9:28pm
Accompanied by two puppets from last year's Best Musical winner Avenue Q, two execs come out to explain what the American Theatre Wing is and what the organization does—the Tony equivalent of the Academy president coming out to be, well, boring as hell. Sorry, puppets don't make it any more interesting.

9:30pm
Sally Field comes out to present. Damn, she looks young—seriously, like twelve years old. And she played Forrest Gump's mother ELEVEN YEARS AGO for god's sake.

9:32pm
Oh, darling Hugh makes a joke about Sara Ramirez's top busting out. Please, like he even noticed her giant breasts.

9:33pm
Hugh says that "the range of our next presenter [Nathan Lane] is legendary." OH YES HUGH I'M SURE YOU'VE EXPLORED HIS RANGE QUITE A BIT.

9:35pm
Billy Crystal wins Best Special Theatrical Event for his one-man show 700 Sundays. Great, I'm predicting a cloying, pepper-and-paprikash speech that lasts about 700 hours. He thanks "people that I loved who touched me and made me a man"—which yields a quick camera cut to Hugh Jackman, who winks and smirks LIKE THE DIRTY LITTLE SCHOOLBOY THAT YOU ARE OH HUGH YOU NAUGHTY BASTARD YOU.

9:38pm
The pre-commercial announcer promises some "riotous" performances to come. Damn, let me get my dentures and trifocals back on.

9:46pm
Mike Nichols wins Best Director of a Musical for Spamalot. Diane Sawyer beams and tents her fingers, thinking, "WITH EACH PASSING HOUR MY TRIUMPH OVER YOU BECOMES MORE COMPLETE, O COURIC."

9:49pm
La Cage aux Folles wins Best Musical Revival, prompting general shrieking among drag queens everywhere. All four remaining viewers in the red states turn off their TVs in disgust.

9:52pm
Now that the red-staters have tuned out, apparently it's safe to bring out Al Sharpton. He introduces a musical number from The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. Maybe my pills are wearing off, but this is a remarkably odd, unfunny celebrity visit.

10:01pm
Idina Menzel reviews some award winners from earlier in the night who weren't "lucky" enough to make it in front of a "national" audience. Highlights include the winning costume designer from A Light in the Goddamn Piazza, who lurches toward the stage like the Bride of Frankenstein, and the winning set designer from The Pillowman, who (I believe) says, "It's incredible. I just... it's crazy. I learned to ride a bike between speedbumps." With the seat taken off I gather.

10:03pm
Issuing a full-on WASP counteroffensive to the earlier Jones/Uggams flava onslaught, we have Joan Allen and David Hyde Pierce presenting Best Revival of a Play. Either she's ENORMOUS or he's a tiny little homunculus. The winner is Glengarry Glen Ross, best known to mainstream audiences for its 1992 film adaptation, which showcased several incendiary performances, skewered the American business culture of the 1980s, and introduced the phrase "you stupid f*cking c*nt" into the vernaculars of college males everywhere.

10:09pm
After a luminous-Laura-Linney-led tribute to deceased playwright Arthur Miller comes the ever-exciting death/popularity montage. Oddly, almost no one gets any applause, not even Marlon Brando or Janet Leigh—only Ossie Davis and Fred Ebb get a mild smattering. Damn, this is a tough crowd. Then they bring out an actual live guy, Jesse L. Martin, to do a little song and dance and milk the now three-year-old Chicago marketing cash cow. Maybe I missed something, but how does "Razzle Dazzle" have even the slightest bit to do with dead people? I'll Google it.

10:14pm
Hugh Jackman ushers things back to gaydom with a tinkly little laugh. He jokes about wanting to see Paris Hilton's "play" eight times a week. He then mentions his long-suffering "wife." Please, enough already.

10:16pm
They present Best Actor in a Play, and aww, Bill Irwin wins his first Tony, for the role of George in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. I saw this performance, and it was pretty incredible. His co-star Kathleen Turner is so elated that she rousts her mighty flanks from the seat and starts clapping like a giant purple-clad walrus. Mr. Irwin gives a nice coherent speech. Take note, EVERYONE ELSE.

10:17pm
The camera cuts to actor and non-winner Brían F. O'Byrne, he of the í that makes me írrítated that Í myself am not Írísh and alas laddíe cannot have an í of me very own. I hear his Tony-losing performance in Doubt is not to be missed.

10:18pm
Okay, this odd couple takes the cake—Alan Alda and Marcia Cross. He's his standard smiley and squinty self; she's her standard robot self. Essentially they just cancel each other out. Who invited her to this thing? I know she's been in a couple plays, but what this show needs desperately is, you know, human charisma. She just stands there, emaciated body perfectly postured and symmetrical, zeroing her unwavering cyborg gaze directly at the camera, boring into the retinas of all 200 viewers who are still watching.

10:19pm
Oddest couple ever is actually there for a reason—to present Best Actress in a Play. I love Phylicia Rashad, but god I hope she doesn't win, lest we have another All About Eve moment like last year. As was widely predicted, Cherry Jones wins for Doubt. Before heading up to the podium, Ms. Jones gives her partner a big luscious lesbian lady-loving kiss. What is this, the CHENEY HOUSEHOLD??!?

10:20pm
Finally, the much-touted musical number from Spamalot—the pre-commercial announcer has mentioned it about five times by now. Star Tim Curry acts like he's still in the movie Clue, and in fact, Madeline Kahn comes back from the grave to do the whole Mrs. White "flames... flames on the side of my face" bit. It turns out that Sara Ramirez's giant breasts have given her an amazing voice, and she hams it up bigtime. This woman is awesome. Somehow she keeps her enormous, gargantuan, giant breasts under control. Seriously, she has got some giant breasts.

Posted by m_ruv on June 8, 2005 11:04 AM