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[0:00] Judith Light: I'm Judith Light, and you're listening to, And the Tony Goes To...

[0:05] Judith Light: It's a look back at Broadway's most magical night, and all of the winners reminisce with delight, with their talents and brilliance they always impress, and the Tony goes to my special guest.

[0:21] Judith Light: Have you ever dreamed of winning a Tony Award? Did you ever practice your Tony acceptance speech in the bathroom mirror? Did you grow up watching the Tony Awards every year? Do you have a collection of Tony Award shows on VHS tape that you refuse to throw out? Well then this is the podcast for you.

[0:40] Judith Light: Every week I interview your favorite Tony Award winners, and together we go down memory lane as my guests share intimate, and never before shared details about their Tony experience. By the end of every episode you're going to feel like you just won a Tony. Welcome to, And the Tony Goes To...

[0:59] Ilana Levine: I'm your host, Ilana Levine. Welcome today's Tony winner, Judith Light.

[1:06] Ilana Levine: It's our pleasure to present this year's Isabelle Stevenson Tony Award to Judith Light.

[1:17] Judith Light: Thank you. Thank you so much. It has long been my privilege to support the HIV, AIDS, and the LGBTQ plus communities. So to be honored in this way tonight is extremely humbling.

[1:36] Judith Light: On the 10th anniversary of this award, I must acknowledge that it is here, in this theater community, that I have been inspired to do this work. It was the height of the AIDS pandemic in the early 80s, and so many people in our theater family were dying. However, even as they suffered the ravages of the disease, they came out and demonstrated courage the likes of which I had never seen before.

[2:04] ⚠ About 2 minutes of audio could not be automatically transcribed.

[3:45] Judith Light: Hello.

[3:46] Judith Light: Can you talk about how it feels listening to that speech now? It's as emotional for me now as it was almost a year ago when I received it in June of 2019. And I think even more so now that we are living in this time of the pandemic. And I am reminded of the courage and the bravery of everyone in our community during the AIDS pandemic. And what life was like then and what it is also like right now in the ways that people were frightened and bigoted. And there was the kinds of information that were being passed that was devastating for people. And I recall all of that emotionally and physically when I hear that speech. And it reminds me of also who we can be as human beings. When you look at the LGBTQIA plus community now and how far we have come in so many ways, there is a reminder that this community is a community of leadership.

And to have watched everyone in that community rise so magnificently and with such kindness and generosity and thoughtfulness and care. And it is so what we're seeing now. And particularly in New York with our frontline workers. And it all feels of a peace to me. I know I'm not particularly articulate about it. However, I'm just living with so much of the feeling of the time in the early 80s. And then as the disease progressed and how the community was held. And then as we move forward. And then here we are in this time in this moment now. So it's very, very emotional.

[6:30] Judith Light: Yeah. I mean, you know, you are one of only six performers in Tony history to win back-to-back Tony Awards for performance. You won for Other Desert Cities and you won for The Assembled Party and then parties. And then you were told that you were going to be the recipient of the Isabella Stevenson Award, which is a Tony Award for philanthropic good in the world. And it is not lost on me, my beloved Judith Light, that when I asked you which of your Tony speeches you wanted this episode to be about, it was not about either of your performance related Tonys. It was about shining light on ways to inform and educate and share information to help illuminate things that people are still uneducated about, fearful of, and don't understand how change needs to happen.

And it is really extraordinary to me that that was the speech you chose. And I am not surprised, knowing how you live your life. But it would really be interesting if you could share, you know, this is a Tony that you go to knowing you're going to win, right? Like there's no – it's not like, who else is being nominated for this award? It doesn't work like that.

[8:00] Judith Light: No. The way you had to sit and wait on other nights, not knowing, being happy to be nominated, being celebrated all season, but really not knowing what the outcome was going to be. And I wonder if you can speak a little to that experience and how it is a different experience when that's the case. And how did you find out you were going to be nominated?

[8:21] Judith Light: I mean, that you were going to win the Isabella Stevenson Award? Well, there's a long way to this, my sweet friend, and that part of it is that I had been away from the theater for a long time. And I came back and I did a play for MCC that was – that I now sit on the board of that theater. And it's, you know, the gang, the great gang, it's Bernie Telsey and Bob LuPone and Will Kentler and a host of others. And also the producer was someone who has become a very close friend, just like the boys have, Daryl Roth. And so I came back and I did that and then I would come back and periodically I would do different plays. But then I was brought – we came back to do a show called Ugly Betty. And we were filming here and then we were canceled after two years here in New York.

