2023 Tony Awards: Best Play nominees include record three Pulitzer Prize winners
For the first time in the 76-year history of the Tony Awards, three Pulitzer Prize-winning original dramas have been nominated in the Best Play category in the same year. Only five of the 17 new plays from the 2022-2023 season made the cut in the extraordinarily competitive race, and three of the five had previously received the prestigious honor of the Pulitzer: James Ijames’ “Fat Ham,” Stephen Adly Guirgis’ “Between Riverside and Crazy,” and Martyna Majok’s “Cost of Living.”
This historic result was not a guarantee. Indeed, according to our final official odds, only two of the plays were anticipated to break through: “Fat Ham,” which ultimately nabbed five nominations, and “Between Riverside and Crazy,” which landed two. “Cost of Living,” which closed back in November, was ranked seventh, but its odds were bolstered by three of our Editors and two of our Experts correctly predicting it to break through. The show would go on to perform as well as “Fat Ham,” earning five total nominations.
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One reason for this history-making trio of Pulitzer winners earning nominations this year is the length of time some of these shows waited to come to Broadway. While “Fat Ham” is the 2022 and most recent recipient of the award, “Cost of Living” earned the honor in 2018 and “Between Riverside and Crazy” even earlier in 2015.
Even nominating two Pulitzer winners in the same year has been an incredibly rare occurrence at Broadway’s biggest awards ceremony. The most recent time this happened was almost 20 years ago in 2004, when Doug Wright’s “I Am My Own Wife” and Nilo Cruz’s “Anna in the Tropics” were both nominated at the Tonys. Wright’s drama won Best Play as well as an acting trophy for Best Actor for Jefferson Mays, and earned a bid for directing for Moisés Kaufman. “Anna in the Tropics” earned one other nomination in Featured Actress for Daphne Rubin-Vega, who just so happened to be on the Tony nominating committee this year.
SEE 2023 Tony Awards nominations surprises: ‘Ain’t No Mo’’ and ‘Cost of Living’ exceed expectations
The first time the Tonys nominated two Pulitzer winners for Best Play took place almost 70 years ago in 1956, when “The Diary of Anne Frank,” written by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, went up against “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” by Tennessee Williams. The former took home the Tony and received four other nominations, while the latter earned a total of four bids.
Do any of the three 2023 nominees have an edge to win? According to our first batch of odds, Tom Stoppard’s “Leopoldstadt” has a sizable lead on the field in first place, with the majority of our users picking it to prevail for the top honor; the show did win the Olivier for Best New Play back in 2020. “Fat Ham” currently sits in second place. But a lot could change in the next month or so until the winners are announced on June 11, especially as hundreds more users make their predictions.
SEE 2023 Tony Awards nominations snubs: ‘Life of Pi,’ ‘Death of a Salesman,’ Phillipa Soo …
In all, 10 of the 17 eligible dramas earned at least one Tony nomination. Those include “Ain’t No Mo’” and “Leopoldstadt” with six, “Cost of Living,” “Fat Ham,” and “Life of Pi” with five, “Prima Facie” with four, “A Christmas Carol” and “Good Night, Oscar” with three, “Between Riverside and Crazy” with two, and “Summer, 1976” with one. The seven plays that were entirely blanked include “Mike Birbiglia: The Old Man & The Pool,” “Peter Pan Goes Wrong,” “Pictures From Home,” “The Collaboration,” “The Kite Runner,” “The Thanksgiving Play,” and “Walking With Ghosts.”
PREDICT the 2023 Tony Awards through June 11
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