There are no ifs, ands, or maybes about it—Sunday, June 8, was a happy ending for the Broadway community. After a two-year hiatus, the annual Tony Awards returned home to Radio City Music Hall, the venue it had called home for 20 shows prior, and it really did feel like a homecoming.
And while I presume that each Tony Sunday—when producers, actors, directors, writers, and friends of the industry come together to celebrate the Broadway season—is a pretty joyful affair, there was something about this year that felt special, perhaps because of the recent announcement that this was Broadway’s highest-grossing season in history or because we find ourselves in a moment when our communities need live art and creativity more than ever. Regardless, the main takeaway of the night for those who experienced it in person was that it was one to remember. Here are some of the moments—heart-wrenching, skipping, and warming—that will cement this year’s Tonys as one of the greats.
The festive preshow
The show airs live on CBS and Paramount+ from 8 p.m. sharp, but a handful of awards are announced in a preshow broadcast, this year cohosted by Darren Criss (Maybe Happy Ending) and Renée Elise Goldsberry (Hamilton). As many of the night’s winners explained in their acceptance speeches, it takes a village to make theater happen. Unfortunately, keeping an audience’s attention long enough to fit all of the villagers’ awards into a single ceremony is a big ask, even of die-hard theater people. So cue The Tonys: Act One, announcing the winners for best choreography, musical score, lighting design, and more.
The first standing ovation of the night went to Gary Edwin Robinson, awarded for excellence in theatre education for his work on the theatre-arts program at Boys and Girls High School in Brooklyn. “I told you I was going to the Tony Awards one day!” Robinson exclaimed to his family as he wielded his award.
Partners in life and choreography, Buena Vista Social Club duo Justin Peck and Patricia Delgado took home the Tony for best choreography. Upon accepting the award, Delgado revealed that she and Peck had actually danced to a Buena Vista Social Club song at their wedding—to which the audience couldn’t help but give a big aw.
Cynthia Erivo’s rousing opening number
Before long, though, Criss and Goldsberry said their goodbyes to the audience (for the time being, anyway) and passed the torch to Cyntia Erivo, who did not disappoint with her original opening number, “Sometimes All You Need Is a Song.” As she stepped down from the stage and into the audience, asking Kristin Chenoweth, Aaron Tveit, and Adam Lambert to sing out the title of the song into her microphone, it really did feel like one big family reunion.
Erivo went on to center that homecoming feeling in her monologue. “There’s no place like home, and Broadway has always been mine,” she said, donning an appropriately ruby red GapStudio dress. (With the trailer for Wicked: For Good released just last week, this is sure to be the start of a second wave of Oz-focused styling for Erivo.)
She went on to give the audience the musical moments they craved, as well as the humor they needed to power through the three-plus-hour main ceremony. Just take her announcing Jonathan Groff as a “man who makes everyone wet” before he took the stage for his teaser performance from Just in Time. (Leave it to the Tony Awards to make you realize that your crush on Jonathan Groff is probably the least unique thing about you.)
The In Memoriam segment
This year’s In Memoriam segment felt particularly moving. In September, the inimitable and beloved Tony-winning actor Gavin Creel died from cancer at just 48. To honor Creel and the other theater talent who passed this year, his dear friend Sara Bareilles joined Erivo on stage for a rendition of “Tomorrow” that was both heartbreaking and heart lifting. (The song was also, of course, a direct tribute to its composer, Charles Strouse, who died just last month.) While the show cut to a commercial break immediately after the tribute, Radio City Music Hall was totally silent for several moments, even after the lights came up.
A conclusion to one of the most exciting Tony races ever
The nerves in the room were basically palpable before the announcement of best female actress in a musical. It had been a race between Nicole Scherzinger and Audra McDonald since the start, and when Scherzinger’s name was read out loud (by Oprah Winfrey, no less), excitement exploded throughout the crowd as audience members leaped to their feet. While I have no doubt that the level of uproar would have been the same for McDonald, I do think that the audience was excited to cheer on a Broadway underdog (that is, compared to the highly—historically!—Tony-decorated McDonald). When Scherzinger accepted her Tony, she circled back to the homecoming idea at the heart of the evening. “Growing up, I always felt like I didn’t belong. But you all have made me feel like I belong and I have come home.”
The Hamilton reunion!
But, unsurprisingly, I don’t think I’m alone in saying the best moment of the night was Hamilton’s 10-year-anniversary mash-up performance. Lin-Manuel Miranda teased via TikTok over the weekend that the cast would give us all the highlights of the musical in the few minutes they were allotted. I was sitting around a group of audience members about my age—people who were in high school when Hamilton opened on Broadway in 2015—and the collective excitement we felt at the sound of the first few notes of “Non-Stop” sent me right back to 10th grade, singing the lyrics alone in my car the first week I got my license. Then, looking around, I realized that it wasn’t just me or the other 20-somethings but the entire audience dancing in their seats, bumping to the music. I hadn’t seen a room this captivated since the Eras Tour. It once again felt as though history was happening in Manhattan.
Later, a little after 11 p.m., as Erivo sang the house down with a Dreamgirls parody that recapped the night, audience members had already risen to their feet, applauding. The 2025 Tonys felt like a win for everyone—and like Broadway was officially, officially back.