And I didn't know what I was going to do next. And I thought, I have to stay here. I had been so longing to be back in New York. It is the home of my heart. And my husband Robert and I had been living in L.A. for, you know, over 30 years. And I probably don't have the math on that exactly right, but it was a long period of time. And I came back and so we finished Ugly Betty.

[9:45] Judith Light: And then I was invited to audition for this young director for a play called Lombardi, which was about the life of Vincent Lombardi. And I was invited to do this through my friend Dan Loria, who I had been on One Life to Live With. And Dan said, I want – you know, he said to his good friend Tommy Kail, who –

[10:09] Judith Light: is the director of Hamilton and so much more. And I went in and I auditioned for it. And a lot of people said to me, don't audition for it. It's too small a part for you. And I said, I haven't been on Broadway in a million years. I said, I'm going in. It's an interesting part. And Tommy gave me the part in the room. That's mommy kale. So we're doing Lombardi, and everybody thinks it's going to be, you know, it's the little engine that could, we thought we were going to be on Broadway for maybe, you know, a couple months, maybe three months, something. Nine months. So in the process of this, I get this call from my agent that says, they want you to do a reading of a Richard Greenberg play that Bernie Telsey has recommended you for.

And I think it was on the day of a matinee, a morning of a matinee, or maybe it was on the day off of Lombardi. So I said, sure, I'll go in. I'll do it. And it was a play called On the Babylon Line. In the room were Richard Greenberg and Joe Mantello, Joe and Richard, good friends. Joe maybe was just listening to the play, maybe going to direct it, whatever. So I did that. And then I left. And then I went back to doing Lombardi. And I got nominated for a Tony for Lombardi.

[11:29] Ilana Levine: Yeah, you did.

[11:30] Judith Light: I was shocked completely. I know this is a long story, but this is like, this is what happens when you keep saying yes. So I did. So I, I'm at the Tony luncheon. And who should I be seated next to? But the genius Joe Mantello, who had been nominated for The Normal Heart, for his acting work in The Normal Heart. And if you saw him, he was extraordinary. Anyway. So we were seated next to each other at the Tony luncheon. And we're just chatting and whatever. And then I don't remember how much after that. I didn't get the Tony for that. Ellen Barkin did for Normal Heart. And she was extraordinary. And so anyway, so I got a call after all of that, after those Tonys, that they made me the offer. Linda Lavin was leaving.

She was going to go do the play The Lions on Broadway, and she was leaving Other Desert Cities. And Joe thought that maybe I could do this from having seen me do the reading of On the Babylon Line, for Richard Greenberg. They offered me Other Desert Cities, I did Other Desert Cities. I won the Tony that year, I was a nervous wreck and forgot to mention John Robin Bates and Joe Mantello, and I've never gotten over it.

[12:49] Ilana Levine: And well, you just have, and they will hear it on this podcast. So you are good.

[12:55] Judith Light: I guess so. And then right after that, Lynn Meadow had asked Richard Greenberg to write a play for Jessica Hecht and me, which was The Assembled Parties. And literally, it was the year after that, all of that came out of that one reading that one time. And I was wildly nervous each time I didn't even listen to whether I like I slept through one of the Tony announcements. I was doing laundry at another Tony announcement. I just I, I didn't expect it. And what I want to say about that is that when you have a community like this theater community, this is a and you know this because you're in the theater. This is an intense connected family that knows what it means to give your life in service to the theater.

What it means to give to an audience, what it means to be of service. And so when you have a family like this that welcomed me back the way that they did, after I had been gone for so long, I have never forgotten that I never will forget that. So when I received the two Tonys, the warmth and generosity toward me was extraordinary. And I, I treasure that.

