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    Best and Worst Moments From the 2025 Tony Awards

    There was a “Hamilton” reunion, Nicole Scherzinger’s outsize grandeur and Cynthia Erivo’s pleasant “sing-off” music. But those cheesy projections were a big miss.Best Reunion: The ‘Hamilton’ CastIt was plugged before what seemed like every commercial break, but when members of the original cast of “Hamilton” finally gathered onstage at Radio City Music Hall for a 10th-anniversary reunion performance, the hype proved justified. Sleekly lit and dressed and choreographed, Lin-Manuel Miranda and Leslie Odom Jr. were gloriously back; so were Phillipa Soo, Renée Elise Goldsberry and Jasmine Cephas Jones and that Tony-nominated guy who played King George. The eight-song medley — which included “My Shot,” “The Schuyler Sisters” and “The Room Where It Happens”— snapped. I’d make room for it on any list of all-time-best Tonys performances.— Scott HellerBest Inspiration: Here’s to You, Mr. RobinsonGary Edwin Robinson, the head of the theater arts program at Boys and Girls High School in Brooklyn, accepting his special Tony Honor.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesThe smooth baritone, the sly half-smile and the wink at the camera. This guy had to be an actor. And, once upon a time, he was. But Gary Edwin Robinson received a Tony Award last night for his second career, as a teacher, at Boys and Girls High School in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. Accepting the honor in that voice that could make you believe anything, he said that he trained his students not merely to appreciate theater, but to find careers in it. Appreciation is of course valuable, but the harder thing is to instill in young people the idea that finding “the theater in themselves” can be honorable, and even necessary.— Jesse GreenBest Epic Acceptance: Nicole ScherzingerAn outsize grandeur animated Nicole Scherzinger’s acceptance speech.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesNicole Scherzinger’s acceptance speech was as epically demonstrative as her movements in “Sunset Boulevard” are controlled, restrained, precise. The acknowledging of “the exceptional warrior women in this category”! The shaking! The crying! The swooping motions from the hand that was not holding her new award! At times it felt like seeing a modern Maria Callas shaking her fist at the heavens, except that for once those heavens had ruled in her favor. There was an outsize grandeur to the drama of it all that felt classical. Can Medea be far off?— Elisabeth VincentelliBest Placement: Cynthia Erivo’s Balcony BitReady to mingle: The show’s host Cynthia Erivo in the balcony.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Lin-Manuel Miranda and Original ‘Hamilton’ Cast Reunited for a Tonys Medley

    Marking the 10th anniversary of the show’s opening, the creator and cast reunited to perform “My Shot,” “The Schuyler Sisters” and other notable songs.The cast of “Hamilton” on Sunday returned to the room where it happened, at least metaphorically.To mark the 10th anniversary of the show’s opening, 28 members of the original cast — the show’s creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda, along with the other stars, ensemble members, swings and standbys — gathered onstage at Radio City Music Hall and performed a medley of some of the musical’s biggest songs: “Non-Stop,” “My Shot,” “The Schuyler Sisters,” “Guns and Ships,” “You’ll Be Back,” “Yorktown,” “The Room Where It Happens” and “History Has Its Eyes on You.”They dressed not in the show’s period costumes, but in an array of high-fashion evening wear — all black with a few character-driven accents (Lafayette got a Frenchman’s beret; Burr a dueler’s cape; and King George the one splash of color: royal red).They didn’t say a word, but Cynthia Erivo, this year’s Tony Awards host and in 2016 the only musical performer to win a Tony for any show other than “Hamilton,” hailed the production.“Hamilton reinvigorated the American theater and changed not just Broadway, but how Americans views their own history,” Erivo said, before adding wryly, “or so I’m told.”“Hamilton” opened on Broadway on Aug. 6, 2015. The following spring, it was nominated for a record 16 Tony Awards, and then, in a Tonys ceremony at the Beacon Theater, it won 11 prizes, including best musical. (The event was memorable for many reasons — among them, it took place hours after the deadly Pulse nightclub shooting in Florida, which led the “Hamilton” cast to drop the use of muskets in its production number, and prompted Miranda to give his “love is love” acceptance speech.)The show quickly became the biggest phenomenon Broadway had seen in quite some time, and in the decade since, it has only gotten bigger, spinning off touring companies, streaming a live-capture film on Disney+, grossing about $3 billion in North America, and still going strong.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    What to Expect at the 2025 Tony Awards: ‘Hamilton,’ Robots and More

