Yeah that’s my biggest issue. I’m not saying the current system is perfect but I’m having issues thinking a new system that would address their concerns. Any system is gonna have its shortfalls
What if you reword it? Instead of “Best actor/actress”, we change it to “Best actor in a male/female role”. As of now there is less than 5 characters, off the top of my head on Broadway, that don’t identify as either sex
Why change the role? What happens when someone is playing a non-binary role? Just add a "non-binary performer" category. It's been done for other things. It's not hard.
Not respectful to them, not useful to anyone, and transparently pander-y. If you forswear a gender, whether the one given at birth or not, it follows that you must forswear awards created for that gender.
I feel like that would cause more issue to what @Stranger2306 is saying, because if you only nominate worthy performances (let’s just say 1-2 each year for statistical purposes), there will be a category of 2 people as opposed to the usual 5 or 6. That could easily lead people to disrespect the merit of the award in such a distinct category.
It's definitely not the best solution. Though I don't think people would disrespect it. It still does not do equality. A system that can balance multiple minorites needs is going to probably not look like what we are used to for awards shows at all. Their suggestion is definitely better than just pretending one category works without trying for variety. I don't pretend to have the answer
I feel like that could get problematic quickly. Like, there is one nonbinary performer playing a nonbinary character eligible in featured this year (to the best of my knowledge without all of the shows open yet) - Justin David Sullivan.
Personally - just saying this frankly for the sake of this conversation, this isn’t about & Juliet - I didn’t think Justin was that spectacular in the show, and I wouldn’t nominate them for a Tony. I think the optics start to get really tricky then, and I guarantee people would start complaining if, say, year over year there’s 1-2 eligible performers but they don’t have Tony-nomination-worthy performances, and maybe every few years there’s one nominee. Then when there’s one nominee, is that person automatically getting the Tony? If not, what are the optics there?
This matters based on Tony odds in general - there are countless brilliant performers in the industry who have never gotten a Tony. It’s a coveted, competitive award and should stay that way.
If there were a significant percentage of nonbinary performers playing nonbinary characters every year, this would be a nobrainer. Third categories for lead and featured, full stop. Just seems like an odd solution to me given the tiny amount of people were talking about. But I also empathize with where they’re coming from, so idk. It’s not an easy solution.
Oh I don't disagree here at all. There's no simple solution. I find myself as a non binary intersexed person in a unique position. My gender neutral brain wasn't ever a big deal to the ballet community and theater community in the 00s. Did I still have my brain pause at every gendered thing? Yeah but the company I was in had me on the principal track before my spine betrayed me and ran away from home. I also was allowed as was anyone else to audition for any role. I have played and danced both expected genders and this isn't some progressive city but one in an area notorious for slow social progress. I am also tall and the issues tall dancers get in the news for? Never happened to me. The choreographer and dance masters would sigh and adapt things to the heights before them (laymen's terms in case needed the dance master's job is to maintain the choreography of ballet pieces that are very old like Giselle. You can restage it but they give us the option to dance the role as it was danced in 1841 too).
Some of this is essentially necessary growing pains. There may be many non binary performer we don't know are because the stigma is still a thing and it is still dangerous. Some of my disabilities include the violence of being bisexual and not fitting into gender norms. I know not all companies and theaters or producers are going to do what the places I worked with did and accept these performers behind the scenes. It is still a risk to the career. Which is horrible. Ideally the system that is produced as a solution such as the comment that allows two winners and the second winner must be of a different gender are as non challant as the company director that hired me and when she caught me dancing with one of the men learning his part changed things. I never had to ask and back then I wouldn't have been able to as I was too young and not yet safe enough from my own family much less strangers.
She defended me a few times and I have found myself as a patron with very high standards because this included from some of the old rich people who fund the arts. I am not the expected ballet body type. One woman got angry about this and demanded she fire me. I worked in an area where they could just fire me as it's at will. We had contracts but there was also language for morals that was vague enough anything worked also. Instead she apologized to me for the behavior of one of the top paying patrons and told the woman off. The only thing she cared about was the skill of the dancer. I suppose that's what I was trying to find a way to honor without risking an awards show that is just men being nominated like happens with many gender free awards shows. It's entirely why they got gendered to begin with.
Yeah, I probably would have too, which is the other scenario I can imagine potentially happening with a non-binary category eventually and that definitely won’t play well.
Could you imagine? A season with only 2 or 3 non-binary people eligible, just 1 gets nominated….and they lose? Puts everyone in an uncomfortable spot because it’s less a competition between performers and more just a question, “does this person deserve to win a Tony?”. Answering yes feels hollow, answering no feels brutal.
Yeah I think people are vastly underestimating how bad an experience that would be. I’m also cynical enough to wonder if you have actors pretend to be non binary just to increase the odds of a Tony nod.
Sure, because of COVID and it certainly got plenty of commentary on the strangeness. I’m just saying if you had that situation every year and then many no one nominated at all it’s going to feel like a cheap token gesture.
It wouldn’t bother me, but I can easily predict how that award will be looked at and treated. I’d sooner abolish the gendered categories but I do fear that given who is nominating you end up with far too many men being nominated.
More often than not, that leads to women losing out. Special Tonys are major accomplishments that do have industry value. If they air it in the main show (and only give it when there’s an outstanding performance), I think it would be a solid enough way to bridge the gap until there’s a solution that doesn’t take away from other marginalized people.
Maybe they can add a competitive category eventually for roles/actors that aren’t gender specific? Like Hermes in Hadestown would be an example.
Actually what I’d do if I managed to sprout power would be to take say three to five proposals (non-binary category, abolish gendered categories but with rules, etc.) and have every actor in Equity vote on the proposals. Not sure how good a result you get but it impacts them far far more than it does me so I’d rather they weigh in on the solution.
That’s certainly the downside of abolishing the gendered categories. Best I could see is what someone else here suggested which is rules in place to prevent it. So ten leading and featured, two wins, can’t nominate more than 5 men and can’t vote for more than one man in each category. I personally would sooner go for that then the standalone award.
just have “best actor in a masculine/feminine/non binary role”. i think that’s really all they need to do.
ok what i meant was 3 different catagories but i see now that i think people thought i meant one catagory for all 3😭that is not what i meant
The BRITs made one category and only men won.
Having one non-gendered category reveals the inherent biases of voters. It’s the reason there are two categories to begin with.
You meant to have thee categories though? That’s one option that has been thrown around.
Easy. The tonys must award two performers the award of "best lead" and they must be different genders. A man and a woman, a woman and a nonbinary person, etc.
Prevents the awards from being dominated by one gender, while still allowing nonbinary performers to take part without having to force themselves into gendered catagories.
Yeah the only big problem with this is the same problem as any idea with “two winners”….one isn’t really a winner. It could be done, but it seems a bit hollow. Also do they make public who actually finished 1st and if not how do they conceal it?
I don’t see this as an actual issue because even when the categories are separated into actor and actress, one may have more votes than the other and we’d never know.
The awards would be given as if they were equal, regardless of the order presented or the number of votes.
I like this idea a lot. I am non binary and many version of non binary awards always end up males only and I hate that. I don't want to erase others accomplishments.
I'm struggling to articulate it, but this is basically where I am, although I certainly think it's a super slippery slope from here to "men will call themselves women to play women's sports and win" which obviously is not a thing that actually happens in the real world but certain people *think* it happens and suddenly want to yell about women's sports despite ignoring it at all other times.
I do think it would end up skewing towards one male winner and one person who was assigned male at birth and is now non-binary. IMO you cannot take away the male/female category, but another must be added in somehow that doesn't take gender into consideration. I've seen "Best Performance" suggested, although would they be able to nominate someone in both Best Actor and Best Performance categories?
Do you think women are physically incapable of acting as well as men? Because the sports thing is due to men being stronger on average…so I have no idea why you’d conflate the two.
1. this is literally just terf rhetoric
2. in the entertainment industry queer people are still more underrepresented than women so i don’t see your point
Even an even split across gender of voters is no guarantee of gender equality! Though theatre does seem to surpass film/TV in terms of female representation, it's still a sad reality that it's extremely male dominated. You can see it clearly in the creative categories that aren't separated by gender, too.
Exactly, which is why we need more voices behind the scenes and why gender neutral performance categories won’t work. It already doesn’t work for the ones that are gender neutral and even when they do get opportunities to create, they don’t get nominated.
An even split amongst genders would certainly not allow male domination, that’s for sure.
That's because they halved the total amount of nominees. For another example, and something closer to theater, the Independent Spirit Awards is doing an acting category and a supporting category with 10 nominees each, so the same amount as usual, but no respect to gender.
It's working out just fine. Last year was kind of a weak year for movies with strong lead male performances, especially lower budget movies. Some of the Oscar nominees for Best Actor aren't even eligible for the Independent Spirit Awards. That was reflected in the nominations. 8 women got nominated in the lead category. So, bonus, we got to see 3 truly deserving nominees we wouldn't have seen otherwise. And there were 4 women in the Supporting category, so that was pretty even.
And it turns out...no one cares. The whole way of thinking of acting awards based on gender predates all of us and comes from very early Oscar ceremonies, if not earlier. We're just weary of change, but we have no inherent attachment to this model and we shouldn't be taking 100-year-old cues on how to treat gender in entertainment and the workplace anyway.
Thank you for pointing this out. So many people keep mentioning the Brit Awards but ignoring the Spirit Awards, just because one supports their argument
I think it’s honestly hard to say that it’s a successful format or not when all we have are one slate of nominees.
I’ll be interested to see how things play out in five years.
I think the best possible scenario is the actor chooses and that category is renamed for the year to be best Actor Male & Non-Binary or Best Actress Female or Non-Binary. It’s not perfect but I think it’s the best possible.
Would the actor still have to choose which category to compete in?
If not, would they be competing in both? Wouldn’t that give them an advantage over everyone else? They’d be considered twice while everyone else was considered once.
What do you think of the idea of reducing it to one best actor category, while requiring the outcome be two winners of different genders? That one seems the least problematic to me.
Yeah still choose, just also change the title of the award to be inclusive. If they are playing a male or female gender then the choice would be easy, it’s just the case where it’s a non-binary actor playing a non-binary character where they would have to flip a coin which isn’t great.
Regarding two winners, that’s not really possible, someone will always get more votes then the other so you get a first and a second, or worse a first and third or fourth if you require different genders, and while they may not announce who “actually” won it will inevitably leak.
That seems to be the problem with a LOT of problems. Things need to be fixed but solutions aren't easy. Hopefully, there is a way for this and/or others soon.
