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[0:00] Aaron Albano: You're listening to Tony Telecasts from The Ensemblist, the only podcast that shows you Broadway from the inside out. I'm Aaron Albano.

[0:11] Mo Brady: And I'm Mo Brady.

[0:23] Aaron Albano: Welcome back, listeners, to our miniseries about the Tonys, bringing you all the drama behind the drama of a theater season in Broadway history.

[0:30] Mo Brady: In each podcast episode, we will watch a telecast of the previous Tony Awards, not only the performances, but the opening and speeches, to see how it reflects the season as a whole.

[0:40] Aaron Albano: So let's dive in and continue our talk about the 1988 Tony Awards.

[0:53] Mo Brady: The first nominated performance was from the original Broadway production of Into the Woods, was the prologue narrated by Angela Lansbury, and children will listen. Aaron, first thoughts?

[1:08] Aaron Albano: Very, very first thoughts is I love Into the Woods. I think we all grew up on Into the Woods. And especially during the prologue, I was like, this is the perfect way to advertise this show. It just gives the whole show in a nutshell. But then my second thought was, wait, this is B-roll. Oh, are we here again? We're just going to get pre-recorded footage into a performance, which was fine, because I feel like the live performance began at children will listen, right?

[1:36] Mo Brady: I think you're right. That feels right to me.

[1:39] Aaron Albano: So my favorite thing about watching this performance was during the prologue, when the witch comes out, I was like, oh, when the witch is like dressed up like an old witch, right? With like prosthetics and mask. I was like, that doesn't look like Bernadette Peters. Maybe they used covers because Bernadette has to come out as the real witch later. They got to do a quick change. So I had no idea. So I was like, okay, maybe this is just like, stand in witch for the prologue before she comes up beautifully. And then we get to children will listen, and out walks Felicia Rashad. And I said, oh, wait a second. Where's Bernadette? The Googling begins. And that's when I like literally had to pause and be like, what happened? Where's Bernadette? Is Felicia Rashad the witch? Is she the original witch that I just didn't know about? And Bernadette's on the recording? Like all of these questions, which I feel like you had the same questions, right?

[2:37] Mo Brady: Yes. So I had remembered that Felicia Rashad was a replacement, but I didn't realize that Bernadette had left before the Tony Awards. So this show opened in September, and Bernadette left in March. So I don't know if she was not eligible. Or I mean, I assume she was eligible because lots of shows that close in the fall are eligible for Tony Awards.

[3:01] Aaron Albano: Yeah.

[3:02] Mo Brady: But she just wasn't, she wasn't in the show anymore. So I mean, it's like, it's like Jane Lynch doing little girls in Annie.

[3:09] Aaron Albano: I guess there you go.

[3:10] Mo Brady: That's true. I was floored. It shook me so hard. And it took me until the end of the number to get over my shookness. In similar shookness, this cast, I think because of that PBS Great Performances, this cast is legendary in my mind.

[3:27] Aaron Albano: Yes.

[3:28] Mo Brady: And the fact that only Robert Westenberg as Cinderella's Prince and the Wolf and Joanna Gleeson are nominated.

[3:34] Aaron Albano: Yes.

[3:35] Mo Brady: Is wild.

[3:36] Aaron Albano: It's wild! It kind of reminds me of The Secret Garden, how we don't see Mandy Patinkin nominated or Rebecca Luker. What is that? I don't even know. Like, there's too many brilliant people in this show. And again, you're right. Maybe it's like our biases because we literally grew up watching this show. But like, where's Chip Zine? Where's I forget the woman who played Cinderella.

[4:00] Mo Brady: Kim Crosby.

[4:02] Aaron Albano: Yeah. Kim Crosby. Little Red. What's her name?

[4:04] Mo Brady: Daniel.

[4:05] Aaron Albano: Oh, see, it's bad. I don't know any of these names because I just know them as Little Red.

[4:08] Mo Brady: The definitive Little Red and the definitive Jack and the definitive everybody.

[4:12] Aaron Albano: Yeah, there's like...

[4:13] Mo Brady: Like Chuck Wagner's chillin' in there. So many people that I'm just like, only the two of them? Granted, they deserve it. But still, I feel like this could have swept the nominations. And yet, because we're here in a season with Behemoth, the Phantom of the Opera.

[4:29] Aaron Albano: Yeah.

