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'Hadestown' Captures 8 Tony Awards, Including Best Musical

Associated Press

   "Hadestown,'' the brooding musical about the underworld, had a heavenly
   night at the Tony Awards, winning eight trophies Sunday, including best
   new musical and handing a rare win for a female director of a musical.
   Playwright Jez Butterworth's "The Ferryman'' was crowned best play. In
   the four lead actor and actress categories, Bryan Cranston won his
   second acting Tony, but theater veterans Elaine May, Santino Fontana
   and Stephanie J. Block each won for the first time.
   The crowd at Radio City Music Hall erupted when Ali Stroker made
   history as the first actor in a wheelchair to win a Tony. Stroker,
   paralyzed from the chest down due to a car crash when she was 2, won
   for featured actresses in a musical for her work in a dark revival of
   "Oklahoma!''
   "This award is for every kid who is watching tonight who has a
   disability, who has a limitation or a challenge, who has been waiting
   to see themselves represented in this arena,'' she said. "You are.''
   Rachel Chavkin, the only woman to helm a new Broadway musical this
   season, won the Tony for best director of a musical for "Hadestown.''
   She became only the tenth woman to win as director of either a play or
   a musical on Broadway and told the crowd she was sorry to be such a
   rarity.
   "There are so many women who are ready to go. There are so many people
   of color who are ready to go.'' A lack of strides in embracing
   diversity on Broadway, she said, "is not a pipeline issue'' but a lack
   of imagination.
   Cranston seemed to tap into the vibe when he won the Tony for best
   leading man in a play award for his work as newscaster Howard Beale in
   a stage adaptation of "Network.''
   "Finally, a straight old white man gets a break!'' he joked. The star,
   who wore a blue ribbon on his suit to support reproductive rights, also
   dedicated his award to journalists who are in the line of fire. ``The
   media is not the enemy of the people,'' he said. "Demagoguery is the
   enemy of the people.''
   The respect for women's work also got a boost when Butterworth, who
   earlier asked the crowd to give his partner, actress Laura Donnelly, a
   round of applause for giving birth to their two children while working
   on the ensemble drama, handed his best play trophy to Donnelly. A
   Donnelly family story inspired him to write the play.
   Fontana won his first Tony as the cross-dressing lead in "Tootsie.''
   Fontana, perhaps best known for his singing role as Hans in "Frozen,''
   won in an adaptation of the 1982 Dustin Hoffman film about a struggling
   actor who impersonated a woman in order to improve his chances of
   getting a job. It was the only win for "Tootsie.''

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