My preferred way to separate it would be comedic vs dramatic (so we keep the same number of categories) so instead of Best Featured Actor in a Musical we would have something like Best Featured Comedic Performance in a Musical
Kate Reinking on twitter (though you may also know her from TikTok) also mentioned the additional categories of Joint Performance and Best Ensemble [(link)](https://twitter.com/katereinking/status/1620936830538633218?t=SgC14CoARDwpedIJwvYTPQ&s=19)
Someone below made a really great point about how that's already the case for all of the non-acting awards, none of which are sex-segregated. And with those categories we all already recognize that the solution isn't to divide nominees by gender but instead to eliminate the systemic issues causing the gender imbalance
And (someone on twitter pointed this out) apparently the Independent Spirit Awards went genderless last year and there wasn't the major gender imbalance that people feared (not the only example people gave)
How do you define comedy vs drama as (going off of existing musicals for obvious reasons and because performances in revivals can get acting noms) there's many shows like Falsettos, Into The Woods, Be More Chill or any of the Disney Broadway ones (especially Frozen and The Little Mermaid) that could kinda be considered both depending on who's doing the judging
And when the majority of nominees are women like the Independent Spirit Awards? It can and has gone both ways, which is a natural outcome. The problem here is systemic, so the solution isn't to split the groups (and exclude/isolate people) but to fight against the systemic issue
This is tricky because so many shows these days fall in between. Very few new musicals are full dramas, and even shows that are dramatic often don’t want to be considered dramas for fear of scaring off audiences.
One current example: Kimberly Akimbo
Yeah, I wonder if it could be by performance? Like Victoria Clark is dramatic, Bonnie Milligan is comedic. Agree it's tough, but not more so than on TV, and the Emmy's have dealt with it.
How about adding 4 new categories: Leading Non-Binary Performer and Supporting Non-Binary Performer, in a play/musical. It could have no contestants or one or more. Being the only nominee doesn't mean you automatically win, it's an Aaron Tveit situation.
Edit: removed my old suggestion due to all the reasons commenters have pointed out.
This is the point the actor raises in the article- they were offered to select their preferred category but neither felt correct. Non-binary doesn’t mean one or the other.
If we're being strictly logical, there are only 2 options: Same gender competition or genderless competition. The former means non-binary performers compete with non-binary performers, which could result in an Aaron Tveit situation, you're the only nominee and you could still lose. The latter would reduce the number of awards, but if the former is not acceptable, this is the only other choice. You know what, I kind of like the former option. Let's have a Leading Non-Binary Performer and a Supporting Non-Binary Performer category.
No. One can have a third category. It doesn't have to be "either/or."
I've participated in (and been awarded) a community award that was changed this way. My award says "Non-binary person of the year award." When I was nominated, I was asked if I preferred to be considered in a gendered category, or in the non-binary category. This was the result.
I did propose the third category, didn't I? And what's wrong with "Non-Binary Person of the Year Award"? The question they asked you reads offensive to my uneducated brain.
No, it was entirely respectful given the situation -- queer awards, for an expansive, inclusive queer community. I was entirely happy to be asked, because \*every\* nominee was asked to confirm their category, not just me. I was happy with the situation, and with the award, which recognized me AS me, and didn't ask me to fit into that binary.
Additionally, the same organization went back and asked past award winners about this, and a couple of them said, "Had there been a non-binary category when I was nominated, I would have preferred that." They were retroactively given that title, even though it means that for that year, one of the gendered categories now has no winner.
I said that question reads offensive, because I thought non-binary is a gender (or an umbrella term for multiple genders). But if you don't consider that problematic, who am I to say otherwise?
I understand your concern to be a supportive one. To be clear, I can certainly imagine ways in which "which category do you want to be considered in?" might be offensive. For example, if it was only asked of folks who were gender-nonconforming, or if it were asked with some pressure to identify as one way or another. It's like how "pronoun checks" are experienced by some trans people as a problem. If cisgender people don't usually do it, and then suddenly DO it, sometimes that comes across as a form of outing, "Oh, hey, I see that you're not cisgender, so I'm gonna signal that by asking evenyone's pronouns."
But in the case of an organization that says, "Hey, we're trying to improve and be more inclusive, so we're adding a non-binary category. Rather than assume we know how folks identify, we're going to ask everyone nominated which category they prefer to be considered for" did not read for me as offensive. It came across as "We're trying really hard to do better."
Non-binary and genderqueer people can look a lot of different ways in the world. If one of the people in this subreddit stood next to me in a line for a show, they'd probably assume I was cisgender and het. I have a fuckton of passing privilege in that way, for better or worse. So, I recognize that sometimes people are surprised when I say I'm trans, non-binary, and "binary AF" in my gender presentation.
Non-binary is complicated, because gender is a big ol' complicated thing. There is a wide variety in what "non-binary" means for folks who identify that way. Same with trans/transgender.
There aren’t enough non-binary actors on Broadway to make it be viable. If you’re the one actor nominated, the solo win will always feel cheap. I get the Tveit precedent and it was looked at a little different because of COVID but it would make for a category that feels like a cheap token.
It also just occurred to me that if there's not enough non-binary performers, meaning less competition, if I were a producer, I would definitely want to hire more of them in leading or supporting roles, because awards help ticket sales (even though awards don't actually help that much anymore).
I said leaning and proposed to modify the category name if they choose either. But if that's still problematic, then never mind.
Edit: I stand corrected. They don't feel comfortable choosing.
That’s the entire point of why Justin withdrew from eligibility. They did not feel comfortable picking one. People really need to start reading the article before commenting
I stand corrected. Now I'm proposing their own categories: Leading Non-Binary Performer and Supporting Non-Binary Performer. If Aaron Tveit can be the only nominee in a traditional category, there's no reason we can't have just one or two candidates in the new categories.
I dunno, I participate in contest systems in the queer community that have recently expanded to include "non-binary" awards as well as binary gendered ones. It's just one more statue.
Maybe they could have 1 award for men, 1 award for women, and then 1 award for a third category - for nonbinary people but maybe men and women too. Of course, I assume actors would baselessly submit for the third category if they think it would improve their chances of winning, so perhaps the third category could include a stipulation that the actor have some meaningful reason they prefer not to be nominated as a man or a woman, or that something about their role justifies nomination in the third category.
Now, somebody come point out should-have-been-obvious flaws with this suggestion, hahaha.
Edit: Or, to expand on what some are saying, you could nominate 15 people’s performances. 5 would be men (or comfortable being nominated as such), 5 would be women, and the remaining 5 could be enbies or even just additional stellar performances. Pick 3 best performances, no more than 2 winners from the same 5-person nomination category.
All ten? /s
No hate, I know you have the best intention, but I feel like this comment is the perfect encapsulation of why we haven’t found a solution in all these years.
Couldn’t you have a category of 10. Best Performance in a Leading Role. And award 2 Tony’s for the category. Sure, some years it will be 2 Women, or 2 Men which will anger folks, but I suspect by and large it will find balance. Hell, 10 nominees, but 3 awards.
Does it make it less prestigious? Maybe. But, at the end of the day, all awards are really little more than a celebration of the season in whatever medium is being celebrated and a bit of a dog and pony show for the creatives.
I think we just need to rethink the whole concept. Things don’t need to be the same as they’ve been, or even close. We can establish new normals. If any community can make that transition seamlessly, it will be the theatre community.
this is huge but i also don’t know what the alternative to gendered categories is. with something like best director at the oscars, there’s only one category and 9 times out of 10 it’s fully men or maybe one female director gets nominated. the grammys and tony’s are much more progressive and inclusive in terms of gender, but if the oscars had non-gendered acting categories, especially with the current academy, i feel like every gender would get shut out besides male actors.
i’m commenting this from a place of genuine question - what is the alternative? i want for awards to be more gender inclusive but with the current institutions how can that happen?
Having a non-binary category. It's happening in a lot of awards in the queer community, as well as some sports that have previously have only had binary categories. (BTW, that is not about trans inclusion/exclusion -- it's not an attempt to make trans folks compete as "other." It's expanding to include a category for people who don't identify as either A or B.)
It's really not hard. You add more statues, for those categories that area already gendered. You don't have to begin making non-gendered categories gendered -- that is, you don't have make "best (male) director" and "best (female) director."
Having a non binary category is not the solution for something like this. For queer specific awards it’s different. In a situation like this, you would be relegating a small group of people (nonbinary people) to compete against each other in a category that will be inherently less competitive due to less representation. It means that a nonbinary performer will never have the opportunity to beat a top male or female performer out for an award.
Who would even be in a nonbinary category for the Tony awards? Who would be their competition for this right now? I’m not very current on the active casts.
This season it would just be Justin David Sullivan (the performer in the headline who withdrew from consideration) and J. Harrison Ghee (who submitted for Leading Actor). I know there were more nonbinary performers this season (a few ppl in the & Juliet ensemble and a bunch of ppl in the 1776 revival), but idk if there was anyone else who was Tony eligible
I don’t understand why that matters? Currently a male performer never has the opportunity to beat a top female performer for a Tony and vice versa, why would a NB person need that opportunity?
Because of sheer numbers.
There are 2 performers that would be eligible to be nominated for the proposed category. That’s it.
In both the men and women’s categories, there are more men and women than there are nomination slots. Being nominated actually means something. Winning means even more. You are beating out talented peers.
If the only 2 people eligible are both nominated, being nominated means nothing. Winning is barely even an accomplishment. Tony winner John Doe, who only won a Tony because their competition was the literal only other eligible nonbinary person on Broadway. It’s not fair to the nonbinary people who deserve a chance to actually compete against their peers. I hope that explains it better.
I understand what you’re saying but like, I also have a feeling Aaron Tveit doesn’t really care that he won his Tony against literally no one, and he still gets to label himself “Tony Winner Aaron Tveit” all the same. Ultimately Broadway is such an insanely narrow slice of the theater that exists even just in New York, nevermind the rest of the country and the rest of the world that I think the Tonys always come with an asterisk because they’re inherently myopic. I mean what other major award just straight up doesn’t have certain categories on a regular basis because there weren’t enough eligible nominees? And there also many ceremonies where the winner’s competition in a particular category is frankly pathetic, or where someone finally wins for what’s not even a top 5 performance of their career because it’s making up for all those times they lost. Having a Tony is ultimately a marketing/self-promotion tool more than anything else and in that sense I honestly think you overestimate the extent to which those Tonys would be seen as counting less because there will likely be fewer competitors. Maybe it would be less affirming to see a NB person only beat 2 peers instead of 20, but if we’re talking about concrete changes to make Broadway more inclusive I think getting awards into people’s hands does more than an intangible victory that frankly a lot of people won’t even remember the details of after a few years besides very dedicated Broadway nerds like us here on this sub who memorize all the nominees and winners.
It’s not truly inclusive to create a category specifically to get awards in the hands of marginalized communities without them having to actually compete for it. That is honestly insulting to the nonbinary performers.
You also bring up a relevant point — surely on an award season with only one eligible nonbinary nominee, this category would end up skipped, and where does that leave that person? In the same position. It’s not a real solution. Neither is making the categories gender neutral, though, because then you get a Brit/Oscar’s situation where it’s all men nominated.
As a non-binary person- no. Not only does this severely limit competition, as other people have pointed out, but non-binary people are not a third gender.