[14:34] Judith Light: I treasure those two Tonys, those back to back those consecutive Tonys as much. However, when we talk today, you are correct. The Isabelle Stevenson carries with it what I expressed at first, the emotion and the level of work that I felt called to do when I was losing so much of my family. Right. And so those nights and also these Tony luncheons where everybody who's nominated gets to be there. And this was not a community. There were no people weren't holding it with this competitive, angry, sort of cut off from you edge. It was this warmth of everyone in the family being there together and acknowledging each other and the understanding of what it means to be in this family. So for me, those two Tonys carry a very precious story with them and an extraordinary acknowledgement.

[15:50] Judith Light: And the Isabelle Stevenson is set apart. And how I found out that I was getting it was that Charlotte St. Martin called me to tell me. And I was in L.A. I think I was shooting Transparent, the last season of Transparent, maybe the fourth season of Transparent. And she called me and said, the American Theatre Wing is giving you this. And I just I kept saying, Oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God. She said, Do you want to say anything else to me? I was like, so anyway, that. And I really do believe that there were people in that company and people who were incredibly supportive of me. And one of them was Stephen Schwartz. I have known Stephen. We went to Carnegie together, Carnegie Mellon University. And Stephen received it, too, for all the work that he had done. But I'm sure that and they and of course, all of them in that community had been very supportive of me receiving the other two Tonys. So I know there was there was generosity toward me for receiving this.

[17:06] Ilana Levine: Well, I understand why you would feel generosity, but it is a tiny token for a community to say thank you to you. I mean, it is it is very hard to say thank you for the kind of generosity and gifts you have bestowed upon the entire LGBTQIA plus community for decades. And so it's just the beginning of ways in which our community have wanted to say to you, thank you. And and you are in the company of, you know, Larry Kramer and Brian Stokes Mitchell and Eve Ensler and Stephen Schwartz. As you said, it's a very small list of people who have been given this award. Your speech is really one of Pony or any other place that someone has to give a speech. It's one of the most magnificent speeches I've ever heard. And I wonder if you could talk a little bit about the process of writing it, because that's a speech, you know, you are giving and it means so much to so many. How did you even begin creating what really is one of the most beautiful?

[18:20] Judith Light: Thank you. Actually, it goes on a little bit longer than I think that you have on there. There's something a little bit longer to the to our youth. And I'm not sure if you if you have that on there. But anyway, it's a little bit longer. The way I started, the way I started writing it was I just went at it full throttle and it was long. It was and I knew I had to cut it down. I mean, I thanked, you know, I was thanking everyone and I was including everyone and everything and I didn't want to leave anyone out. And then I knew that I had to. And so I started cutting it down. And I have a wonderful guide, someone who really supports me, coaches me in terms of things in this vein. And I read that to him and I had I have used the George Bernard Shaw quote a couple of other times and I didn't want to use it again.

And he said to me, you it's the it's the perfect moment. It's George Bernard Shaw, for God's sake. And it's it expresses everything you feel and know. So and then I cut it down. And then I just kept cutting it down until the morning, I think, of the actual Tony's, when I realized that it was still too long. And I went back in and I cut it some more because I didn't want to be cut off. And I knew that I had a very specific time limit. And I wanted to make that I got in the things that were of utmost importance. And that's how it that's how it came to be. And so.

[20:17] Judith Light: I appreciate you saying that very, very, very much. It took me a long time. I started working on it months before. It's one of those moments in life where there is a moment in time where you are together with your family, the people who have supported you, yourself, your awareness of what work... It wasn't like anybody said, you know, you should do this. This would be a good thing to do. That within me was the calling of something that I knew was true for me that I had to do. And people said to me, you know, this is early on. And they said, you know, you could ruin your career. You really could. And I said, I have to speak up. Do you see what's happening? And so to know that as life has gone on, that there was an acknowledgement to that.

And it wasn't brave. It wasn't courageous. It was just something that I had to do. And I still feel that way about the community. It's a community that has inspired me and continues to inspire me. And so I felt in that moment that all things came together in one place at one time. And I am as grateful to them as they were expressing to me. So it's everyone almost having a similar moment in time together. There's an intimacy in that and a delicacy and a fragility and the seeing everyone out in the audience, all people I knew and love, is a treasure that I carry with me to this moment.

