Full Breakdown
2026 Tony Awards: Nominations Highlight New Musicals and Historic Milestones
5/6/2026, 8:01:53 PM
Nomination Overview
On May 5 2026, Uzo Aduba and Darren Criss announced the 79th Tony nominees for productions opened between April 28 2025 and April 26 2026. New musicals “The Lost Boys” and “Schmigadoon!” each earned twelve nominations, leading the slate and offering a box-office boost. “Ragtime” received eleven; “Death of a Salesman,” “Cats: The Jellicle Ball,” and “The Rocky Horror Show” each earned nine. The Best Musical field comprises “The Lost Boys,” “Schmigadoon!,” “Titanique,” and “Two Strangers (Carry a Cake Across New York).” The ceremony is June 7 at Radio City Music Hall, hosted by Pink, and broadcast on CBS and streamed on Paramount+.
Season Context and Numbers
The 2025-2026 Broadway season presented six musicals and nine plays, down from fourteen the prior year; five musical revivals and ten play revivals completed the productions. Twenty-four shows earned at least one nomination across twenty-six categories. A 55-member committee compiled the slate; 857 Tony voters will decide the winners.
Record-Setting Highlights
June Squibb, 96, became the oldest acting nominee, surpassing Lois Smith; Danny Burstein reached nine nominations, becoming the most-nominated male performer, overtaking Jason Robards Jr. Apple earned Tony nods through “Schmigadoon!,” tying for most-nominated musical. Producer Scott Rudin returned after a hiatus, earning nominations for the “Death of a Salesman” revival and play “Little Bear Ridge Road.”
Critical Observations
Commentators noted omissions: musical “Beaches” received no nominations despite poor box-office performance; lead actors in “Chess” were overlooked; revivals “Proof” and thriller “The Fear of 13” earned no acting nods. The snubs highlight debates about nomination breadth.
Conflicting Reports
Sources differ on the nominations for “Two Strangers (Carry a Cake Across New York),” citing either eight or eleven nods. All other counts are consistent.
Verbatim Quotes
> “I’m over the Jellicle moon about this!” — Bill Rauch, co-director of *Cats: The Jellicle Ball*
> “a huge amount of satisfaction and joy in being recognized by my community at this point in my life for this role and in this show that is so resonant right now in the world we're living in.” — Joshua Henry, *Ragtime*
> “The fact that we're still telling that story, but to be able to update it to a modern idiom, and to a political idiom, as well as all of the family stuff that happens in the story, makes it so immediate for a modern audience,” — Mark Strong, *Oedipus*
> “The music is the hook that grabs people and then I think they’re a little bit surprised at how emotionally attached they get to these flawed human beings, and they’re rooting for everybody.” — Mark Strong, *Oedipus*
Looking Ahead
857 voters will cast ballots before the June 7 ceremony, and results will shape the commercial outlook for the season’s new works and inform future Broadway production strategies.