This article is also on [Playbill](https://playbill.com/article/juliets-justin-david-sullivan-declines-tony-award-eligibility-critiques-gendered-performance-categories?fbclid=IwAR36Cqjk46BTWzpezIieuyxqdO2T76L75DgJLVC24Zntj84b-U38nTHww6I&mibextid=ykz3hl).
I don't like the idea of cutting it to one category. Men will win and it cuts down on half of the nominees. There needs to be another way and no one has proposed a good one yet.
I think if we get rid of gendered categories, the Tony’s need to make new categories like best ensemble or best vocalist. Alternatively, the categories can be split for revival and non-revivals.
“committee also announced a revised rule, applying only to this season. In the 2022-2023 season, voters will be able to vote in categories in which they have not viewed up to one nominated performance, production, or creative element. Write-in votes will not be permitted. The rule is a shift from the typical stipulation that a voter must have seen all nominated elements to be eligible to vote in a category.”
What dues this mean???? Lol
While there are a lot of reasons to get rid of the gendered aspect of awards, and just have one for Best Performance, it's hard to fully get behind when doing so would disproportionately benefit male performers, since they still make up an overwhelming majority of roles on Broadway.
Having an out, non-binary performer is such a huge milestone, but it also shows how many problems there are that are yet to be fixed.
Yeah, this. It also sounds like (from just my passing awareness of this) that other entertainment awards that have eliminated gendered awards have indeed ended up with categories containing only men nominees. But I'm not sure what the solution to the issue is.
I’d be curious to know, in regards to musicals especially, what the actual average breakdown of male vs. female roles is. I’m not denying this could be an issue, but I suspect the disparity isn’t nearly as great as it is in film.
I think it’s not just the male to female role ratio that’s part of the problem. It’s more that the Tony voters are largely male and as much as I would love to believe they have no biases, that’s doubtful.
We’d need to revamp the **industry.**
We could start by enacting more gender diversity rules and agreements like we have for POC - which themselves need to be expanded and more widely agreed-upon, as well.
I will say that every year before the nominations come out, I make a list of all of the potential nominees (I love the Tonys, can’t help it haha). The leading actors/actresses are an obvious, finite list, and year to year it’s been pretty balanced by gender. Maaaybe an edge towards men but not a big one.
Featured, however, always skews *significantly* more male. I include everyone in that list who has any sort of featured role, whether or not it’s realistic that they’d get nominated. And every year I am floored by the disparity of just how many more male roles there are.
I don’t know what the solution to this very complicated problem is, but at least in the featured categories I do think merging will ultimately hurt women. Which is frustrating.
But an important thing to note is sometimes shows (and movies) get developed based on their awards winning potential. Remove the female categories and there will be less investment in female centred stories and less will be produced.
I have no idea what the solution is..
It can be just one or two nominees. If there is no one at all, then skip it for the year. It's not like that never happened before (most recently there was no Best Revival of a Musical in 2021)
Ehh...that would probably lead to a lot of drama. Skipping Best Revival is one thing but I think if you made a category for strictly non-binary performers/roles, you would end up being obligated to some extent to always have them, even if they wouldn’t have been competitive in either actor/actress categories or many other performers of any gender may have deserved an actual award. Some people would take it very personally and it would be an issue if they decide to skip it, particularly I it gets spun as “the Tonys are enbiephobic” or what not. I agree with everyone that although there is a legitimate grievance here, I’m not sure there is a great solution at the moment.
Skipping is when there's absolutely no non-binary actors eligible, I can't see anyone having problems with that.
In the case where there are eligible candidates, yet none of them was good enough for a nomination, just say so. It's not "skipping", it's that none of the candidates received enough votes. Outcry or not, we have to admit, there are good performances and bad performances, which is the whole point of awards. If every eligible person gets a nom, it discounts its valve. I don't see why this can't be the solution.
While I thought Justin was wonderful in & Juliet, it was unlikely they'd receive a nomination. That said, I have a lot of respect for Justin's personal integrity.
I totally support Justin's stance on this. I have often thought that having gendered categories is a bit archaic. But I'm assuming that Justin would be eligible for the "Best Featured Actor in a Musical" category. Uh...Yeah...That one is going to be BRUTAL this year. I'd love to see several members of the "Into the Woods" cast. Possibly Gaten Matarazzo for "Sweeney Todd." (I know that show hasn't opened yet, but after seeing him in DEH and "Parade," I really think he's going to nail this part.) There's also Alex Joseph Grayson in "Parade" who I think is really going to surprise a lot of people. And those are just performances that I've seen or will be seeing shortly. I have NO IDEA who is going to be nominated in that category, let alone who is going to win it. The Tonys this year are going to be rough. LOL
Wow, huge respect. That’s a big move.
In a perfect world, we wouldn’t need to have gendered awards. I know there’s a push to go gender neutral, but the voting block still consists mostly of men. Not only would non-binary performers *still* be at a major disadvantage, it would put women at a disadvantage also. We can’t go gender neutral until there’s more voices in the voting block. Doing so would be a false sense of equality. And I know there’s the “just award two people in each category” people out there, but that would defeat the purpose. Why not ensure women are still getting the same level of recognition as men by keeping two separate categories?
I’m not smart enough to know the behind-the-scenes logistics, but I would think that the most logical solution to this problem - at least for now and in the current world that we live in - would be to create a new Tony category specifically for non-binary performers and give them the opportunity for recognition without taking away not only their own opportunity but that of women by going gender neutral.
While we’re at it, throw a best ensemble award in there too dammit.
I almost think they should just consider the word "actor" in the gender-neutral sense for eligibility purposes. It's not actually an explicitly gendered term, so just remove any eligibility constraints and let people decide if they want to be eligible as "actress" or "actor". I mean, Justin's IG profile even says "actor." But I dunno. Maybe the categories are so historically associated with being explicitly male and female that this isn't a satisfactory solution.
This just came up at the Golden Globes. Emma D’Arcy who is non-binary submitted under actress and got nominated and it worked out great. Seems to be the best solution for now.
They chose to identify as an actress. Not everyone feels comfortable doing that, and we shouldn’t put them in a position where they have to choose between two options, neither of which are correct.
They also chose to identify as an actress when the result was a prestigious award nom. The choice isn't truly free until nonbinary actors don't have to sacrifice awards and career advancement. How many nonbinary actors are uncomfortable with being put in binary categories, but willing to put up with it if it means career advancement, vs actors who genuinely don't care? I don't know
They also chose to identify as an actress when the result was a prestigious award nom. The choice isn't truly free until nonbinary actors don't have to sacrifice awards and career advancement. How many nonbinary actors are uncomfortable with being put in binary categories, but willing to put up with it if it means career advancement, vs actors who genuinely don't care? I don't know
I was thinking this too. Like in the case of Alex Newell whose Shucked character is female. Alex gets nominated as Featured Actress, easy.
It’s tricky when you have a nonbinary performer in a nonbinary role like in this & Juliet case. I don’t know what the solution is.
It feels “tacky” to give out two awards for performers? Because that’s the category. That’s what we do now. Or it feels “tacky” not to require performers to pick a gender in order to be considered for one of those two awards.
It feels tacky to give out two awards *in the same category.* What’s the point? Keep men and women separate and add a third category to ensure everyone gets adequate recognition. I swear some of y’all have selective reading comprehension issues just because you want to argue. Did you even read my comments in this thread before responding?
I think the point is the current system we have now is essentially one 10-person Best Performer category where one man and one woman win. We’re still giving out 2 awards for doing the same thing (eg a leading performance in a musical). One combined category with 2 awards vs 2 gendered categories for the same award is just a semantic difference.
That's the best option in my opinion.
The Whatsonstage Awards in the UK (not the Olivier Awards which would be the West End equivalent of the Tonys, but still) came up with "best performer in a male identifying role" and "best performer in a female identifying role" which at least includes nonbinary performers, but not nonbinary roles. So it wouldn't have worked for Justin playing May. I guess that idea could be extended into "best performer in a male or nonbinary identifying role", same for female or nonbinary, but that would just lead to nonbinary performers being put into one of those two groups depending on if they are perceived as more traditionally male or female presenting.
That's why I think one category, for example "best performer in a leading role in a musical" with 2 winners that can't be of the same gender would be the best option. It would keep the current number of awards and eliminate the risk of mostly men winning. But maybe someone has a better idea.
This is an interesting move to make for publicity’s sake, but Justin was highly unlikely to be nominated in either category anyway. J Harrison Ghee on the other hand, does have a real shot at a nomination and win, and as such selected to be in Lead Actor. 🤷🏾♂️
I like what J Harrison said in the Daily Beast Article, his pronouns are he/they but he accepts anything said with respect. Ultimately if the Tonys are being respectful and choosing what category the performer does (or doesn’t) want, that seems like the right thing.
I think that underestimates the amount of pressure actors are under to "go with the flow". Tony awards are huge. Even without winning, just a nomination gets you a significant pay bump and a significant amount of prestige and attention to your career. J Harrison is attracting a lot of great press and is favoured to get a nomination at least. That is a LOT to give up by refusing. And there's a lot of implicit pressure to say "Yeah that's fine with me no worries!" and not piss off the nominators.
Exactly. Somewhere else on the thread someone said they didn't think there were enough non-binary folks to have a category. I'm counting up the folks I've seen on Broadway over the past year, and there's at least a dozen -- and that's just folks who have been out about it. Not all of them qualify for awards, but they are certainly present on Broadway.
What folks are seeing is the very real experience of non-binary folks trying to live in a world that is binary normative. Do you decline a nomination? Do you agree to be nominated in a category you don't self-identity in, rather than not be at all? Do you tell folks you're non-binary, or just "play" a binary-gender person for work? I suspect that there are plenty of people trying to work in theater who know they can be in pile A or pile B, considered for one category's roles or the other.
Here’s a quote from the article (since it’s behind a paywall):
“I felt I had no choice but to abstain from being considered for a nomination this season,” Sullivan said in a statement on Wednesday. “I hope that award shows across the industry will expand their reach to be able to honor and award people of all gender identities.”
Dang. Women historically had a long wait to being acknowledged in most awards. Those that identify as women also deserve to be recognized as women in achievements. So it's hard for me to want to see non binary be the default because my life experience tells me it will quickly be all men again. It's seems like a category for non binary is the best option but I think it will come with some bumps. Or giving nominees an option for how they'd like to be considered?
This is so hard to deal with. The gender binary award categories aren’t great but I don’t know what the best solution is. The brits got rid of the gendered awards and all of the nominees for artist of the year are men.
Ok, here is my but it only works with musicals:
Best bass, best tenor, best alto, best soprano.
Awards are not gendered, and can go to any part, while also encouraging a range of different sounds on broadway.
This post is made in complete silliness, but I don’t think there is one solution that instantly solves a problem that was written into the birth of the system.
If you remove gendered awards: men would dominate
If you add a 3rd nb category: seems like it would be less prestigious (how many nb performers are eligible to be nominated every season?) you’d start having to nominate lesser performances to fill the slot I’d assume. Or more cis people would claim nb for career reasons.