    This year’s annual celebration of the best on Broadway is being hosted by Cynthia Erivo.Singing robots. Undead frenemies. A dead bank robber, and a dying cave explorer. A fumbling group of spies, and a bumbling group of pirates. Also: “Hamilton.”Welcome to the 2025 Tony Awards, which take place on Sunday at 8 p.m. Eastern at Radio City Music Hall, broadcast on CBS.The show is Broadway’s biggest night, because it introduces the latest plays and musicals to a television audience of several million, any of whom might turn into a theater lover, a ticket buyer, or even an artist (so many Broadway performers and producers have stories about watching the Tony Awards as children).Here’s what to expect:The HostThis year’s ceremony is being hosted by Cynthia Erivo, a 38-year-old British actress who won a Tony Award in 2016 for her breakout performance starring in a revival of “The Color Purple.”In the years since, she has focused on movies, television and music — she stars as Elphaba in the pair of “Wicked” films (the second one comes out Nov. 21), and she played Harriet Tubman in the film “Harriet” and Aretha Franklin in National Geographic’s “Genius: Aretha.”After the Tony Awards, she’ll be returning to the stage. In August she’s playing Jesus in a one-weekend run of “Jesus Christ Superstar” at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, and then early next year she’ll star in a one-woman version of “Dracula” in London’s West End.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Tribeca Festival: Lin-Manuel Miranda Has Advice for Aspiring Filmmakers

    An artist development program at the Tribeca Festival aims to support underrepresented groups in filmmaking.The Tribeca Festival is undoubtedly a star-studded event with famous figures, including actors, directors, musicians and artists gracing red carpets and showcasing their works.But supporting aspiring and emerging filmmakers through its artist development programs is also very much part of the festival’s DNA, according to its chief executive, Jane Rosenthal, who founded the event with Robert De Niro and Craig Hatkoff.“So much of the festival is about discovery, and the development programs are part of that,” she said. “We are always looking for new voices and stories and new ways of telling stories, and there are not enough programs supporting aspiring artists.”Since 2015, the artist development programs have included eight initiatives that give producers, directors, writers and other creative people in the moviemaking industry full funding for their projects.Rosenthal said that they have awarded close to $2 million annually, supported more than 1,000 filmmakers and seen celebrities such as Kerry Washington, Queen Latifah and John Leguizamo get involved as mentors and judges. “Everybody needs an advocate, and celebrities, no matter where they are in their careers, help lift these filmmakers up through their support,” Rosenthal said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Lin-Manuel Miranda reflects on upcoming Latinx films

    A program at the Tribeca Festival, the organization he helped create, aims to support underrepresented groups in filmmaking.The Tribeca Festival is undoubtedly a star-studded event with famous figures, including actors, directors, musicians and artists gracing red carpets and showcasing their works.But supporting aspiring and emerging filmmakers through its artist development programs is also very much part of the festival’s DNA, according to its chief executive, Jane Rosenthal, who founded the event with Robert De Niro and Craig Hatkoff.“So much of the festival is about discovery, and the development programs are part of that,” she said. “We are always looking for new voices and stories and new ways of telling stories, and there are not enough programs supporting aspiring artists.”Since 2015, the artist development programs have included eight initiatives that give producers, directors, writers and other creative people in the moviemaking industry full funding for their projects.Rosenthal said that they have awarded close to $2 million annually, supported more than 1,000 filmmakers and seen celebrities such as Kerry Washington, Queen Latifah and John Leguizamo get involved as mentors and judges. “Everybody needs an advocate, and celebrities, no matter where they are in their careers, help lift these filmmakers up through their support,” Rosenthal said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘Hamilton’ Cancels Kennedy Center Run Over Trump’s Takeover

    “Hamilton,” the musical theater juggernaut about the birth of American democracy, is canceling plans to perform next year at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, citing President Trump’s moves to impose his ideological and cultural values on the long-cherished venue.The musical had been slated to be part of the Kennedy Center’s celebration of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. But after Mr. Trump ousted the Democratic members from the center’s once-bipartisan board, became its chairman and replaced its president, “Hamilton” decided not to come.“This latest action by Trump means it’s not the Kennedy Center as we knew it,” the show’s creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda, said in a joint interview on Wednesday with its lead producer, Jeffrey Seller. “The Kennedy Center was not created in this spirit, and we’re not going to be a part of it while it is the Trump Kennedy Center. We’re just not going to be part of it.”Mr. Seller said the “Hamilton” team believed that Mr. Trump “took away our national arts center for all of us.”“It became untenable for us to participate in an organization that had become so deeply politicized,” he said. “The Kennedy Center is for all of us, and it pains me deeply that they took it over and changed that. They said it’s not for all of us. It’s just for Donald Trump and his crowd. So we made a decision we can’t do it.”Richard Grenell, the Kennedy Center’s new president, called the cancellation “a publicity stunt that will backfire” in a post on social media. He accused Mr. Miranda of being “intolerant of people who don’t agree with him politically” and said that it was clear that he and Mr. Seller “don’t want Republicans going to their shows.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Lin-Manuel Miranda Releases ‘Warriors’ Album With Eisa Davis

