The Broadway League and American Theatre Wing's presentation of the 74th annual Tony Awards will be held at Broadway's Winter Garden Theatre—which will be the home for the upcoming revival of The Music Man—according to a Tony spokesperson.
The ceremony, as previously announced, will take place September 26 in a four-hour celebration spread across two separate televised events.
Winners for a majority of the categories—the nominees were announced in October last year and voted upon this March—will be revealed in a 7 PM ET presentation streaming on Paramount+.
A live concert event, titled Broadway’s Back!, will follow, beginning at 9 PM ET on CBS, the ceremony’s usual broadcast home, as well as on the aforementioned streamer and the CBS app. In addition to performances from Broadway favorites and the three current Best Musical contenders (Jagged Little Pill, Moulin Rouge!, and Tina: The Tina Turner Musical), the primetime concert will feature the presentation of the night’s final three categories: Best Play, Best Revival of a Play, and Best Musical.
Both the Paramount+ and CBS portions of the evening will be broadcast from the Winter Garden. The Tonys were previously presented at the Winter Garden in 1975, the only year the theatre hosted the annual celebration.
Members of the industry will be able to attend a viewing party, hosted by The Tony Awards and sponsored by City National Bank, at the Broadway Theatre, most recently home of the revival of West Side Story, which recently announced it will not reopen. The party will feature live entertainment.
The 2020 awards, perhaps now more aptly the 2021 awards, will honor the 2019–2020 season cut short by the coronavirus pandemic, as performances came to a halt March 12 last year. During the nominating process, the awards’ Administration Committee deemed productions that opened by February 19, 2020, eligible. Of the contenders, the Alanis Morissette jukebox musical Jagged Little Pill leads the pack with 15 nominations. As for plays, Jeremy O. Harris’ Slave Play made history with 12 nominations. Check out the full list of nominations here.
The Tony Awards recently announced recipients for several special awards. Tony Honors for Excellence in the Theatre will go to veteran press agent Irene Gandy, stage manager Beverly Jenkins, PRG Scenic Technologies President Fred Gallo, and New Federal Theatre (founded by Woodie King, Jr.). Other honorees include Lifetime Achievement recipient Graciela Daniele, Isabelle Stevenson Award recipient Julie Halston, and Special Tony honorees American Utopia, Freestyle Love Supreme, and Broadway Advocacy Coalition.
Originally scheduled for June 7, 2020, the Tony Awards were officially put on hold March 25—a couple weeks after the Broadway shutdown went into effect; a few months later, organizers expressed their optimism for a virtual ceremony in the fall. But even when nominees were announced in October, details remained scarce on the actual ceremony. As voting approached, the League and Wing announced that they were shifting their plans, aiming instead for a ceremony in conjunction with Broadway’s reopening.
Guests for the Tony Awards and the viewing party will need to provide proof of vaccination.
Collaborating with the League and Wing on Broadway’s Back! is frequent partner White Cherry Entertainment, with the company’s Ricky Kirshner and Glenn Weiss serving as executive producers. Weiss will direct the broadcast.