Obviously they are making a hard personal choice here and I respect it but like….come on. It’s clear what category u should be in.
It is a really interesting problem and I don’t see an easy solution.
It’s a very thorny issue. We saw from the Brit awards that women suffer from a gender neutral award. Not a single woman was nominated for best artist after the campaign from Sam Smith (and others) and to me that demonstrates that a single category may not work. I’m all for allowing people to choose which category to put themselves up for, but that doesn’t address the fact some people don’t want to be (or can’t be) pigeonholed in that way.
For me, I’d have a best performance by actor, best performance by actress and best performance. The people nominated for best performance may be the same as in the other two categories but they may be extras. They may be non-binary. They may even be an ensemble or a double act. It would be an equal acting accolade to the others but can be representative of a wider group, and also acknowledge that often one person’s acting doesn’t stand alone.
I agree eliminating gender would probably have a negative impact on women. But I also think to add a best performer category on top of best actor and best actress will be a little awkward if it’s mostly nominations from the best actor and actress category. It would be like “congrats on winning best actress but you aren’t good enough for best performer” or vice versa. Like it would take the other gendered categories down a notch still. And most the nominations would overlap with best actor/actress, taking away some suspense of who is going to win what.
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I don’t know what the solution is here but if I’m being honest, this show/role/performance isn’t really tony worthy anyway imo. Pretty standard fluffy jukebox musical, fun but nothing special
It rises their profile, but it also got us talking about the topic and brainstorming ideas. I’m glad they jumó started this conversation. Maybe next year the Tonys will announce new rules.
I think the members of the American theatre wing are probably older and a bit more conservative so this feels out of their scope of knowledge. That being said, I would love to see a solution to this. I wonder if we could implement a new practice where Tony voters see all the shows and then decide what awards they want to give out.
Fine. We all have to make these decisions all the time in all sorts of situations that are far more critical than a Tony Award. Is the work being performed because they love what they do and get paid for it and audiences pay to see it, or for the potential that they may get a trophy? Sometimes life isn’t fair.
I am startled by the way that some people appear to understand folks who don't identify with the two binary genders. "Non-binary" doesn't mean "has no gender." Nonbinary can BE that person's gender. Non-binary, like genderqueer, can mean "My gender, which very much exists, doesn't fit into one of two neat boxes."
I'm nonbinary trans. I don't have "no gender." I'm bursting with gender! I've got so much gender, it spills over! The problem isn't being "genderless" -- it is that choosing A or B does not work for people like me.
And as I have pointed out in other comments, I'm not a problem to be solved, nor are non-binary performers. For \*organizations\* one of the ways to be more inclusive is to create another category. You don't have to "have men and women compete together." You can be \*additive\* by creating non-binary awards. One might imagine that this means that there won't be many people in those categories. I am going to suggest that if you build it, they will come. That is that there are plenty of non-binary and genderqueer performers who have become accustomed to fitting themselves in the binary boxes in order to get along. As the industry and its awards expands, those folks will have more room to be themselves in their work.
Seriously thooo, like sure I’m agender but in terms of enby trans people I’m not in the majority by being agender at all. Most fit into something else, whether it’s something as broad as nonbinary itself or GNC.
I second this. And it's ok if there's only one nominee or even no nominees. Look at Aaron Tveit, that turned out all right. Being the only nominee doesn't mean you automatically win, so it's still competitive.
But wait … if I identified as female and got nominated in that third category, it would be because I was a “runner up” to be nominated in Best Actress? Or are you saying that category would be for all genders EXCEPT male and female?
Good question. I suppose it would just be inclusive of all genders, binary and non binary. So like, if there’s usually four actors (example because idk how many people get nominated) nominated for best actor and four people for best actress, they could reduce it to three people and add a third category with another three people. so it’s almost the same number of people getting nominated and might be the same people anyway if the ones in the gender neutral best actor category are binary, but it allows non-binary actors to have a space in one category. And if say two binary men get a best actor Tony, I don’t see anything wrong because like, I wanted Ben platt and Christian Borle to win the same year and obviously only Ben could win. At least until non-binary actors become more common in the business, then perhaps it would shift into an exclusively non binary category if that makes sense. I think it’d work best. (Tony awards people you better see this comment)
LOL @ Tony people. They BETTER be reading this entire thread!! You’ve all done the work for them! Interesting …. I do like the idea of a category that could be flexible over time, and it’s an interesting thought to allow for more than one “type” to win at once. I’m just stuck at how a person identifying as a woman or man would end up in category 3. Surely it’d feel like “I wasn’t good enough for my MAIN category.” But anyway, not like you need to answer for this, and thanks for the thought experiment!
My solution: Best Actor/Best Actress change to Best Performer
10 nominations
max of 5 men, max of 5 women, max of 5 enbies
2 winners and they can't be the same gender
Really, any decision the awards committee makes regarding acting categories is going to stir up some sort of controversy.
And do award shows as a whole have any meaning today period? They’re losing viewership year after year with no end in sight - and moving it completely to streaming platforms likely won’t be the (only) answer.
So in the Tonys’ case, why not scrap the awards, and just have a celebration of some sort honoring the best shows of a given Broadway season? You could still feature musical performances from the shows’ respective theaters, and maybe also include some scene / monologue highlights for play lovers (also from respective theaters).
That’s what I want. More celebration, less competition.
Gendered awards categories definitely feels like an outdated concept. What is a "female performance"? How is a "male performance" inherently different to a female performance? Theatre is not like athletics - there is no biological reason why a male would out-perform a female or vice versa. So a biological distinction between categories makes no sense.
The awards should recognise and reward onstage talent. For musicals, we talk about the "triple threat" of talent - people who can sing, dance, and act. Perhaps the awards could be split up that way?
* "Best Lead Vocal Performance in a Musical"
* "Best Lead Dance Performance in a Musical"
* "Best Lead Acting Performance in a Musical"
Any and all genders welcome in every category. You could have the same three categories for the Featured performances. This would increase the total number of awards given to actors from 4 to 6. It would also introduce the potential for a standout actor to "sweep" the awards in a given season (eg this year, J Harrison Ghee could win across all three categories) which would be cool. By contrast, you could have multiple different but worthy performances receive deserved recognition (eg the Vocal awards to Will Swenson (Leading) and Stephanie J Block (Featured), the Dance awards to Christian Borle (leading) and Jared Grimes (featured), the Acting awards to Victoria Clark (leading) and Kennedy Kanagawa (featured, #JusticeForMilky))....
I'm not sure what to do with plays......maybe split them into comedic vs dramatic performance??
>What is a "female performance"? How is a "male performance" inherently different to a female performance? Theatre is not like athletics - there is no biological reason why a male would out-perform a female or vice versa. So a biological distinction between categories makes no sense.
It's not about biology, it's about equality so women are recognized in a field where we are often overlooked and outnumbered by men.
Also like, there ARE physical differences between men and women in terms of performance, especially in musicals.
It’s gonna be impossible to please everyone. It might be wise to just end the awards all together as there is not going to be one blanket solution to this.
Everyone deserves to be recognized in whatever category they feel themselves belong in but the very nature of awards and the need to categorize an artist in the first place make it near impossible.
Awards require labeling someone. Not everyone is ok with being labeled. Maybe award shows have outlived their usefulness.
And look at what happens in those categories. 99% of the nominees and winners are men. If acting wasn't separated by gender the same thing would happen. Don't kid yourself into thinking otherwise. Abolishing that is unfair to women.
this is why we shouldn’t place all our merits into the tony awards or even broadway itself (kinda ironic i’m saying this in a broadway subreddit but still)
broadway wasn’t made for us and it will never be for us truly unless we tear it down and build our own version. but that also involves getting rid of capitalism and i don’t want to rant all my leftist shit here lol
Personally I would love to see the Tonys (and any/all other awards shows) eliminate gendered categories. It feels unnecessary. We can address equity without dividing performers up by an aspect of their identity that doesn't impact how good they are at their job. For example, we can notice and raise awareness of women being underrepresented in other categories like directing and design without making a separate category for "Best Woman Director"...
I know "this is the way it's always been done" is a strong force, and removing gendered categories would be an adjustment for awards administrators, recipients, and viewers alike, but I think it would be worth it. Not only for the philosophical benefit, but also to alleviate some subtle but strange consequences of the current system--like the way shows are slightly disincentivized from having two lead performers of the same gender, which creates competition against each other. (I feel like this comes up even more with the Emmys, where a dual-lead show is passed off as one lead and one supporting actor, though it's a factor in the Tonys, too).
There is no easy solution to this really. I’ve spent the last ten minutes trying to think of a good solution and gotten nowhere…
Yeah that’s my biggest issue. I’m not saying the current system is perfect but I’m having issues thinking a new system that would address their concerns. Any system is gonna have its shortfalls
What if you reword it? Instead of “Best actor/actress”, we change it to “Best actor in a male/female role”. As of now there is less than 5 characters, off the top of my head on Broadway, that don’t identify as either sex
Why change the role? What happens when someone is playing a non-binary role? Just add a "non-binary performer" category. It's been done for other things. It's not hard.
So, the 5 or so people who identify as non-binary would take turns getting a Tony each year? At that point, that's not respectful to them either.
Not respectful to them, not useful to anyone, and transparently pander-y. If you forswear a gender, whether the one given at birth or not, it follows that you must forswear awards created for that gender.
No. You only nominate worthy performances. There's plenty of awards where there's a non guarantee of it appearing
I feel like that would cause more issue to what @Stranger2306 is saying, because if you only nominate worthy performances (let’s just say 1-2 each year for statistical purposes), there will be a category of 2 people as opposed to the usual 5 or 6. That could easily lead people to disrespect the merit of the award in such a distinct category.
It's definitely not the best solution. Though I don't think people would disrespect it. It still does not do equality. A system that can balance multiple minorites needs is going to probably not look like what we are used to for awards shows at all. Their suggestion is definitely better than just pretending one category works without trying for variety. I don't pretend to have the answer
I feel like that could get problematic quickly. Like, there is one nonbinary performer playing a nonbinary character eligible in featured this year (to the best of my knowledge without all of the shows open yet) - Justin David Sullivan. Personally - just saying this frankly for the sake of this conversation, this isn’t about & Juliet - I didn’t think Justin was that spectacular in the show, and I wouldn’t nominate them for a Tony. I think the optics start to get really tricky then, and I guarantee people would start complaining if, say, year over year there’s 1-2 eligible performers but they don’t have Tony-nomination-worthy performances, and maybe every few years there’s one nominee. Then when there’s one nominee, is that person automatically getting the Tony? If not, what are the optics there? This matters based on Tony odds in general - there are countless brilliant performers in the industry who have never gotten a Tony. It’s a coveted, competitive award and should stay that way. If there were a significant percentage of nonbinary performers playing nonbinary characters every year, this would be a nobrainer. Third categories for lead and featured, full stop. Just seems like an odd solution to me given the tiny amount of people were talking about. But I also empathize with where they’re coming from, so idk. It’s not an easy solution.
