So, what is the value of a Tony Award for Best Musical? The answer is clearly, “It depends.”
Some Tony Award winners, like The Phantom of the Opera just keep on going and show what the value is. Other non-Tony winners, like Wicked, just keep on going, too.
So let’s take a look at the past 10 Tony Best Musicals. See if a pattern emerges.
- Fosse
Year: 1999
No. of Performances/Year Closed: 1,093/2001
Notable Nominees Still Running: None
Worth Noting: Not many musical reviews make it to the Best Musical category, but Fosse not only got there, it ran over two and a half years. - Contact
Year: 2000
No. of Performances/Year Closed: 1,010/2003
Notable Nominees Still Running: None (But Andrew Lippa’s The Wild Party was among them.)
Worth Noting: A conceptual musical, it gave Susan Strohman the spotlight as director and choreographer, and then she would “unconceptualize” Broadway soon, with The Producers. - The Producers
Year: 2001
No. of Performances/Year Closed: 2,502/2007
Notable Nominees Still Running: None (But Paul Gordon’s Jane Eyre and The Full Monty still get productions.)
Worth Noting: The Producers took Broadway in a zany, self-referential direction and won 12 Tony Awards in the process, a record. It was nominated for 15, also a record that was just tied by Billy Elliot. - Thoroughly Modern Millie
Year: 2002
No. of Performances/Year Closed: 903/2004
Notable Nominees Still Running: Mamma Mia!
Worth Noting: Here’s the first instance in the past 10 years where a non-winner outlasted the winner. Mamma Mia! continues to play to packed houses, although Millie enjoyed a respectable run. - Hairspray
Year: 2003
No. of Performances/Year Closed: 2,642/2009
Notable Nominees Still Running: None
Worth Noting: Hairspray only closed in the big January 2009 blood-letting when 13 shows closed, many victims of the economic downturn. Another nominee from 2002, Movin’ Out, also enjoyed a very healthy three-year, 1,303-show run. - Avenue Q
Year: 2004
No. of Performances: Still Running
Notable Nominees Still Running: Wicked
Worth Noting: This is the year that proves the exception to all the rules. Avenue Q surprised everyone by taking the Best Musical award from Wicked, but it’s the girls from Oz who continue to sell out the house on Broadway and in two touring productions. Plus, 2004 was the year The Boy From Oz earned Hugh Jackman a Best Actor award and enjoyed a healthy one-year run. - Spamalot
Year: 2005
No. of Performances/Year Closed: 1,575/2009
Notable Nominees Still Running: None
Worth Noting: Silliness won out in 2005, but it was sublime, Mike Nichols-directed silliness. All I can say is I’m glad I didn’t have to choose the winner from Spamalot, The Light In the Piazza, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and The 25th Annual Putman County Spelling Bee. What a lineup! - Jersey Boys
Year: 2006
No. of Performances: Still Running
Notable Nominees Still Running: None
Worth Noting: The Jersey Boys juggernaut had stiff competition from The Color Purple, which ran 910 performances, and my personal favorite, The Drowsy Chaperone. - Spring Awakening
Year: 2007
No. of Performances/Year Closed: 859/2009
Notable Nominees Still Running: Mary Poppins
Worth Noting: Tony took a serious turn after years of favoring lighter fare with Spring Awakening, which took home eight awards. But what does it say that Mary Poppins continues to play to good houses? And even though it was critically acclaimed, Spring Awakening had the shortest run of any Best Musical in the past decade. - In The Heights
Year: 2008
No. of Performances: Still Running
Notable Nominees Still Running: None
Worth Noting: It’s pretty amazing that one year after being nominated for the Best Musical Tony, Cry-Baby, Passing Strange and Xanadu have all closed. Of the three, only Xanadu ran for any length of time.
So, what does this tell us? Not every Tony-winning Best Musical enjoys a long run and some are outpaced by shows they beat. But the Tony Award for Best Musical is clearly worth a lot of performances, even though there are the overlooked exceptions such as Wicked and Mamma Mia! that break the rule.