[4:30] Mo Brady: Yeah. And so that's the next performance. We see the title song and music of the night, which I feel, which is so interesting because I feel like I've seen this mashup of the Phantom of the Opera for the last 30 years.

[4:41] Aaron Albano: Well, can I tell you, we've seen this mashup in three of the four Tony performances that we've watched.

[4:46] Mo Brady: We've literally...

[4:50] Aaron Albano: I know. And we always have to take ourselves out of it and be like, okay, this is the first time. This is not historical. This is legit the first time. That's what's crazy about it. It's like, we watched it at the year of the musical actor in 1991. We watched the 25th anniversary in 2013. And then their inaugural performance in 1988. We should just rename this the Phantom of the Opera podcast.

[5:13] Mo Brady: Yeah, there you go.

[5:14] Aaron Albano: Uh huh. What are the names of the two old men who run the opera house?

[5:18] Mo Brady: That's honestly the two roles for us.

[5:20] Aaron Albano: Honestly. Why did I just think that it was like, Waldorf and...

[5:23] Mo Brady: Statler and Waldorf.

[5:24] Aaron Albano: Perfect. Great. Thank God. That's literally us in Muppet form at this point. We're just in the one box at the Minskoff where they hang the Broadway Cares flags during the Easter bonnet. Just you and me up there being like, just heckling, Bernadette Peters left in March.

[5:42] Mo Brady: Ho, ho, ho, ho.

[5:44] Aaron Albano: Perfect. Okay. I thought this was simple, but effective. I don't know. What did you think?

[5:50] Mo Brady: It's fine. The most interesting thing to me is how Angela Lansbury introduces it.

[5:54] Aaron Albano: Oh, go ahead.

[5:55] Mo Brady: She says, quote, through the brilliant interweaving of Andrew Lloyd Webber's music and Hal Prince's stagecraft, we are made to feel we are experiencing it for the first time. The touching and bizarre tale of a man's haunted love for a young singer who becomes his voice is like nothing we've ever seen before.

[6:13] Aaron Albano: Firstly...

[6:14] Mo Brady: First off, I think we're projecting a win for Phantom, which I don't think was a shocker, but it reminds me of how Rosie describes The Lion King as the best musical I've ever seen before best musical is announced.

[6:26] Aaron Albano: Yeah, definitely showing her cards a little bit in terms of her bias.

[6:29] Mo Brady: Secondly...

[6:30] Aaron Albano: This description is icky, right?

[6:32] Mo Brady: This description is revisionist history right here. Like, this is very clearly pre the Me Too movement, because whoa. I was like, wow, a man's haunted love. Way to paint your protagonist in the best light possible.

[6:49] Aaron Albano: Haunted love.

[6:50] Mo Brady: Uh huh. Serafina.

[6:55] Aaron Albano: Serafina. Okay, did you know anything about Serafina before?

[7:07] Mo Brady: I watched the movie and I remember dancing around the living room to the movie soundtrack as like a 10 year old a lot.

[7:16] Aaron Albano: Same. I remember watching this movie because I think it came out in 1992.

[7:22] Mo Brady: Feels right. And I believe I got into this movie because Whoopi Goldberg was in it. And this was, this was like peak Sister Act, Sister Act 2 time.

[7:30] Aaron Albano: Oh my gosh.

[7:31] Mo Brady: Like, and so I was like, okay, I want to watch everything that Whoopi's in, especially if it's a musical. Let's go. I remember loving it, but clearly I was too young to really understand what any of it was about.

[7:43] Aaron Albano: Right.

[7:44] Mo Brady: After watching this telecast, I definitely looked it up on streaming services to see if it was around. It's not anywhere. So I look forward to watching it again when it is available to me. It really made me want to see a revival of it because I'm like, how would 2020 take on this show?

[8:01] Aaron Albano: Sure.

[8:03] Mo Brady: One of the things I think was most interesting and I didn't realize was sort of like the hook. The marketing hook was that it was performed by South African children, quote unquote, of apartheid.

[8:14] Aaron Albano: Yeah.

[8:15] Mo Brady: Which they call, they call them performing in the show rather than professional performers, which always makes me laugh. I'm like, if you're getting paid, you're a professional, sorry.

[8:23] Aaron Albano: Yeah, exactly. But I feel like that's one of those marketing decisions where everybody wins.

[8:30] Mo Brady: Yeah, sure.

[8:31] Aaron Albano: Yeah. Because the performers for me were a little dead eyed, even though they sounded glorious. Like the music is so good.