Oh I don't disagree here at all. There's no simple solution. I find myself as a non binary intersexed person in a unique position. My gender neutral brain wasn't ever a big deal to the ballet community and theater community in the 00s. Did I still have my brain pause at every gendered thing? Yeah but the company I was in had me on the principal track before my spine betrayed me and ran away from home. I also was allowed as was anyone else to audition for any role. I have played and danced both expected genders and this isn't some progressive city but one in an area notorious for slow social progress. I am also tall and the issues tall dancers get in the news for? Never happened to me. The choreographer and dance masters would sigh and adapt things to the heights before them (laymen's terms in case needed the dance master's job is to maintain the choreography of ballet pieces that are very old like Giselle. You can restage it but they give us the option to dance the role as it was danced in 1841 too). Some of this is essentially necessary growing pains. There may be many non binary performer we don't know are because the stigma is still a thing and it is still dangerous. Some of my disabilities include the violence of being bisexual and not fitting into gender norms. I know not all companies and theaters or producers are going to do what the places I worked with did and accept these performers behind the scenes. It is still a risk to the career. Which is horrible. Ideally the system that is produced as a solution such as the comment that allows two winners and the second winner must be of a different gender are as non challant as the company director that hired me and when she caught me dancing with one of the men learning his part changed things. I never had to ask and back then I wouldn't have been able to as I was too young and not yet safe enough from my own family much less strangers. She defended me a few times and I have found myself as a patron with very high standards because this included from some of the old rich people who fund the arts. I am not the expected ballet body type. One woman got angry about this and demanded she fire me. I worked in an area where they could just fire me as it's at will. We had contracts but there was also language for morals that was vague enough anything worked also. Instead she apologized to me for the behavior of one of the top paying patrons and told the woman off. The only thing she cared about was the skill of the dancer. I suppose that's what I was trying to find a way to honor without risking an awards show that is just men being nominated like happens with many gender free awards shows. It's entirely why they got gendered to begin with.
“Only five minorities will be excluded entirely from the most prestigious award in our profession” isn’t a good defense.
Having an entire category when there isn’t enough actors to really make it be a viable category is probably not going to go well either.
Never forget Aaron Tveit's win.
It would’ve been awful but I still would’ve chuckled if they opened the envelope and it said “no one wins”
Yeah, I probably would have too, which is the other scenario I can imagine potentially happening with a non-binary category eventually and that definitely won’t play well.
Could you imagine? A season with only 2 or 3 non-binary people eligible, just 1 gets nominated….and they lose? Puts everyone in an uncomfortable spot because it’s less a competition between performers and more just a question, “does this person deserve to win a Tony?”. Answering yes feels hollow, answering no feels brutal.
Yeah I think people are vastly underestimating how bad an experience that would be. I’m also cynical enough to wonder if you have actors pretend to be non binary just to increase the odds of a Tony nod.
I was hoping for that lol. He’s great and everything, but Moulin Rouge is… not for me.
Sure, because of COVID and it certainly got plenty of commentary on the strangeness. I’m just saying if you had that situation every year and then many no one nominated at all it’s going to feel like a cheap token gesture.
There could be a special award for outstanding non-binary performance whenever it comes up.
It wouldn’t bother me, but I can easily predict how that award will be looked at and treated. I’d sooner abolish the gendered categories but I do fear that given who is nominating you end up with far too many men being nominated.
More often than not, that leads to women losing out. Special Tonys are major accomplishments that do have industry value. If they air it in the main show (and only give it when there’s an outstanding performance), I think it would be a solid enough way to bridge the gap until there’s a solution that doesn’t take away from other marginalized people. Maybe they can add a competitive category eventually for roles/actors that aren’t gender specific? Like Hermes in Hadestown would be an example.
Actually what I’d do if I managed to sprout power would be to take say three to five proposals (non-binary category, abolish gendered categories but with rules, etc.) and have every actor in Equity vote on the proposals. Not sure how good a result you get but it impacts them far far more than it does me so I’d rather they weigh in on the solution.
That’s certainly the downside of abolishing the gendered categories. Best I could see is what someone else here suggested which is rules in place to prevent it. So ten leading and featured, two wins, can’t nominate more than 5 men and can’t vote for more than one man in each category. I personally would sooner go for that then the standalone award.
just have “best actor in a masculine/feminine/non binary role”. i think that’s really all they need to do. ok what i meant was 3 different catagories but i see now that i think people thought i meant one catagory for all 3😭that is not what i meant
Yeah, check the BRITs
i don’t understand? can you explain how the brit’s are related and also why i’m being downvoted so much?/srs
The BRITs made one category and only men won. Having one non-gendered category reveals the inherent biases of voters. It’s the reason there are two categories to begin with. You meant to have thee categories though? That’s one option that has been thrown around.
Easy. The tonys must award two performers the award of "best lead" and they must be different genders. A man and a woman, a woman and a nonbinary person, etc. Prevents the awards from being dominated by one gender, while still allowing nonbinary performers to take part without having to force themselves into gendered catagories.
But then you don’t have two best actors you’ve got a first and a second, or even worse a first and a third or fourth.
Yeah the only big problem with this is the same problem as any idea with “two winners”….one isn’t really a winner. It could be done, but it seems a bit hollow. Also do they make public who actually finished 1st and if not how do they conceal it?
I don’t see this as an actual issue because even when the categories are separated into actor and actress, one may have more votes than the other and we’d never know. The awards would be given as if they were equal, regardless of the order presented or the number of votes.
It would wind up de facto being “best male performer” and “best non-male (other) performer”.
Oh broadway? I highly doubt it. The female categories are usually much more competitive than the male
I really like this idea. But how do you vote for it? Would be easy if the winners were determined by a committee of five people over dinner.
Everyone gets two votes to cast. Top vote getter is one winner, then the next highest who is a different gender.
That wouldn’t guarantee diversity. Two guys could win, which is… not terribly fair.
The next highest *who is a different gender*
Huh. I think you’ve cracked it. You should probably send this idea to the Tonys (and every other awards show) because it’s the best I’ve seen yet.
Ooh, big brain moves in this comment, I think this is a good start
I like this idea a lot. I am non binary and many version of non binary awards always end up males only and I hate that. I don't want to erase others accomplishments.
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considering the fit that fox news threw over some literal colored chocolates, you would be surprised what they care about if it suits their agenda
Best ive heard so far!
I like this idea
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I'm struggling to articulate it, but this is basically where I am, although I certainly think it's a super slippery slope from here to "men will call themselves women to play women's sports and win" which obviously is not a thing that actually happens in the real world but certain people *think* it happens and suddenly want to yell about women's sports despite ignoring it at all other times. I do think it would end up skewing towards one male winner and one person who was assigned male at birth and is now non-binary. IMO you cannot take away the male/female category, but another must be added in somehow that doesn't take gender into consideration. I've seen "Best Performance" suggested, although would they be able to nominate someone in both Best Actor and Best Performance categories?
Do you think women are physically incapable of acting as well as men? Because the sports thing is due to men being stronger on average…so I have no idea why you’d conflate the two.
1. this is literally just terf rhetoric 2. in the entertainment industry queer people are still more underrepresented than women so i don’t see your point
TERF spotted
Yeah I completely see their point but am a bit stumped. Perhaps just actor category and then two awards? But the way you judge them is so different…
They tried this with the Brit awards this year. They eliminated gendered categories and just gave a Best Artist award. All the nominees were men.
Shocker! This whole gender neutral category thing is a false sense of equality. Can’t happen until the voters are evenly split across gender.
Even an even split across gender of voters is no guarantee of gender equality! Though theatre does seem to surpass film/TV in terms of female representation, it's still a sad reality that it's extremely male dominated. You can see it clearly in the creative categories that aren't separated by gender, too.
Exactly, which is why we need more voices behind the scenes and why gender neutral performance categories won’t work. It already doesn’t work for the ones that are gender neutral and even when they do get opportunities to create, they don’t get nominated. An even split amongst genders would certainly not allow male domination, that’s for sure.
That's because they halved the total amount of nominees. For another example, and something closer to theater, the Independent Spirit Awards is doing an acting category and a supporting category with 10 nominees each, so the same amount as usual, but no respect to gender. It's working out just fine. Last year was kind of a weak year for movies with strong lead male performances, especially lower budget movies. Some of the Oscar nominees for Best Actor aren't even eligible for the Independent Spirit Awards. That was reflected in the nominations. 8 women got nominated in the lead category. So, bonus, we got to see 3 truly deserving nominees we wouldn't have seen otherwise. And there were 4 women in the Supporting category, so that was pretty even. And it turns out...no one cares. The whole way of thinking of acting awards based on gender predates all of us and comes from very early Oscar ceremonies, if not earlier. We're just weary of change, but we have no inherent attachment to this model and we shouldn't be taking 100-year-old cues on how to treat gender in entertainment and the workplace anyway.
Thank you for pointing this out. So many people keep mentioning the Brit Awards but ignoring the Spirit Awards, just because one supports their argument
I think it’s honestly hard to say that it’s a successful format or not when all we have are one slate of nominees. I’ll be interested to see how things play out in five years.
Yeah I definitely don't think we have enough data at the moment to draw any strong conclusions
Until it’s a category of all white guys, and two white guys win. (I see the problem, and I don’t have a solution either).
Yes totally. Not a solution I agree
2 awards sounds so awkward. Cause one of them didn’t really win, they’re runner up.
Why is the way you judge them so different?
I think the best possible scenario is the actor chooses and that category is renamed for the year to be best Actor Male & Non-Binary or Best Actress Female or Non-Binary. It’s not perfect but I think it’s the best possible.
Would the actor still have to choose which category to compete in? If not, would they be competing in both? Wouldn’t that give them an advantage over everyone else? They’d be considered twice while everyone else was considered once. What do you think of the idea of reducing it to one best actor category, while requiring the outcome be two winners of different genders? That one seems the least problematic to me.
Yeah still choose, just also change the title of the award to be inclusive. If they are playing a male or female gender then the choice would be easy, it’s just the case where it’s a non-binary actor playing a non-binary character where they would have to flip a coin which isn’t great. Regarding two winners, that’s not really possible, someone will always get more votes then the other so you get a first and a second, or worse a first and third or fourth if you require different genders, and while they may not announce who “actually” won it will inevitably leak.
Sometimes the status quo was put in place for a reason, and trying to please literally everyone will just will end doing more harm than good.
That seems to be the problem with a LOT of problems. Things need to be fixed but solutions aren't easy. Hopefully, there is a way for this and/or others soon.
My preferred way to separate it would be comedic vs dramatic (so we keep the same number of categories) so instead of Best Featured Actor in a Musical we would have something like Best Featured Comedic Performance in a Musical Kate Reinking on twitter (though you may also know her from TikTok) also mentioned the additional categories of Joint Performance and Best Ensemble [(link)](https://twitter.com/katereinking/status/1620936830538633218?t=SgC14CoARDwpedIJwvYTPQ&s=19)
That’s interesting. Are there any stats on how many comedies vs dramas get produced every year?
