musical slot, but then again, I am predicting the absolutely atrocious Spider-Man (which I named the Worst Show of 2011) will be nominated in that very category due to weak competition and Tony politics.  Since the chances of Ghost actually being worse than that train wreck are infinitesimally small, perhaps Ghost stands a chance.

Which also means it could wind up among the Best Book and Score nominees, although I again doubt this will actually happen.  Ghost has not accumulated the industry clout that Spider-Man somehow has, and seemingly lacks the latter show’s mass commercial appeal.  The bland lead actors are also out of luck, as looking pretty and singing well thankfully isn’t quite enough to earn someone a Tony nomination.  Depending on how well Da’Vine Joy Randolph plays up the Sassy Black Woman archetype, she may find herself among the Best Supporting Actress nominees, although her chances of winning are currently next to nothing.  And even though it broke down on the night most critics reviewed the show, Ghost’s set could prove dazzling enough from a technical standpoint to get nominated.

Just one more article to go and we’ll have officially touched on every Broadway production that has opened during this busy season.  Look for it to go live soon!

To read my previous Tony Watch articles, look here:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5