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Best Musical Not Winning Best Book and Score

Alex Kulak2
Broadway Star
joined:9/11/16
Broadway Star
joined:
9/11/16

With the recent awards The Band's Visit has received, this makes the fourth year in a row that the show that won the Tony for Best Musical has also won both Best Book and Best Score, and it's been 12 years since the Best Musical Tony Winner won neither (with Drowsy Chaperone taking home Book and Score while Jersey Boys took the gold). 

The awards going this way has always interested me. On one hand, the production may be more impressive than the material. You don't see Best Director and Best Screenplay going to the Best Picture winner at the Oscars every year. On the other hand, the script and the music seem so all-consuming when it comes to stage shows. If a musical isn't the best written or the best composed, why is it the best musical?

With the influx of Jukebox musicals this season, do you think that this streak will be broken?

HamilHansen
Featured Actor
joined:6/2/17
Featured Actor
joined:
6/2/17

This has happened several times, I'm sure it'll happen again...

 

Urinetown won Book and Score but Millie won Best Musical in 2002 also.

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poisonivy2
Broadway Legend
joined:1/3/16
Broadway Legend
joined:
1/3/16

Into the Woods won Best Score while POTO won Best Musical.

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LALALand
Stand-by
joined:7/2/10
Stand-by
joined:
7/2/10

Have those awards ever gone to 3 different musicals?

Alex Kulak2
Broadway Star
joined:9/11/16
Broadway Star
joined:
9/11/16

If Memory serves, In 2005, Spamalot took Best Musical, Spelling Bee took best Book and Light in the Piazza took Best Score.

Shh_413
Understudy
joined:4/24/18
Understudy
joined:
4/24/18
The year Contact won Best Musical, Aida won Best Score, and James Joyce's The Dead won Best Book
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NoName3
Broadway Star
joined:8/12/11
Broadway Star
joined:
8/12/11

Ragtime took Book and Score but lost to The Lion King.

 
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Soaring29
Leading Actor
joined:12/14/14
Leading Actor
joined:
12/14/14

Alex Kulak2 said: "With the recent awardsThe Band's Visithas received, this makes the fourth year in a row that the show that won the Tony for Best Musical has also won both Best Book and Best Score, and it's been 12 years since the Best Musical Tony Winner won neither (withDrowsy Chaperonetaking home Book and Score whileJersey Boystook the gold).

The awards going this way has always interested me. On one hand, the production may be more impressive than the material. You don't see Best Director and Best Screenplay going to the Best Picture winner at the Oscars every year. On the other hand, the script and the music seem so all-consuming when it comes to stage shows. If a musical isn't the best written or the best composed, why is it the best musical?

With the influx of Jukebox musicals this season, do you think that this streak will be broken?
"

 

You see it win either the award for it's screenplay(either for  Best Original Screenplay or  for Best Adapted Screenplay) or for Best Director   almost every year though, with Gladiator and Chicago being the most recent examples of winning neither followed by The Greatest Show On Earth in 1952, All The King's Men in 1949, Hamlet in 1948, Rebecca in 1940, The Great Ziegfield in 1936, Mutiny On The Bounty in 1935, Grand Hotel in 1932, The Broadway Melody in 1928/1929, and Wings in 1927/1928.  


 

 

 

 

 

Updated On: 6/16/18 at 03:04 PM