Jeremy! Elle! Eddie! Liev! An Exclusive Look Behind the Scenes of the 2024 Tony Awards (2024)

“I know it’s Broadway, but we’re at the ballet!”

Ariana DeBose was twirling about a space in Lincoln Center’s David H. Koch Theater, which last night hosted the 77th Tony Awards. Returning to host the ceremony for the third time, the dancer first, Oscar-winner second, was right at home in the madness. It was 4:30 p.m., just about three hours before her call time, and she’d been hailed “the busiest woman on Broadway” by The New York Times earlier that day.

“It doesn’t feel like I’m multitasking—it just sort of is to me,” she said, posing in an intricate Oscar de la Renta dress made of connected acrylic pieces resembling stained glass. Soon enough, the room she was in—a patron lounge turned speakeasy hosted by Baccarat and Basil Hayden—would become the busiest on Broadway, allowing the theater industry’s heavyweights a brief respite as they escaped the flashes of the blue carpet outside and prepared to take their seats before the show.

Another Broadway-beloved dancer, Julianne Hough, juggled three Shake Shack milkshakes and a Basil 75 (one of the speakeasy’s themed co*cktails, a take on the classic French 75) as she hustled out to prepare for her own duties cohosting the Tonys preshow. She briefly crossed paths with producer and red-carpet staple Jordan Roth, whose sheer black Rodarte look contrasted sharply with Hough’s airy, cream-colored Ermanno Scervino dress.

His vinous look—inspired by Dionysus, the Greek god of wine and theater—complemented the room’s natural elements: plum blossoms extending from hand-painted wallpaper and peaco*cks of different sizes positioned elegantly throughout. Roth’s appearance in the room, at around 5:15 p.m., was the evening’s starting gun, with a frenzy of nominees and celebrities promptly flowing in after him.

Shaina Taub (Suffs) posed for photos in a garnet pantsuit and olive-branch hair clip—unwittingly the perfect complement to the room’s brooding interior—while Deirdre O’Connell entered shyly behind Cabaret’s Gayle Rankin, demurely introducing herself as “Didi” to those unaware of the downtown favorite’s radical best-actress win just two years prior. Anna Wintour and Bee Carrozzini followed Harvey Fierstein into the bustling festivities, as Jeremy Strong stuck closely to power couple Amy Herzog and Sam Gold, whose adaptation of An Enemy of the People would net him a best-actor trophy in a few hours.

The party briefly turned into a near-religious affair upon Jessica Lange’s entrance, and everyone in the room made a point to pay their respects to the legendary actor. With the sun never setting on the Ryan Murphy empire (at least not on Broadway, where the showrunner wisely sources his talent), Lange (Mother Play) warmly greeted fellow stage-and-screen stars Billy Porter and Andrew Rannells (Gutenberg! The Musical!). Rannells’s guest, his longtime friend Zuzanna Szadkowski, also drew considerable attention: Best known as Dorota from Gossip Girl, Szadkowski had recently finished a deliriously funny run in Coach Coach off-Broadway.

Even those who, so far, only long to work with Lange stood with mouths agape. Kara Young (Purlie Victorious), soon to win her first Tony, gushed that she was happy to be alive to witness Lange live onstage. In a lime chiffon gown (with a gloriously flaring cape) designed by Bibhu Mohapatra, Young called out to an incoming Juliana Canfield (Stereophonic): “Juli-ah-na?”

“K-ah-ra?”

The two hugged and excitedly caught up, having developed a friendship during the season’s 24/7 press-and-openings cycle, which Canfield’s Stereophonic costar Sarah Pidgeon delightfully called “extracurriculars.” (For those wondering: She said the cast of this year’s best play has never partied on designer David Zinn’s hyperrealistic recording-studio set, though whether that changes now that it’s won best scenic design remains to be seen.)

The star of another show with a jaw-dropping set, Elle Fanning (Appropriate), wore a black Saint Laurent suit and bold red lip as she prepared to celebrate Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’s riotous play. Due to prior commitments, Fanning was unable to follow the production when it transferred from the nonprofit Hayes Theatre to the larger Belasco but said she reveled in being able to surprise costar (and future best-actress winner) Sarah Paulson backstage after a performance.

Elsewhere, the genial Canfield (in a sleek black dress with a flowering vine running down her side) greeted William Jackson Harper, looking sharp in a white tuxedo. With a mixture of amazement, earnestness, and understanding, she congratulated him on his nomination for Uncle Vanya, which had played its final performance at Lincoln Center’s Beaumont Theatre, only a few steps away, mere hours earlier.

By this point, guests had smoothed into the evening’s celebratory nature with bespoke drinks like the Spritzprobe (an in-joke many appreciated) and eagerly called out to each other. Taraji P. Henson, a first-time producer on Jaja’s African Hair Braiding (“I know good material when I see it”), took a minute from holding court in a corner of the room to playfully ask Leslie Odom Jr. (Purlie Victorious) if he remembered her. Henson would later oblige a guest by recording a “Happy Father’s Day” video on their phone, as Young and Amber Iman (Lempicka) joked about letting their fathers sit as they milled about. The party flowed out of the speakeasy and into the Koch Theater’s halls as ushers played their jaunty take-your-seats xylophones.

Daniel Radcliffe (Merrily We Roll Along) and partner Erin Darke efficiently snapped pics as Eddie Redmayne (Cabaret) entered wearing a black tuxedo with a cape detail and Simone Rocha brooch. “I’m the least punky human being in the world, but I’m trying to challenge that,” the actor said, explaining that he has been trying to bring a little bit of the Emcee (his character in the show) to every look this season.

Looking beyond the evening’s ceremony, the booked-and-busy director Kenny Leon spoke of a production of his due to begin rehearsals in January (likely his starry Othello, with Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal, which opens in the spring) to Adrienne Warren. Having just been announced as the stars of the first Broadway production of The Last Five Years, directed by Whitney White (Jaja’s), Warren and Nick Jonas worked the crowd together in early preparation for the intimate two-hander they’d be tackling later in the season. “Jason Robert Brown is one of the best composers of our generation,” Warren raved about that musical’s author. “Well, not my generation but all generations.”