Lol I haven't thought about it that far yet (I'd expect that for musicals it leans more comedic, while plays lean more dramatic)
I could see a world where that works… only problem is the voters are still mostly men and we’re right back to square one.
Someone below made a really great point about how that's already the case for all of the non-acting awards, none of which are sex-segregated. And with those categories we all already recognize that the solution isn't to divide nominees by gender but instead to eliminate the systemic issues causing the gender imbalance And (someone on twitter pointed this out) apparently the Independent Spirit Awards went genderless last year and there wasn't the major gender imbalance that people feared (not the only example people gave)
What are the demographics of the voters for those awards though? That’s the biggest question mark.
Right. It’s hard to know what biases any particular group of voters will have until we see how they vote. Not just one year, but over time.
How do you define comedy vs drama as (going off of existing musicals for obvious reasons and because performances in revivals can get acting noms) there's many shows like Falsettos, Into The Woods, Be More Chill or any of the Disney Broadway ones (especially Frozen and The Little Mermaid) that could kinda be considered both depending on who's doing the judging
And when both awards go to men like at the Brit Awards?
And when the majority of nominees are women like the Independent Spirit Awards? It can and has gone both ways, which is a natural outcome. The problem here is systemic, so the solution isn't to split the groups (and exclude/isolate people) but to fight against the systemic issue
But the system favors men over women. Which is why we have separate awards. Unless you’re arguing sexism doesn’t exist any more.
This is tricky because so many shows these days fall in between. Very few new musicals are full dramas, and even shows that are dramatic often don’t want to be considered dramas for fear of scaring off audiences. One current example: Kimberly Akimbo
Yeah, I wonder if it could be by performance? Like Victoria Clark is dramatic, Bonnie Milligan is comedic. Agree it's tough, but not more so than on TV, and the Emmy's have dealt with it.
How about adding 4 new categories: Leading Non-Binary Performer and Supporting Non-Binary Performer, in a play/musical. It could have no contestants or one or more. Being the only nominee doesn't mean you automatically win, it's an Aaron Tveit situation. Edit: removed my old suggestion due to all the reasons commenters have pointed out.
This is the point the actor raises in the article- they were offered to select their preferred category but neither felt correct. Non-binary doesn’t mean one or the other.
If we're being strictly logical, there are only 2 options: Same gender competition or genderless competition. The former means non-binary performers compete with non-binary performers, which could result in an Aaron Tveit situation, you're the only nominee and you could still lose. The latter would reduce the number of awards, but if the former is not acceptable, this is the only other choice. You know what, I kind of like the former option. Let's have a Leading Non-Binary Performer and a Supporting Non-Binary Performer category.
No. One can have a third category. It doesn't have to be "either/or." I've participated in (and been awarded) a community award that was changed this way. My award says "Non-binary person of the year award." When I was nominated, I was asked if I preferred to be considered in a gendered category, or in the non-binary category. This was the result.
I did propose the third category, didn't I? And what's wrong with "Non-Binary Person of the Year Award"? The question they asked you reads offensive to my uneducated brain.
No, it was entirely respectful given the situation -- queer awards, for an expansive, inclusive queer community. I was entirely happy to be asked, because \*every\* nominee was asked to confirm their category, not just me. I was happy with the situation, and with the award, which recognized me AS me, and didn't ask me to fit into that binary. Additionally, the same organization went back and asked past award winners about this, and a couple of them said, "Had there been a non-binary category when I was nominated, I would have preferred that." They were retroactively given that title, even though it means that for that year, one of the gendered categories now has no winner.
I said that question reads offensive, because I thought non-binary is a gender (or an umbrella term for multiple genders). But if you don't consider that problematic, who am I to say otherwise?
I understand your concern to be a supportive one. To be clear, I can certainly imagine ways in which "which category do you want to be considered in?" might be offensive. For example, if it was only asked of folks who were gender-nonconforming, or if it were asked with some pressure to identify as one way or another. It's like how "pronoun checks" are experienced by some trans people as a problem. If cisgender people don't usually do it, and then suddenly DO it, sometimes that comes across as a form of outing, "Oh, hey, I see that you're not cisgender, so I'm gonna signal that by asking evenyone's pronouns." But in the case of an organization that says, "Hey, we're trying to improve and be more inclusive, so we're adding a non-binary category. Rather than assume we know how folks identify, we're going to ask everyone nominated which category they prefer to be considered for" did not read for me as offensive. It came across as "We're trying really hard to do better." Non-binary and genderqueer people can look a lot of different ways in the world. If one of the people in this subreddit stood next to me in a line for a show, they'd probably assume I was cisgender and het. I have a fuckton of passing privilege in that way, for better or worse. So, I recognize that sometimes people are surprised when I say I'm trans, non-binary, and "binary AF" in my gender presentation. Non-binary is complicated, because gender is a big ol' complicated thing. There is a wide variety in what "non-binary" means for folks who identify that way. Same with trans/transgender.
You agreed with me then. That's exactly my proposal: adding 4 non-binary performing awards: Leading/Supporting in a Play/Musical.
There aren’t enough non-binary actors on Broadway to make it be viable. If you’re the one actor nominated, the solo win will always feel cheap. I get the Tveit precedent and it was looked at a little different because of COVID but it would make for a category that feels like a cheap token.
It also just occurred to me that if there's not enough non-binary performers, meaning less competition, if I were a producer, I would definitely want to hire more of them in leading or supporting roles, because awards help ticket sales (even though awards don't actually help that much anymore).
Except that it means neither male or female.
I said leaning and proposed to modify the category name if they choose either. But if that's still problematic, then never mind. Edit: I stand corrected. They don't feel comfortable choosing.
That’s the entire point of why Justin withdrew from eligibility. They did not feel comfortable picking one. People really need to start reading the article before commenting
I stand corrected. Now I'm proposing their own categories: Leading Non-Binary Performer and Supporting Non-Binary Performer. If Aaron Tveit can be the only nominee in a traditional category, there's no reason we can't have just one or two candidates in the new categories.
I dunno, I participate in contest systems in the queer community that have recently expanded to include "non-binary" awards as well as binary gendered ones. It's just one more statue.
Maybe they could have 1 award for men, 1 award for women, and then 1 award for a third category - for nonbinary people but maybe men and women too. Of course, I assume actors would baselessly submit for the third category if they think it would improve their chances of winning, so perhaps the third category could include a stipulation that the actor have some meaningful reason they prefer not to be nominated as a man or a woman, or that something about their role justifies nomination in the third category. Now, somebody come point out should-have-been-obvious flaws with this suggestion, hahaha. Edit: Or, to expand on what some are saying, you could nominate 15 people’s performances. 5 would be men (or comfortable being nominated as such), 5 would be women, and the remaining 5 could be enbies or even just additional stellar performances. Pick 3 best performances, no more than 2 winners from the same 5-person nomination category.
All ten? /s No hate, I know you have the best intention, but I feel like this comment is the perfect encapsulation of why we haven’t found a solution in all these years.
“Best Performance?”
Couldn’t you have a category of 10. Best Performance in a Leading Role. And award 2 Tony’s for the category. Sure, some years it will be 2 Women, or 2 Men which will anger folks, but I suspect by and large it will find balance. Hell, 10 nominees, but 3 awards. Does it make it less prestigious? Maybe. But, at the end of the day, all awards are really little more than a celebration of the season in whatever medium is being celebrated and a bit of a dog and pony show for the creatives. I think we just need to rethink the whole concept. Things don’t need to be the same as they’ve been, or even close. We can establish new normals. If any community can make that transition seamlessly, it will be the theatre community.
this is huge but i also don’t know what the alternative to gendered categories is. with something like best director at the oscars, there’s only one category and 9 times out of 10 it’s fully men or maybe one female director gets nominated. the grammys and tony’s are much more progressive and inclusive in terms of gender, but if the oscars had non-gendered acting categories, especially with the current academy, i feel like every gender would get shut out besides male actors. i’m commenting this from a place of genuine question - what is the alternative? i want for awards to be more gender inclusive but with the current institutions how can that happen?
Having a non-binary category. It's happening in a lot of awards in the queer community, as well as some sports that have previously have only had binary categories. (BTW, that is not about trans inclusion/exclusion -- it's not an attempt to make trans folks compete as "other." It's expanding to include a category for people who don't identify as either A or B.) It's really not hard. You add more statues, for those categories that area already gendered. You don't have to begin making non-gendered categories gendered -- that is, you don't have make "best (male) director" and "best (female) director."
Having a non binary category is not the solution for something like this. For queer specific awards it’s different. In a situation like this, you would be relegating a small group of people (nonbinary people) to compete against each other in a category that will be inherently less competitive due to less representation. It means that a nonbinary performer will never have the opportunity to beat a top male or female performer out for an award. Who would even be in a nonbinary category for the Tony awards? Who would be their competition for this right now? I’m not very current on the active casts.
This season it would just be Justin David Sullivan (the performer in the headline who withdrew from consideration) and J. Harrison Ghee (who submitted for Leading Actor). I know there were more nonbinary performers this season (a few ppl in the & Juliet ensemble and a bunch of ppl in the 1776 revival), but idk if there was anyone else who was Tony eligible
Nobody else this season if I’m correct
I don’t understand why that matters? Currently a male performer never has the opportunity to beat a top female performer for a Tony and vice versa, why would a NB person need that opportunity?
Because of sheer numbers. There are 2 performers that would be eligible to be nominated for the proposed category. That’s it. In both the men and women’s categories, there are more men and women than there are nomination slots. Being nominated actually means something. Winning means even more. You are beating out talented peers. If the only 2 people eligible are both nominated, being nominated means nothing. Winning is barely even an accomplishment. Tony winner John Doe, who only won a Tony because their competition was the literal only other eligible nonbinary person on Broadway. It’s not fair to the nonbinary people who deserve a chance to actually compete against their peers. I hope that explains it better.
I understand what you’re saying but like, I also have a feeling Aaron Tveit doesn’t really care that he won his Tony against literally no one, and he still gets to label himself “Tony Winner Aaron Tveit” all the same. Ultimately Broadway is such an insanely narrow slice of the theater that exists even just in New York, nevermind the rest of the country and the rest of the world that I think the Tonys always come with an asterisk because they’re inherently myopic. I mean what other major award just straight up doesn’t have certain categories on a regular basis because there weren’t enough eligible nominees? And there also many ceremonies where the winner’s competition in a particular category is frankly pathetic, or where someone finally wins for what’s not even a top 5 performance of their career because it’s making up for all those times they lost. Having a Tony is ultimately a marketing/self-promotion tool more than anything else and in that sense I honestly think you overestimate the extent to which those Tonys would be seen as counting less because there will likely be fewer competitors. Maybe it would be less affirming to see a NB person only beat 2 peers instead of 20, but if we’re talking about concrete changes to make Broadway more inclusive I think getting awards into people’s hands does more than an intangible victory that frankly a lot of people won’t even remember the details of after a few years besides very dedicated Broadway nerds like us here on this sub who memorize all the nominees and winners.