[8:38] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[8:39] Aaron Albano: They are a little dead eyed. And I was like, I don't know what the story is, but I like the singing.

[8:44] Mo Brady: Well, and I'm wondering if that, because we were children and didn't know anything outside of the four walls of our house, if the struggle in South Africa was a lot more culturally present at the time. And so everybody would have already would have known exactly what the show is about. And those of us...

[9:00] Aaron Albano: Particularly to Upper West Side, Lincoln Center audiences who are like, going down to the pristine walls of Lincoln Center Theater to get a look into the challenges of people in third world countries and how they triumph over adversity.

[9:16] Mo Brady: Sure, sure. I will say I do love, because I didn't know back in the day, the movie starred Lilete Kumalo as Serafina, who originated the show on Broadway and was nominated for Best Featured Actress. And all I could think of was, oh, look, a movie adaptation that's transferring over your Broadway leads. That'd be nice.

[9:38] Aaron Albano: Anything Goes. Okay, so this is the season of the Phantom of the Opera versus Into the Woods.

[9:42] Mo Brady: Oh, side note. There's also Patti LuPone playing Reno Sweeney in Anything Goes.

[9:47] Aaron Albano: Like, what in the heck?

[9:49] Mo Brady: For sure. It is incredible. Her singing this song every time she sings any of those...

[9:57] Aaron Albano: You're just like, yes, Patti LuPone, that is exactly what I want to hear right now, is you singing the title song to Anything Goes. What a perfect warble to bring this role back that was originally associated with Ethel Merman.

[10:13] Aaron Albano: Okay, so you can see how when we get the Roundabout Theatre revival, and we get Sutton Foster, we're gonna like tap, tap, tappy tap it up, right? Our Reno Sweeney is gonna be a tapper. Do we need Patti LuPone to tap?

[10:26] Mo Brady: I wasn't convinced that I needed Patti LuPone to tap. What do you think?

[10:30] Aaron Albano: I mean, I don't know Anything Goes at all. So do we need Reno Sweeney to tap? Because according to this performance, we kind of need Patti LuPone to tap.

[10:39] Mo Brady: It's fine that she doesn't, because she definitely doesn't. But I was like, because I would assume that Ethel Merman didn't tap.

[10:46] Aaron Albano: Yeah, I'm gonna assume that.

[10:47] Mo Brady: I'm gonna assume that was a clean parking break.

[10:49] Aaron Albano: Yeah.

[10:50] Mo Brady: So I'm like, Patti made a good effort in this number. And I think she faked pretty darn well for a majority of the number. But it was when it got to like a solo part where she was doing some like Maxi Ford turns, where I was like, oh, oh girl. To me, that's no tea, no shade about Patti LuPone. That's about how you create a vehicle for your leading lady.

[11:11] Aaron Albano: Sure.

[11:12] Mo Brady: There is a way to stage that. I mean, the show won Best Choreography, so obviously they were doing something right. But there is a way to stage an incredible version of the title number of Anything Goes starring Patti LuPone, where you don't make her do anything.

[11:26] Aaron Albano: Maxi Ford turns in the Clearing House show.

[11:28] Mo Brady: For real. Anything.

[11:30] Aaron Albano: Uh huh. But, I mean, I thought it was a great number. My favorite, one of my other favorite aspects of that number is you got the whole company, which is awesome. And this dancing ensemble is dancing for their lives and killing it. That singing ensemble up in the balcony, I was like, this is the easiest money that has ever been made on the Tonys.

[11:51] Mo Brady: Nah.

[11:52] Aaron Albano: It's the same thing as the kinky boot swings on the moving staircase.

[11:56] Mo Brady: Oh, fair.

[11:57] Aaron Albano: Okay.

[11:58] Mo Brady: And everybody say, yeah.

[11:59] Aaron Albano: Fair. They're probably not pre-recorded, so they're probably singing live.

[12:01] Mo Brady: Oh, that might be real.

[12:04] Aaron Albano: They might not even be singing.

[12:05] Mo Brady: Who are we talking? They're probably just standing up there, living their lives on the, what, poop deck? What is it called in a cruise ship?

[12:10] Aaron Albano: Moving on. Okay. Fourth nomination performance, a show I knew nothing about.

[12:28] Mo Brady: Romance, Romance, with a two song performance. I'll always remember it.

