Tony deaf

"Holy crap, this is gonna be ugly."

Had Nathan Lane uttered those words at the top of the show instead of two hours and forty-five minutes in, I could have taken evasive action. I haven't seen any of these shows, I haven't even read reviews of them, but if CBS is willing to take a ratings loss and afford Broadway three hours of prime time for self-promotion, Broadway might at least make an effort. Maybe you can't make an interesting award show out of a couple dozen clunkers, but you have to try. For example, dressing Sean Hayes in a series of silly outfits is not the same thing as hiring a host with a personality. (I assume the big kiss he planted on Kristin Chenoweth was intended as a retort to that dumb Newsweek article by Ramin Setoodeh. I'm sorry it didn't work.)

Apparently the only musicals of distinction were revivals and jukebox shows, and I couldn't tell much about the plays. There were flashing lights and wildly waving arms and legs and something called Green Day. Is Alfred Molina playing Uncle Fester, or was that someone else? Is Catherine Zeta-Jones's entire performance as bad as her singing of "Send In the Clowns"? Was I out of the room when Barbara Cook sang, or did they not even ask her, lest the audience realize that everything else was dreck? But I suspect the people downstairs had never heard of Green Day and the people upstairs had never heard of Julie Harris. The future was upstairs.

There were other things that annoyed me, but I'm feeling better. Thanks, hosting site, another killing rampage avoided through the miracle of blogging.