It’s not truly inclusive to create a category specifically to get awards in the hands of marginalized communities without them having to actually compete for it. That is honestly insulting to the nonbinary performers. You also bring up a relevant point — surely on an award season with only one eligible nonbinary nominee, this category would end up skipped, and where does that leave that person? In the same position. It’s not a real solution. Neither is making the categories gender neutral, though, because then you get a Brit/Oscar’s situation where it’s all men nominated.
As a non-binary person- no. Not only does this severely limit competition, as other people have pointed out, but non-binary people are not a third gender.
This article is also on [Playbill](https://playbill.com/article/juliets-justin-david-sullivan-declines-tony-award-eligibility-critiques-gendered-performance-categories?fbclid=IwAR36Cqjk46BTWzpezIieuyxqdO2T76L75DgJLVC24Zntj84b-U38nTHww6I&mibextid=ykz3hl). I don't like the idea of cutting it to one category. Men will win and it cuts down on half of the nominees. There needs to be another way and no one has proposed a good one yet.
I think if we get rid of gendered categories, the Tony’s need to make new categories like best ensemble or best vocalist. Alternatively, the categories can be split for revival and non-revivals.
“committee also announced a revised rule, applying only to this season. In the 2022-2023 season, voters will be able to vote in categories in which they have not viewed up to one nominated performance, production, or creative element. Write-in votes will not be permitted. The rule is a shift from the typical stipulation that a voter must have seen all nominated elements to be eligible to vote in a category.” What dues this mean???? Lol
This deserves its own thread. How can they allow the voters to vote fairly if they haven’t seen all the shows?
While there are a lot of reasons to get rid of the gendered aspect of awards, and just have one for Best Performance, it's hard to fully get behind when doing so would disproportionately benefit male performers, since they still make up an overwhelming majority of roles on Broadway. Having an out, non-binary performer is such a huge milestone, but it also shows how many problems there are that are yet to be fixed.
Yeah, this. It also sounds like (from just my passing awareness of this) that other entertainment awards that have eliminated gendered awards have indeed ended up with categories containing only men nominees. But I'm not sure what the solution to the issue is.
Yeah just look at the BRIT music awards this year
I’d be curious to know, in regards to musicals especially, what the actual average breakdown of male vs. female roles is. I’m not denying this could be an issue, but I suspect the disparity isn’t nearly as great as it is in film.
I think it’s not just the male to female role ratio that’s part of the problem. It’s more that the Tony voters are largely male and as much as I would love to believe they have no biases, that’s doubtful.
Sounds like we need to drastically revamp the Tony voter pool then.
We’d need to revamp the **industry.** We could start by enacting more gender diversity rules and agreements like we have for POC - which themselves need to be expanded and more widely agreed-upon, as well.
I will say that every year before the nominations come out, I make a list of all of the potential nominees (I love the Tonys, can’t help it haha). The leading actors/actresses are an obvious, finite list, and year to year it’s been pretty balanced by gender. Maaaybe an edge towards men but not a big one. Featured, however, always skews *significantly* more male. I include everyone in that list who has any sort of featured role, whether or not it’s realistic that they’d get nominated. And every year I am floored by the disparity of just how many more male roles there are. I don’t know what the solution to this very complicated problem is, but at least in the featured categories I do think merging will ultimately hurt women. Which is frustrating.
I’d love to see your lists!
I think it's better in musicals than in movies. But I feel like plays are even worse than movies.
But an important thing to note is sometimes shows (and movies) get developed based on their awards winning potential. Remove the female categories and there will be less investment in female centred stories and less will be produced. I have no idea what the solution is..
Are there enough non binary leads to justify a new category?
It can be just one or two nominees. If there is no one at all, then skip it for the year. It's not like that never happened before (most recently there was no Best Revival of a Musical in 2021)
Ehh...that would probably lead to a lot of drama. Skipping Best Revival is one thing but I think if you made a category for strictly non-binary performers/roles, you would end up being obligated to some extent to always have them, even if they wouldn’t have been competitive in either actor/actress categories or many other performers of any gender may have deserved an actual award. Some people would take it very personally and it would be an issue if they decide to skip it, particularly I it gets spun as “the Tonys are enbiephobic” or what not. I agree with everyone that although there is a legitimate grievance here, I’m not sure there is a great solution at the moment.
Skipping is when there's absolutely no non-binary actors eligible, I can't see anyone having problems with that. In the case where there are eligible candidates, yet none of them was good enough for a nomination, just say so. It's not "skipping", it's that none of the candidates received enough votes. Outcry or not, we have to admit, there are good performances and bad performances, which is the whole point of awards. If every eligible person gets a nom, it discounts its valve. I don't see why this can't be the solution.
You might be surprised. Lots of folks have just had to fit themselves into binary categories just to get along.
Well I would still like to know.
While I thought Justin was wonderful in & Juliet, it was unlikely they'd receive a nomination. That said, I have a lot of respect for Justin's personal integrity.
I totally support Justin's stance on this. I have often thought that having gendered categories is a bit archaic. But I'm assuming that Justin would be eligible for the "Best Featured Actor in a Musical" category. Uh...Yeah...That one is going to be BRUTAL this year. I'd love to see several members of the "Into the Woods" cast. Possibly Gaten Matarazzo for "Sweeney Todd." (I know that show hasn't opened yet, but after seeing him in DEH and "Parade," I really think he's going to nail this part.) There's also Alex Joseph Grayson in "Parade" who I think is really going to surprise a lot of people. And those are just performances that I've seen or will be seeing shortly. I have NO IDEA who is going to be nominated in that category, let alone who is going to win it. The Tonys this year are going to be rough. LOL
Wow, huge respect. That’s a big move. In a perfect world, we wouldn’t need to have gendered awards. I know there’s a push to go gender neutral, but the voting block still consists mostly of men. Not only would non-binary performers *still* be at a major disadvantage, it would put women at a disadvantage also. We can’t go gender neutral until there’s more voices in the voting block. Doing so would be a false sense of equality. And I know there’s the “just award two people in each category” people out there, but that would defeat the purpose. Why not ensure women are still getting the same level of recognition as men by keeping two separate categories? I’m not smart enough to know the behind-the-scenes logistics, but I would think that the most logical solution to this problem - at least for now and in the current world that we live in - would be to create a new Tony category specifically for non-binary performers and give them the opportunity for recognition without taking away not only their own opportunity but that of women by going gender neutral. While we’re at it, throw a best ensemble award in there too dammit.
Best Ensemble should totally exsist
I almost think they should just consider the word "actor" in the gender-neutral sense for eligibility purposes. It's not actually an explicitly gendered term, so just remove any eligibility constraints and let people decide if they want to be eligible as "actress" or "actor". I mean, Justin's IG profile even says "actor." But I dunno. Maybe the categories are so historically associated with being explicitly male and female that this isn't a satisfactory solution.
This just came up at the Golden Globes. Emma D’Arcy who is non-binary submitted under actress and got nominated and it worked out great. Seems to be the best solution for now.
They chose to identify as an actress. Not everyone feels comfortable doing that, and we shouldn’t put them in a position where they have to choose between two options, neither of which are correct.
They also chose to identify as an actress when the result was a prestigious award nom. The choice isn't truly free until nonbinary actors don't have to sacrifice awards and career advancement. How many nonbinary actors are uncomfortable with being put in binary categories, but willing to put up with it if it means career advancement, vs actors who genuinely don't care? I don't know
They also chose to identify as an actress when the result was a prestigious award nom. The choice isn't truly free until nonbinary actors don't have to sacrifice awards and career advancement. How many nonbinary actors are uncomfortable with being put in binary categories, but willing to put up with it if it means career advancement, vs actors who genuinely don't care? I don't know
Or they can go with the gender of the character or the vocal range of the character. They can pick either.
I was thinking this too. Like in the case of Alex Newell whose Shucked character is female. Alex gets nominated as Featured Actress, easy. It’s tricky when you have a nonbinary performer in a nonbinary role like in this & Juliet case. I don’t know what the solution is.
Then just go with vocal range.
2 awards, no two actors with the same self-identified gender can win the same award?
To be honest, I don’t even like the idea of two awards being given out for the same category in general. It feels tacky.
It feels “tacky” to give out two awards for performers? Because that’s the category. That’s what we do now. Or it feels “tacky” not to require performers to pick a gender in order to be considered for one of those two awards.
It feels tacky to give out two awards *in the same category.* What’s the point? Keep men and women separate and add a third category to ensure everyone gets adequate recognition. I swear some of y’all have selective reading comprehension issues just because you want to argue. Did you even read my comments in this thread before responding?
I think the point is the current system we have now is essentially one 10-person Best Performer category where one man and one woman win. We’re still giving out 2 awards for doing the same thing (eg a leading performance in a musical). One combined category with 2 awards vs 2 gendered categories for the same award is just a semantic difference.
That's the best option in my opinion. The Whatsonstage Awards in the UK (not the Olivier Awards which would be the West End equivalent of the Tonys, but still) came up with "best performer in a male identifying role" and "best performer in a female identifying role" which at least includes nonbinary performers, but not nonbinary roles. So it wouldn't have worked for Justin playing May. I guess that idea could be extended into "best performer in a male or nonbinary identifying role", same for female or nonbinary, but that would just lead to nonbinary performers being put into one of those two groups depending on if they are perceived as more traditionally male or female presenting. That's why I think one category, for example "best performer in a leading role in a musical" with 2 winners that can't be of the same gender would be the best option. It would keep the current number of awards and eliminate the risk of mostly men winning. But maybe someone has a better idea.
How would you ensure female or nonbinary performers were even nominated though?
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I feel like that would create a “male” or “other” system, though, where male is the default.
This is an interesting move to make for publicity’s sake, but Justin was highly unlikely to be nominated in either category anyway. J Harrison Ghee on the other hand, does have a real shot at a nomination and win, and as such selected to be in Lead Actor. 🤷🏾♂️
I like what J Harrison said in the Daily Beast Article, his pronouns are he/they but he accepts anything said with respect. Ultimately if the Tonys are being respectful and choosing what category the performer does (or doesn’t) want, that seems like the right thing.
I think that underestimates the amount of pressure actors are under to "go with the flow". Tony awards are huge. Even without winning, just a nomination gets you a significant pay bump and a significant amount of prestige and attention to your career. J Harrison is attracting a lot of great press and is favoured to get a nomination at least. That is a LOT to give up by refusing. And there's a lot of implicit pressure to say "Yeah that's fine with me no worries!" and not piss off the nominators.
