The (Non-Musical) Highlights From This Year's Tony Awards

Broadway enjoyed its yearly big night with the 69th Annual Tony Awards, during which Fun Home, The Curious Case of the Dog in Night-Time, and The King and I stood out as the evening’s high-profile winners, picking up the Tony for Best Musical, Best Play, and Best Revival of a Musical, respectively.

And while audiences generally tune in to check out musical numbers for shows they might never be able to see in person, the ceremony always has some memorable non-singing and dancing moments to offer as well. Here are the spoken-word Tony highlights, as we saw them.

The Hosts With the Mostest

Broadway veterans Alan Cumming and Kristin Chenoweth did a fine job emceeing the proceedings, bringing their own musical theater chops to bear during the splashy opening number and gamely delivering the often funny (and sometimes inane) stage patter.

Cumming’s demonstration of how exactly those winners who dared to violate the time limit on acceptance speeches would be encouraged to leave the stage — via a snappily dressed chorus line, naturally — should be repeated at every awards show, from the Emmys to the MTV Video Music Awards.

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All Hail the Queen

Helen Mirren added a Tony to the Oscar that’s already on her awards shelf for reprising her role as Queen Elizabeth II in The Audience. (She also won the award for the funniest non-entendre, saying to her husband, filmmaker Taylor Hackford: “Baby, this is for you, and you know why. That’s nothing rude, incidentally.”) That victory also puts her a mere “G,” as in Grammy, away from achieving EGOT status, at which point Tina Fey is basically obligated to play her in the inevitable Helen Mirren biopic.

There’s an App for That

After winning the Tony for Best Featured Actress in a Musical, The King and I star Ruthie Ann Miles had a great excuse for why she was reading her acceptance speech from her iPhone. “Please recycle,” she told the crowd, who laughed appreciatively. Sounds like Apple has the premise for a whole new marketing campaign.

History Is Made on Tony Night

At a time when movies and television are still struggling to find ways to honor female writers and directors, Tony voters handed some of the night’s most prestigious honors to women. Not only did Curious Case of the Dog in Night-Time director Marianne Elliott pick up her second directing Tony, but Fun Home songwriting team Jeanine Tesori and Lisa Kron achieved the historic first of becoming the first female duo to win Best Original Score. (Kron picked up an additional statuette for Best Book.)

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A Mini-Smash Reunion

If you caught the Smash reference in the previous headline, you were likely also aware that three notable alums from that deliciously trashy behind-the-boards-of-Broadway NBC drama were present at Radio City Music Hall.

Debra Messing — who played scarf-clad lyricist Julia Houston — was a presenter, and the two men in her (fictional) life, Christian Borle (composer Tom Levitt) and Brian d’Arcy James (cuckolded husband Frank Houston), were up for Best Featured Actor in a Musical and Best Actor in a Musical, respectively. Life imitated art, with Borle winning and James, sadly, losing.

It Wasn’t That Bad, NPH

Before handing out the Tony for Best Actress in a Musical, Neil Patrick Harris took another step closer to mensch-hood by spoofing his underwhelming gig as host of the Oscars. “Earlier in the night, I made some predictions in that locked box,” he began, before quickly remembering he was on a different awards show. “That’s a drag, because it went so well last time.”

Broadway still loves you, Neil; it’s Hollywood that’s put you in the penalty box alongside David Letterman, James Franco, and Seth MacFarlane.

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Kelli O’Hara Lives for the Dance

It’s taken ten years and six nominations, but Kelli O’Hara finally has a Tony, for her role in The King and I. And even she was taken aback, remarking, “You think I would have written something down by now, but I haven’t.” She went on to show her continued commitment to the stage by dancing her way into the wings, where Susan Lucci was almost certainly waiting to congratulate her.

George and George, Together Again

Larry David and Jason Alexander — aka the real George Costanza and his fictional counterpart — made the long wait for the night’s final award worth it.

As professional curmudgeon David hilariously groused about the lack of any nominations for his first foray into Broadway, Fish in the Dark, Alexander played the straight man, trying (and failing) to not crack up. Here’s hoping he gets more laughs when he takes over David’s part in Fish in the Dark, starting June 9.