[12:33] The Ensemblist & Broadway Podcast Network:

[16:02] Mo Brady: Before we talk about our Yelp review, I want to ask you, Aaron, what makes the best musical? Here we go. Phantom of the Opera wins direction, sets, costumes, lights, and actor for Michael Crawford. Into the Woods wins best score and book as well as best actress for Joanna Gleason. What makes a musical? Is it the book score? Is it the direction and the production? I don't know an answer to this, but I certainly think this is a Tony Awards where we're forced to reckon with that question.

[16:34] Aaron Albano: That is an interesting conundrum, and I feel like that would lead to many a collegiate argument across theater programs everywhere, because arguably the actor and actress aside, obviously the best musical win aside, you have the bones of the show, which one show won, versus the skin of the show, which the other show won?

[16:56] Mo Brady: Well, it comes back to art and commerce. I used to sing a song when I was an actor. It was to love and marriage, you know, the theme of married with children. And it would go, art and commerce, art and commerce, come together and they make my paycheck. But that balance of like, are the Tony Awards a commercial or are the Tony Awards heralding the most important pieces of our art form?

[17:28] Aaron Albano: Well, I think also what's interesting is to get super deep amongst all of the things that we've discussed, this podcast and our previous podcast, in every year, even the fictional year, we come across this tension of what is overarchingly better, the critically acclaimed artistic property, or the commercial, crowd-pleasing property. The show that closed after a year and a half at the Martin Beck or the show that's been running for 32 years pre-shutdown at the Majestic. The one that played out of town in Boston and had three different leads, or the one that came up from New York Theatre Workshop and is playing at the, what was it called again?

[18:10] Mo Brady: I don't know what shows you're talking about.

[18:12] Aaron Albano: I'm talking about Hit List and Bombshell.

[18:14] Mo Brady: Oh, you're talking about Bombshell? Oh God, I don't know how I forgot that. I was like in my head going like, Into the Woods had three different principles. Okay, and the Phantom and the Opinion.

[18:20] Aaron Albano: No, that's what I'm talking about. I'm literally like, even in the fictional representation of our world, this argument is still happening. And I don't know, do you have a solid opinion? Because I don't know if I do.

[18:32] Mo Brady: Well, I think you have to decide whether the Tony Awards are about art or they're about commerce, and I think for the people at the top, they're about commerce. It's a ticket-selling venue, and so you're trying to sell tickets to this production. You're not trying to say to the children of the theater 30 years from now that Into the Woods is going to be the show they do in middle school because it's a better show than Phantom. You're trying to say, come to Phantom because it's on Broadway right now and you should spend $140 on a ticket.

[19:00] Aaron Albano: I don't know if I agree. Only just because in a perfect world, the best musical encompasses both of those things.

[19:06] Mo Brady: Yeah, but maybe there is no such thing as the best musical. I mean, did Hamilton or producers win all of these awards at any point? And therefore, are those arguably the best musicals of our generation?

[19:18] Aaron Albano: Well, Hamilton is.

[19:20] Mo Brady: Hey, but producers still have the record.

[19:22] Aaron Albano: No, no, but that's personal preference. I don't know. It's like... And here we are. See? It's like the Rogers in 1991. It's like, okay, so you were all rich white men and you awarded other rich white men for seeing yourselves in stories. Good job.

[19:36] Mo Brady: Yeah. So I think at the end of the day, it's all arbitrary. So no one knows.

[19:40] Aaron Albano: Someone is on your side.

[19:42] Mo Brady: Our side.

[19:44] Aaron Albano: Someone else is not.

[19:48] Mo Brady: While we're seeing our side.

[19:50] Aaron Albano: Our side.

[19:52] Mo Brady: Maybe we forgot.

[19:54] Aaron Albano: They are not all.

[19:58] Mo Brady: Let's talk about our Yelp review. Okay. Which performance made the show look better than it was? Romance or Mads? Hands down.

[20:02] Aaron Albano: I think Serafina. I was like popping at those two.

[20:04] Mo Brady: Sure. I could buy both. I mean, Romance or Mads just delightfully touched my 80s soul.

[20:12] Aaron Albano: Because you're an old, old man.

[20:14] Mo Brady: Correct. What performance made you want to buy a ticket?

[20:16] Aaron Albano: Patti LuPone. Just belt at me. Just pat. Do you notice how I said Patti LuPone and not anything else? Patti LuPone. I'm just ready for a show that includes Patti LuPone belting at me and other things.