[23:02] Judith Light: And when you asked me to talk about this, I was so thrilled because as you know, we will not have the Tonys in the same form this year. Yes. And that's why I wanted to do this. Yeah. It's so wise of you. It's so good of you to do this, to bring us all together around the experience of what the Tonys mean. There will be many this year who will not even have the opportunity to be nominated because the shows couldn't go up. And I know at some level what that must feel like for people. So that we get to talk about it and you get to bring it to everyone in this form is so generous and so wise of you. It's not just the Tonys, it's what the theater means. It's a gathering of storyteller to performer, to audience, to our people.

It is a lifeline for people. It is a way of reaching out into the dark and bringing light to people. Art lasts forever. Theater is from the beginning around the campfire passing stories. That is what this is. And it's not just the Broadway theater. It is the off-Broadway theater and the off-off-Broadway theater and what we're doing now on Zoom. But it is the infinite gift and it goes on forever. And so it isn't just that you're doing a podcast about those of us who have received a Tony. You're shedding a light on what people are missing now, what they are longing for. And how can we brave this to bring our audiences back? What can we do to illuminate this time? What can we do to let people know that it will be okay?

And we're all longing to do that. How can we support our organizations like the Actors Fund, like our magnificent Broadway Cares, Equity Fights AIDS? What can we do to bring that story about our theaters? I mean, MCC is very precious to me. There are places in our community that you're giving such a gift and I can't even begin to thank you enough.

[26:13] Ilana Levine: Well, listen, you know how I feel about you. You're one of the great loves of my life. And anytime I get to share you with the world is just a great day. I have a couple of lighter questions for you before we finish. Are you ready for this lightning round?

[26:35] Judith Light: Oh, I'm very bad at that. Go ahead.

[26:38] Ilana Levine: You're not going to be bad at this, I promise. Who did you bring with you the evening you won the Isabelle Stevenson Tony Award to the event?

[26:45] Judith Light: My husband, Robert.

[26:51] Ilana Levine: You mean your really handsome husband, Robert.

[26:55] Judith Light: Oh, listen, you should talk. You have a really handsome husband too.

[26:59] Ilana Levine: Thank you very much. But this is your episode. Don't turn the tables. What did you wear?

[27:07] Judith Light: I wore a Badgley Mischka silver sequined long gown, fully sequined with a little tiny pink bow at the waist and tiny pink velvet buttons. And my stylist, Jack Yeaton, helped me obtain that dress for that night. They were very generous to me, the Badgley Mischka gang. They were just really fabulous. Now, usually I ask my guests, where is your Tony? But we need to be plural right now. Where, my darling, do your Tonys live?

[27:50] Judith Light: They live on this long table that I have under a window. And all three of them are there together so that they can keep each other company.

[28:06] Ilana Levine: That is very sweet. Judith, thank you for being the magical, loving, generous, spectacular, extraordinary human. I feel very lucky to live on a planet where you are living and for all of the work you have done for the LGBTQIA plus community and so many communities. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

[28:25] Judith Light: Thank you, sweet friend. Thank you so much. I'm so happy just to even hear your voice at this time. I hope you're well and safe and that the family is too.

[28:35] Ilana Levine: We are. During our conversation, you heard Judith mention to me that I hadn't played her speech in its entirety. So as soon as we finished recording, I did a deep dive trying to find the rest of her speech. And alas, it was made known to me that because they were running short on time on the night, the entire speech wasn't recorded. So I asked Judith if she would please record the rest of the speech for us to hear. And she has. And here it is. And I will be forever grateful.

[29:07] Judith Light: And to those of you who are our future generations, please remember you are our legacy and that there is nothing to get in life, only what you give. As my dear treasured now departed friend, Paul Manette, the first openly gay man to win the National Book Award said before he died from AIDS. All that will matter when you come to the end is how much you've loved and how much you've given back. All of you in this family have given me so much. And now this extraordinary honor, my gratitude, my respect, my appreciation and my love are infinite.

[29:52] Ilana Levine: And The Tony Goes To is produced by Alan Seales for the Broadway Podcast Network. The music and lyrics for the theme song were written by Georgia Famosa. Theme song orchestration by Alexander Sage Oyen. Episodes are edited by Derek Gunther. Thank you to Parody Bill for the graphics. And please don't forget to go to the iTunes show page and rate and review the show. Thanks for listening.

[30:17] Ilana Levine: And the Tony goes to my special guest. Excerpt from the Tony Awards used with permission of Tony Awards Productions.