David Hyde Pierce wins his first Tony Award!
Wow! David Hyde Pierce has had quite a week. First he publicly acknowledges that he is a gay man (surprising few but still, it is nice) and on Sunday, he won the Tony Award for best actor in a musical for "Curtains."
He performed earlier in the telecast and was so damned good that I was sure he'd win until I heard Raul Esparza sing "Being Alive" from "Company." But David won and was thankful for being in a show "where a character actor could be the lead character" and he also thanked "my partner Brian - it's 24 years of listening to your damn notes - that's why I'm up here tonight."
Making it al even more perfect was that his Tony was presented by oh-so-out Harvey Fierstein and the ageless, gorgeous Bernadette Peters.
I will blog about the rest of the Tonys in a separate post...just wanted to acknowledge the latest high-profile actor to come out on this night of his great triumph!
Keep reading for some of his comments backstage as reported by Broadway.com...
David Hyde Pierce had lots of support within the press room, judging by the enthusiastic reaction to his entrance. How surprised was he? "I was completely surprised. Not only did I not expect to win, I expected to be more together than I was [on stage]. I've been to the Emmys many times, but this meant more to me than I realized because it's the theater."
Still he said, "What took the pressure off is that this is not an acting award. It's an award for the writing, choreography and for who I'm working with. I'm not being modest because I love me," he added, to laughter, "but it's like going surfing and the wave shows up." Told that Debra Monk cried at his win, he said, "I've been an emotional mess this whole week. We all have. We've been doing interviews, performing on talk shows…" Hyde Pierce stopped himself and added, "I completely forgot to mention Rob Ashford and his assistant in my speech, and I should have; he's one of the most important people." Asked about playing the lead in a Broadway show, he said, "I've always been a character actor, and now I appreciate what the supporting actors do. I feel like the flag at Iwo Jima—I have all these people holding me up and all I have to do is wave."
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Greg Hernandez, Page 2 "News Lite" columnist for the Los Angeles Daily News, gives you a fly-on-the-wall account of the Oscars and other awards show, movie premieres, film festivals and various star-studded events. He also shares his celebrity interviews as well as specially-selected videos and photos. He writes about all things pop culture through a gay man's eyes ...
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