“Maybe Happy Ending,” a stirring Broadway musical about two discarded robots who go on a road trip and forge a relationship, won the coveted Tony for best new musical on Sunday night, capping a remarkable journey for a show that faced long odds but won over both critics and fans.
The triumph of a show with a puzzling title and tough-to-explain themes was a vote of confidence in originality by an industry often dominated by big-brand intellectual property and big-name Hollywood stars.
The musical’s prize capped a night in which Broadway rewarded adventurous newcomers: Sarah Snook, the “Succession” star who played 26 roles in a technologically complicated adaptation of “The Picture of Dorian Gray”; Nicole Scherzinger, the former Pussycat Doll who, barefoot and bloodied, delivered a scorching performance in a revival of “Sunset Boulevard”; and Cole Escola, an alt-cabaret performer who imagined Mary Todd Lincoln as an alcoholic who longs to be a chanteuse and turned that zany idea into the hit play “Oh, Mary!”
The awards were spread out among a diverse array of shows. “Maybe Happy Ending,” set in a futuristic Korea, won a night-leading six awards, and “Buena Vista Social Club,” a musical set in Cuba, finished with four.
The awards show took place as Broadway seems finally to be rebounding after a damaging pandemic shutdown. The season that just ended was the highest grossing on record when the figures are not adjusted for inflation. But attendance remains slightly below prepandemic levels and very few musicals are achieving profitability. The season’s success was attributable in large part to three starry plays whose runs are now ending: “Good Night, and Good Luck,” “Othello” and “Glengarry Glen Ross.”
Here are some other things to know about the ceremony:
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A prestigious play wins again: “Purpose,” a family drama by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, won the Tony for best play one month after earning a Pulitzer Prize. Jacobs-Jenkins also won a Tony last year, for the play “Appropriate.”
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Andrew Lloyd Webber, redux: In 2023, Lloyd Webber’s decadeslong streak on Broadway ended with the closing of “The Phantom of the Opera.” But he is now allowing a new generation of directors to reimagine his older shows, and that decision was vindicated when Jamie Lloyd’s radically reconceived “Sunset Boulevard” won the best musical revival prize.
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“Hamilton” returns: Ten years after the juggernaut musical opened on Broadway, its original cast reunited to perform a medley of songs on the broadcast. Inside Radio City Music Hall, the audience sang along.
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A mixed season for celebrities: This was a very starry season on Broadway, and several of the starry shows proved to be popular with audiences. But Denzel Washington, Robert Downey Jr., Jim Parsons and others were overlooked by Tony nominators, and then the nominees George Clooney, Mia Farrow, Bob Odenkirk and others went home empty-handed.
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Politics took a back seat: The show was relatively quiet about current affairs. But not entirely. “Eureka Day,” a comedy about left-wing anti-vaxxers, won best play revival. “English,” a nominated play about English language learners in Iran, was described as having been prompted by the first Trump administration’s travel ban. Francis Jue, who won best featured actor in a play for his role in “Yellow Face,” said, “for those who are being targeted in these authoritarian times, I see you.”
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Musical moments: The ceremony was packed with musical performances. Cynthia Erivo, the powerhouse singer who hosted, led a rousing opening number, performed an In Memoriam duet with Sara Bareilles and closed with a reworked version of “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going” from “Dreamgirls.” Eleven musicals now running on Broadway performed in a wide range of styles — the cast of “Pirates!” strummed on washboards, while the star of “Floyd Collins” ululated.
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Repeat victors: The actress Kara Young won a Tony for the second year in a row — this time for “Purpose” and last time for “Purlie Victorious.” And the director Michael Arden won this year for “Maybe Happy Ending” and in 2023 for “Parade.”
Michael Paulson is the theater reporter for The Times.
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