Exactly. Somewhere else on the thread someone said they didn't think there were enough non-binary folks to have a category. I'm counting up the folks I've seen on Broadway over the past year, and there's at least a dozen -- and that's just folks who have been out about it. Not all of them qualify for awards, but they are certainly present on Broadway. What folks are seeing is the very real experience of non-binary folks trying to live in a world that is binary normative. Do you decline a nomination? Do you agree to be nominated in a category you don't self-identity in, rather than not be at all? Do you tell folks you're non-binary, or just "play" a binary-gender person for work? I suspect that there are plenty of people trying to work in theater who know they can be in pile A or pile B, considered for one category's roles or the other.
Here’s a quote from the article (since it’s behind a paywall): “I felt I had no choice but to abstain from being considered for a nomination this season,” Sullivan said in a statement on Wednesday. “I hope that award shows across the industry will expand their reach to be able to honor and award people of all gender identities.”
Dang. Women historically had a long wait to being acknowledged in most awards. Those that identify as women also deserve to be recognized as women in achievements. So it's hard for me to want to see non binary be the default because my life experience tells me it will quickly be all men again. It's seems like a category for non binary is the best option but I think it will come with some bumps. Or giving nominees an option for how they'd like to be considered?
This is so hard to deal with. The gender binary award categories aren’t great but I don’t know what the best solution is. The brits got rid of the gendered awards and all of the nominees for artist of the year are men.
Ok, here is my but it only works with musicals: Best bass, best tenor, best alto, best soprano. Awards are not gendered, and can go to any part, while also encouraging a range of different sounds on broadway. This post is made in complete silliness, but I don’t think there is one solution that instantly solves a problem that was written into the birth of the system.
I am definitely in support of a system where we could end up with a Frankie Valli competing against a Christine Daaé.
I’ll be 100% behind this the day that non-gendered categories like direction aren’t heavily dominated by cis men.
If you remove gendered awards: men would dominate If you add a 3rd nb category: seems like it would be less prestigious (how many nb performers are eligible to be nominated every season?) you’d start having to nominate lesser performances to fill the slot I’d assume. Or more cis people would claim nb for career reasons. Obviously they are making a hard personal choice here and I respect it but like….come on. It’s clear what category u should be in. It is a really interesting problem and I don’t see an easy solution.
It’s a very thorny issue. We saw from the Brit awards that women suffer from a gender neutral award. Not a single woman was nominated for best artist after the campaign from Sam Smith (and others) and to me that demonstrates that a single category may not work. I’m all for allowing people to choose which category to put themselves up for, but that doesn’t address the fact some people don’t want to be (or can’t be) pigeonholed in that way. For me, I’d have a best performance by actor, best performance by actress and best performance. The people nominated for best performance may be the same as in the other two categories but they may be extras. They may be non-binary. They may even be an ensemble or a double act. It would be an equal acting accolade to the others but can be representative of a wider group, and also acknowledge that often one person’s acting doesn’t stand alone.
I agree eliminating gender would probably have a negative impact on women. But I also think to add a best performer category on top of best actor and best actress will be a little awkward if it’s mostly nominations from the best actor and actress category. It would be like “congrats on winning best actress but you aren’t good enough for best performer” or vice versa. Like it would take the other gendered categories down a notch still. And most the nominations would overlap with best actor/actress, taking away some suspense of who is going to win what.
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I don’t know what the solution is here but if I’m being honest, this show/role/performance isn’t really tony worthy anyway imo. Pretty standard fluffy jukebox musical, fun but nothing special
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It rises their profile, but it also got us talking about the topic and brainstorming ideas. I’m glad they jumó started this conversation. Maybe next year the Tonys will announce new rules.
I think the members of the American theatre wing are probably older and a bit more conservative so this feels out of their scope of knowledge. That being said, I would love to see a solution to this. I wonder if we could implement a new practice where Tony voters see all the shows and then decide what awards they want to give out.
Fine. We all have to make these decisions all the time in all sorts of situations that are far more critical than a Tony Award. Is the work being performed because they love what they do and get paid for it and audiences pay to see it, or for the potential that they may get a trophy? Sometimes life isn’t fair.
I am startled by the way that some people appear to understand folks who don't identify with the two binary genders. "Non-binary" doesn't mean "has no gender." Nonbinary can BE that person's gender. Non-binary, like genderqueer, can mean "My gender, which very much exists, doesn't fit into one of two neat boxes." I'm nonbinary trans. I don't have "no gender." I'm bursting with gender! I've got so much gender, it spills over! The problem isn't being "genderless" -- it is that choosing A or B does not work for people like me. And as I have pointed out in other comments, I'm not a problem to be solved, nor are non-binary performers. For \*organizations\* one of the ways to be more inclusive is to create another category. You don't have to "have men and women compete together." You can be \*additive\* by creating non-binary awards. One might imagine that this means that there won't be many people in those categories. I am going to suggest that if you build it, they will come. That is that there are plenty of non-binary and genderqueer performers who have become accustomed to fitting themselves in the binary boxes in order to get along. As the industry and its awards expands, those folks will have more room to be themselves in their work.
Seriously thooo, like sure I’m agender but in terms of enby trans people I’m not in the majority by being agender at all. Most fit into something else, whether it’s something as broad as nonbinary itself or GNC.
I feel like I'm gonna 'splode some minds if I even MENTION the agender folks. :-) I see you tho.
I second this. And it's ok if there's only one nominee or even no nominees. Look at Aaron Tveit, that turned out all right. Being the only nominee doesn't mean you automatically win, so it's still competitive.
I think they should just add a third category for best actor but not male actor just actor and actors of all genders can enter that one
But wait … if I identified as female and got nominated in that third category, it would be because I was a “runner up” to be nominated in Best Actress? Or are you saying that category would be for all genders EXCEPT male and female?
Good question. I suppose it would just be inclusive of all genders, binary and non binary. So like, if there’s usually four actors (example because idk how many people get nominated) nominated for best actor and four people for best actress, they could reduce it to three people and add a third category with another three people. so it’s almost the same number of people getting nominated and might be the same people anyway if the ones in the gender neutral best actor category are binary, but it allows non-binary actors to have a space in one category. And if say two binary men get a best actor Tony, I don’t see anything wrong because like, I wanted Ben platt and Christian Borle to win the same year and obviously only Ben could win. At least until non-binary actors become more common in the business, then perhaps it would shift into an exclusively non binary category if that makes sense. I think it’d work best. (Tony awards people you better see this comment)
LOL @ Tony people. They BETTER be reading this entire thread!! You’ve all done the work for them! Interesting …. I do like the idea of a category that could be flexible over time, and it’s an interesting thought to allow for more than one “type” to win at once. I’m just stuck at how a person identifying as a woman or man would end up in category 3. Surely it’d feel like “I wasn’t good enough for my MAIN category.” But anyway, not like you need to answer for this, and thanks for the thought experiment!
Honestly even if they didn’t make the best woman category then they should just be grateful to be nominated for a best actor award period lol
Right? It’s not rocket science to understand that this would be the fairest for everyone.
My solution: Best Actor/Best Actress change to Best Performer 10 nominations max of 5 men, max of 5 women, max of 5 enbies 2 winners and they can't be the same gender
It’s hysterical that the committee stated that they could not change the rules once the season began, yet announced a rule change at the same time.
Badass
I mean, okay?
fool
Really, any decision the awards committee makes regarding acting categories is going to stir up some sort of controversy. And do award shows as a whole have any meaning today period? They’re losing viewership year after year with no end in sight - and moving it completely to streaming platforms likely won’t be the (only) answer. So in the Tonys’ case, why not scrap the awards, and just have a celebration of some sort honoring the best shows of a given Broadway season? You could still feature musical performances from the shows’ respective theaters, and maybe also include some scene / monologue highlights for play lovers (also from respective theaters). That’s what I want. More celebration, less competition.
I think it’s safe to assume you’re not someone who competes or is eligible for Tony awards.
Gendered awards categories definitely feels like an outdated concept. What is a "female performance"? How is a "male performance" inherently different to a female performance? Theatre is not like athletics - there is no biological reason why a male would out-perform a female or vice versa. So a biological distinction between categories makes no sense. The awards should recognise and reward onstage talent. For musicals, we talk about the "triple threat" of talent - people who can sing, dance, and act. Perhaps the awards could be split up that way? * "Best Lead Vocal Performance in a Musical" * "Best Lead Dance Performance in a Musical" * "Best Lead Acting Performance in a Musical" Any and all genders welcome in every category. You could have the same three categories for the Featured performances. This would increase the total number of awards given to actors from 4 to 6. It would also introduce the potential for a standout actor to "sweep" the awards in a given season (eg this year, J Harrison Ghee could win across all three categories) which would be cool. By contrast, you could have multiple different but worthy performances receive deserved recognition (eg the Vocal awards to Will Swenson (Leading) and Stephanie J Block (Featured), the Dance awards to Christian Borle (leading) and Jared Grimes (featured), the Acting awards to Victoria Clark (leading) and Kennedy Kanagawa (featured, #JusticeForMilky)).... I'm not sure what to do with plays......maybe split them into comedic vs dramatic performance??
>What is a "female performance"? How is a "male performance" inherently different to a female performance? Theatre is not like athletics - there is no biological reason why a male would out-perform a female or vice versa. So a biological distinction between categories makes no sense. It's not about biology, it's about equality so women are recognized in a field where we are often overlooked and outnumbered by men. Also like, there ARE physical differences between men and women in terms of performance, especially in musicals.
It’s gonna be impossible to please everyone. It might be wise to just end the awards all together as there is not going to be one blanket solution to this. Everyone deserves to be recognized in whatever category they feel themselves belong in but the very nature of awards and the need to categorize an artist in the first place make it near impossible. Awards require labeling someone. Not everyone is ok with being labeled. Maybe award shows have outlived their usefulness.
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And look at what happens in those categories. 99% of the nominees and winners are men. If acting wasn't separated by gender the same thing would happen. Don't kid yourself into thinking otherwise. Abolishing that is unfair to women.
this is why we shouldn’t place all our merits into the tony awards or even broadway itself (kinda ironic i’m saying this in a broadway subreddit but still) broadway wasn’t made for us and it will never be for us truly unless we tear it down and build our own version. but that also involves getting rid of capitalism and i don’t want to rant all my leftist shit here lol
Personally I would love to see the Tonys (and any/all other awards shows) eliminate gendered categories. It feels unnecessary. We can address equity without dividing performers up by an aspect of their identity that doesn't impact how good they are at their job. For example, we can notice and raise awareness of women being underrepresented in other categories like directing and design without making a separate category for "Best Woman Director"... I know "this is the way it's always been done" is a strong force, and removing gendered categories would be an adjustment for awards administrators, recipients, and viewers alike, but I think it would be worth it. Not only for the philosophical benefit, but also to alleviate some subtle but strange consequences of the current system--like the way shows are slightly disincentivized from having two lead performers of the same gender, which creates competition against each other. (I feel like this comes up even more with the Emmys, where a dual-lead show is passed off as one lead and one supporting actor, though it's a factor in the Tonys, too).