[20:30] Mo Brady: I mean, we didn't say what performance of a show. We just said what performance, period.

[20:34] Aaron Albano: There you go. I'm gonna blow your mind. The performance that made me want to buy a ticket was a play.

[20:40] Mo Brady: The plays are the ones without the singing?

[20:42] Aaron Albano: Correct. Joe Turner's Come and Gone, that scene had me riveted. They had me on the edge of my seat. Those two minutes, I was like, I will watch this show. And I love Into the Woods. I like Phantom of the Opera. None of those had me as viscerally as Joe Turner's Come and Gone did. And that's why I'm just like, okay, this is the way I guess we do plays, because after that performance, I would have wanted to watch it.

[21:12] Mo Brady: You would have forked out your money for it. Which speech moved you the most?

[21:14] Aaron Albano: I had a lot of these, actually. My three... I really liked a lot of speeches. So, except for speeches, I loved B.D. Wong's, Ron Silver's, and David Henry Huang's. B.D. Wong, in thanking his parents, is so excited that he accidentally says his parents' address in San Francisco.

[21:32] Mo Brady: Was that a mistake?

[21:34] Aaron Albano: Yes. I texted him after, I was like, did you mean to say your parents' address? And he was like, I said my parents' address. And I was like, sounds like you did. So your parents live at boo-boo-boo-boo-boo-boo.

[21:46] Mo Brady: Ron Silver literally reads himself about making fun of sentimentality in award shows when he watches them at home, and then proceeds to be like, and I'm about to be super sentimental right now. To which he is, and is lovely in thanking his family. It's so wonderful. And David Henry Huang is just so excited about winning that he jumps on Stuart Ostroff from across the stage, and then proceeds to be smiling from ear to ear for his whole speech.

[22:16] Aaron Albano: Biggest surprise win? Looking at it, I think maybe it's Joanna Gleeson. Not that I don't think she deserves it for The Baker's Wife. The Baker's Wife is probably a much more complex role than Reno Sweeney in Anything Goes, but like I said, that's a stacked category, and the fact that you know, Baker's Wife is kind of understated and...

[22:34] Mo Brady: And Patti LuPone is Patti LuPone?

[22:36] Aaron Albano: Yeah. Yeah. I just, I mean, I've never questioned that win but up against the other nominees, I was like, oh good for you! Okay. Minus a similar surprise, only because I don't consider the role that she won for to be a Tony Award winning role, as you probably could tell from... Tell when you said Carlotta's a Tony Award winning role.

[22:56] Mo Brady: Correct. Yes. So Judy Kaye, I mean again, completely deserving. I'm sure she was fantastic in the role. I just never thought that Carlotta would be a Tony Award winning role in Phantom of the Opera.

[23:08] Aaron Albano: Would you recommend watching the 1988 Tony Awards telecast, Mel?

[23:12] Mo Brady: This was a good one. Maybe the performances of the nominated musicals were my kind of least excited part. I liked the sort of whole thing. I liked Madonna. I liked the Michael Bennett tribute. It was all sort of it was a good Tony Awards to watch. And under two hours.

[23:30] Aaron Albano: I agree. I agree wholeheartedly. Especially for that Michael Bennett tribute. Again, it's one of my favorites ever. But also for the best presentation of plays that we've had thus far in our watches. Again, I would buy a ticket because of those plays. And you know how much I watch plays.

[23:48] Mo Brady: And I will say, one of my favorite things was the gratitude that all the Into the Woods and M. Butterfly wins all had when they received their awards. The gratitude of the recipients and the appreciation that the audience had for them. I thought those were really wonderful to watch.

[24:10] Aaron Albano: So, at the end of our last episode, we randomly selected our next Tony Award telecast to watch. It is the 2009 Tony Awards. So, we have the following week and you do as well to watch them. And we will be bringing you our most surprising findings. The Ensemblist was produced today by me, Aaron Albano.

[24:30] Mo Brady: And me, Mo Brady. Special thanks to Wasuf Sami for providing the background research for this Broadway season. There are two great ways you can be helping The Ensemblist right now. One is by leaving us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. And the second is by becoming a Patreon member, which you can do at patreon.com slash The Ensemblist. Please follow The Ensemblist wherever you listen to podcasts, on Spotify, on Apple Podcasts, or at bpn.fm, the home of Broadway Podcast Network. You can also follow us on Instagram. Thanks for listening, everybody. Until next time.