The Phony Awards

I haven't really been all that into the Tony Awards this year, which is ironic because this season I saw almost every eligible musical. (Somehow I could never quite bring myself to buy a ticket for Grease.) The fact that the nominating committee chose to slight the lovely A Catered Affair in favor of the vastly inferior Cry-Baby just left a bad taste in my mouth.

And apparently I'm not the only one with a bitter aftertaste. My sources tell me that there has been a lot of grumbling about the Tony-nomination process this year, and that it might even cause a shakeup in the nominating committee. Too many business types and not enough artists, or something like that. Plus, there are only 26 people on the committee. I know it would be very hard to have a larger number of people who have a chance to see every show, but clearly those 26 people don't reflect an accurate cross-section of the industry.

What's more, a recent piece on Bloomberg.com exposes just how fraudulent the actual voting process is. Voters are supposed to see every show in a category in order to vote for that particular award. But according to Jeremy Gerard, there are quite a few shows this season that saw Tony-voter attendance of less than 50%. Not that that will stop anyone from voting, the oversight process being virtually nonexistent. Apparently, this season isn't all that unusual in that respect.

Then there's the Tony broadcast itself, which this year has become even more of a pander-fest that usual. At this writing, no fewer than thirteen shows will perform musical numbers on the awards ceremony, which will air on CBS this Sunday night at 8 PM. In addition to the traditional nominees for best musical and best musical revival, the show will feature numbers from Rent and The Lion King, the former to commemorate the end of the run of this landmark show, and the latter to celebrate the show's tenth anniversary.

As predicted, CBS will also allow the high-profile but low-quality shows The Little Mermaid and Young Frankenstein to perform, in a blatant ploy for viewership. On the plus side, A Catered Affair will also get a number, which is a bit of a surprise. I'm not sure what the reasoning is behind that: perhaps the producers wanted to make up for the obvious oversight?

Don't get me wrong: I love the numbers on the Tony broadcast even more than the awards themselves. Far more, in fact. And I know that the producers have a fiduciary responsibility to the advertisers to attract the biggest audience possible. But the unsavory combination of a flawed nomination process, a fraudulent voting process, and a painfully populist awards ceremony have left me sort of glad I have a concert to perform in on Sunday evening. So, after the concert I can fire up TiVo and bloop-Bloop-BLOOP my way through all the crap. I have a feeling I'm going to be bloop-Bloop-BLOOP-ing quite a bit.

Comments

[Lissa]

gotta get dem ratings...

[Alicia]

And I hardly call the selection from "A Catered Affair" representative. I'm glad I tuned into the Web broadcast or I would've missed a ton of awards being given.

Now I wonder how they did in the ratings and if they actually WILL see a surge in tickets sales from mid-America. Hmmm.... Not holding my breath. Nobody can afford the gas to get here, no matter how much Disney on Broadway you force down their throats!