{"id":2449412,"date":"2026-06-08T03:22:52","date_gmt":"2026-06-08T03:22:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2449412"},"modified":"2026-06-08T03:22:52","modified_gmt":"2026-06-08T03:22:52","slug":"tony-awards-2026-schmigadoon-wins-best-musical-in-a-season-saved-by-revivals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/tony-awards-2026-schmigadoon-wins-best-musical-in-a-season-saved-by-revivals\/","title":{"rendered":"Tony Awards 2026: “Schmigadoon!” wins best musical in a season saved by revivals"},"content":{"rendered":"

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It was a strange year on Broadway, but then it\u2019s been strange everywhere. Our world at times seems downright unrecognizable, with politicians acting like mob bosses, AI transforming not just the internet but potentially the entire economy, the cost of living leaving only the super rich able to keep up, and I won\u2019t even mention the climate crisis, but the forecast calls for more doom and gloom.<\/p>\n

Good work, however, won\u2019t be denied, even if Broadway producers have perhaps overlearned the lesson of last year\u2019s sleeper, Cole Escola\u2019s \u201cOh, Mary!\u201d Parody with a heavy dose of camp has become all the rage in a theatrical season in which the best musical winner, \u201cSchmigadoon!,\u201d is an affectionate sendup of golden age classics by Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe and <\/p>\n

If Broadway is changing faster than the old guard can keep pace, the same is true for the culture in general. The economics of producing have scrambled the old playbooks. Unusual risk has occasionally brought unexpected rewards. \u201cSchmigadoon!\u201d fended off the competition to take the night\u2019s top prize along with awards for both its book and score by Cinco Paul. <\/p>\n

Michael Arden\u2019s spectacular production of \u201cThe Lost Boys\u201d <\/a>\u2014 the staging won awards for Dane Laffrey\u2019s scenic design and Jen Schriever and Arden\u2019s lighting \u2014 enriched the 1980s cult film on which the show is based with human substance and high-flying showmanship. Shoshana Bean\u2019s win for her featured performance as a persevering single mom, is a testament to the musical\u2019s capacious heart. Ali Louis Bourzgui\u2019s somewhat unexpected yet eminently worthy triumph for his featured performance as the vampire with front-man magnetism, catalyzed the production\u2019s thrilling virtuosity. But few would describe this year\u2019s ragtag selection of new musicals as robust.<\/p>\n

The only overriding lesson may be that there are no overriding lessons. Two-time Oscar winner Adrien Brody made his Broadway debut in \u201cThe Fear of 13,\u201d reprising his acclaimed Olivier-nominated London performance. But he didn\u2019t even receive a nomination for his work \u2014 a snub that I found unaccountable. <\/p>\n

Spoofs like best musical nominee \u201cTitanique,\u201d a zany burlesque of James Cameron\u2019s \u201cTitanic\u201d and all things Celine Dion, found new respectability on Broadway. And \u201cTwo Strangers (Carry a Cake Across New York\u201d), the two-person British musical by Jim Barne and Kit Buchan, endeared itself to audiences (if not so much to Tony voters) with its rom-com appeal. But what does it say about a season in which musical revivals upstaged new work?<\/p>\n

\u201cRagtime,\u201d the Lincoln Center Theatre production directed by Lear deBessonet that originated at New York City Center, was not only the most operatic offering of the season but was all the most emotionally stirring and dramatically ambitious. The show, which justly received the Tony for best musical revival contained perhaps the season\u2019s most seismic tour de force. Joshua Henry\u2019s Tony-winning lead performance as Coalhouse Walker Jr., the path-breaking pianist tragically ahead of his time, was astonishing in both its theatrical might and its generosity, which allowed everyone around him to shine, especially Caissie Levy, who picked up a Tony for her lead performance as a white matriarch whose political consciousness courageously awakens. <\/p>\n

\u201cCats: The Jellicle Ball\u201d pulled off the seemingly impossible by making Andrew Lloyd Webber\u2019s megamusical look cool on Broadway. The production\u2019s radical concept brings the queer audacity of Harlem Ballroom culture to these feline proceedings. For their imaginative daring, co-directors Zhailon Levingston and Bill Rauch were justly honored as were costume designer Qween Jean and choreographers Omari Wiles and Arturo Lyons, among the production\u2019s notable awards. <\/p>\n

\u201cChess,\u201d which was strangely overlooked in the best musical revival category (\u201cThe Rocky Horror Show\u201d strutted in instead), may not have managed to overcome the challenge of this over-elaborate geopolitical tale, even with a puckish new book. But the production made Nicholas Christopher <\/a>a likely future Tony winner star. <\/p>\n

What was old was new again on Broadway, but let\u2019s hope that producers can still believe that the best is ahead of us. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.latimes.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was a strange year on Broadway, but then it\u2019s been strange everywhere. Our world at times seems downright unrecognizable, with politicians acting like mob bosses, AI transforming not just the internet but potentially the entire economy, the cost of living leaving only the super rich able to keep up, and I won\u2019t even mention […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2449413,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2449412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Tony-Awards-2026-Schmigadoon-wins-best-musical-in-a-season.com2F582F7f2F36fcd7c44ca58e8402be6e2c.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2449412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2449412"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2449412\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2449414,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2449412\/revisions\/2449414"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2449413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2449412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2449412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2449412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}