    He collaborated with Eisa Davis to make a concept album inspired by the 1979 movie. One big change: the main gang is made up of women.“The Warriors,” a 1979 film about a group of gang members fighting their way home to Brooklyn from the Bronx, isn’t the most brutal movie ever made, but it’s not exactly Sesame Street either — when it was first released, it was blamed (on pretty flimsy evidence) for inciting violence. And yet, somehow, Lin-Manuel Miranda found himself watching the movie when he was 4, thanks to a friend’s older brother.Sure, the experience was a little scary. But the film also stuck with him. Miranda, like any number of New Yorkers raised in the ’80s, treasures the sights and sounds of a bygone city preserved in the film, as well as its empathy for its characters. (If some of the gang members seem heroic, well, the story, from a novel by Sol Yurick, is based on an ancient Greek military narrative by Xenophon, “Anabasis.”)Now, after a pivot to television and film, the “Hamilton” creator has spent the last two-plus years working with the playwright and performer Eisa Davis to create a “Warriors” concept album.“You write the things that won’t leave you alone, and this won’t leave me alone,” Miranda said in a joint interview with Davis, conducted at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.The album was released on Friday by Atlantic Records. You can listen here.What is ‘The Warriors’ about?Miranda offers a succinct plot summary: “All the gangs of New York are meeting in the South Bronx for this unprecedented peace summit. Cyrus, the charismatic leader who has called the summit, is assassinated. The assassin blames the Warriors, and the Warriors have to fight their way home to Coney [Island], while every other gang in the city is trying to kill them.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Next Project: A ‘Warriors’ Album With Eisa Davis

    The recording, inspired by Walter Hill’s 1979 film about a gang making a perilous trek through New York City, will be available on Oct. 18.In the nine years since “Hamilton” opened on Broadway, Lin-Manuel Miranda has acted (in the film “Mary Poppins Returns” and the HBO series “His Dark Materials,” among others), composed (songs for “Encanto” and “Moana,” for example) and even tried his hand at movie directing (“Tick, Tick … Boom!”).Now he’s returning to his roots, sort of. Miranda, who rose to fame as a musical theater savant, has been working with the playwright Eisa Davis on a concept album inspired by a cult 1979 action film, “The Warriors.” And on Thursday, Miranda and Davis announced that Atlantic Records will release the album on Oct. 18.The album’s executive producer is the rapper Nas; the producer is Mike Elizondo. The album will have 26 songs; the names of the singers have not yet been announced.The album has been in the works for three years. It is unclear if it will lead to a stage production, but “Hamilton” was initially conceived as a concept album, and there is a history of concept albums evolving into stage productions, from “Jesus Christ Superstar” to “Hadestown.”“The Warriors,” based on a 1965 novel that in turn was based on an ancient Greek work, tells the story of a street gang facing a variety of challenges as it retreats from the Bronx to its home base on Coney Island. The novel, also called “The Warriors,” was written by Sol Yurick, and the ancient Greek text, “Anabasis,” by Xenophon; the film was directed by Walter Hill.Miranda, 44, is one of the few musical theater composers to become a celebrity based on his stage work. But “Hamilton,” about the nation’s first Treasury secretary, was a rare accomplishment, winning the Pulitzer Prize as well as 11 Tony Awards, including for best musical and Miranda’s book and score.His other best-known musical is “In the Heights,” for which he wrote the score and Quiara Alegría Hudes wrote the book. Since “Hamilton,” he contributed lyrics to the short-lived musical “New York, New York,” but has not written a new stage production.Davis, 53, is a longtime friend of Miranda and has worked as an actress, a playwright, a singer and a screenwriter. She performed on Broadway in “Passing Strange,” and has numerous credits as a performer Off Broadway and on television and film. Among her plays is “Bulrusher.” More