The Broadway community is one of the hardest working in show business. Alas, a grueling schedule demanding eight shows a week does not always allow much time to come together and celebrate. And so, after sitting through an 85 minute pre-show and a three hour main show, it’s unsurprising that guests of the Tony Awards rallied for the final act of the night: the after-parties. Vogue hopped around to a few of the best to get an inside peek at the starry celebrations…
The Carlyle’s Annual Tony Awards After-Party
While not the first stop of the evening for most, The Carlyle Hotel, where John Gore, Jamie DuMont, and Rick Miramontez were hosting their beloved traditional fete, was certainly the final destination. (That is, if you were lucky enough to make it on the guest list, which seems to get more exclusive each year.) Security is tight at the door. While confident assistants might have been able to blag their way inside in previous years, anyone who arrived at the door on Sunday to try their luck without an invitation was unsuccessful. Those lucky enough to make it through the revolving doors were greeted to a packed lobby, where winners took portraits with their Tonys. Trays of sliders, fries, and shrimp cocktails were passed around, and Champagne glasses were being filled to the rim. In Dowling’s, Ali Louis Bourzgui, who just won the award for best featured actor in a musical, was sharing a couch with his partner, Tassy. His newly claimed hardware sat on top of the table in a puddle of spilled martini—collateral damage in the excited flurry of handshakes coming his way. “There’s something that feels very ‘old Broadway’ about being at The Carlyle,” Bourzgui told Vogue. “The coolest thing about this party is seeing these people you’ve always looked up to. I just saw Brian Stokes Mitchell, and I told him that I listened to all of his songs, especially from Ragtime, while driving to my voice lessons. My heroes are here, so to be in the same room as them is really humbling.”
You couldn’t make it too far without seeing a Glee cast member: Alex Newell, Kevin McHale, Darren Criss, and Chris Colfer were all in attendance. Among them were Lorne Michaels (toasting his Schmigadoon! win), Nicole Scherzinger, Tom Felton, Micaela Diamond, and Bowen Yang. Jim Parsons reflected on his experience playing Ruth DeWitt Bukater in Titanique—his seventh Broadway show:“Titanique is very special. There is something extremely joyous about the material and the people who are drawn to work on it. It made our cast incredibly close, and it made the Tonys so much more meaningful than anything I’ve done before. Backstage, waiting to go on for that opening number tonight with all of those other actors from all of the other musicals, you got the chills, you got excited, you could’ve cried by the time it was over. It was so beautifully intense.”
Upstairs, the dance floor was swelling while trays of caviar-topped chicken nuggets and crepe stations were preparing to satiate guests who would be brave enough to stay past 3:00 a.m. In the piano bar, Megan Thee Stallion celebrated her Tonys debut with friends, while Andrew Durand and Daniel Radcliffe and his wife Erin Darke huddled closely in conversation. In the background was the pianist’s rendition of Elegance from Hello Dolly!—a tune that felt rather fitting for both the crowd and venue that were its audience.
