It is once again that time of year – Tony season. On May 1st, previous Tony winners Sarah Paulson and Wendell Pierce announced the nominees for the six big-hitting categories, including both best play and best musical, on “CBS Mornings,” with the rest of the categories being announced on the Tony Awards YouTube channel only a half hour later. This year’s list of nominees is one of the best I have seen, to the point that it is nearly impossible to make predictions for who will win each category. I was fortunate enough to get the chance to see three shows that are each nominated for several Tonys this season – “Maybe Happy Ending,” “John Proctor is the Villain,” and “Stranger Things: The First Shadow.” In this article, I am going to give a brief explanation of what each show is about and the show’s history, then give my thoughts on each production, and then discuss which of their Tony nominations I think they are going to win. 

Let’s start with what I believe is the most beautiful musical I have ever seen and my personal pick to win the Tony for Best Musical – “Maybe Happy Ending.”

“Maybe Happy Ending” follows two robots named Oliver and Claire. They are HelperRobots, which are essentially servants to their human owners. Both Oliver and Claire are living in an apartment complex made for discontinued versions of HelperBots, which leads them to meet when Claire needs to borrow Oliver’s charger. After this, we watch as they bond, take a road trip to South Korea’s Jeju Island to try and find Oliver’s owner, James, and begin to fall in love. The show originally debuted in Seoul back in 2016 in the show’s original Korean language format, which would go on to be presented in various cities in Japan and China. The English version that is now on Broadway was only created in 2020, when the show ran in Atlanta, Georgia. Composer Will Aronson and lyricist Hue Park worked together to create both the music and the book for the show, which makes this their Broadway debut. The show stars Emmy Award-winning actor Darren Criss, who is best known for his work in the show “Glee” as Oliver, up-and-coming Broadway star Helen J. Shen as Claire, Marcus Choi as James, and Dez Duron as Gil Brentley.

Now, on to my thoughts on the show. Let me just start this by saying that I don’t cry at musicals, and haven’t cried at any media I have consumed in a long time. The only time I’ve ever come close to crying at a musical was during my second time seeing “Beetlejuice the Musical” during Lydia’s song “Home.” However, this show made me cry so much that I was worried I wouldn’t be able to stage door because I would still be sobbing. I went in knowing that I was going to cry. As I expected, the sets were beautiful and amazing – it was the whole reason I was coming to the show, so this didn’t surprise me. At one point, I heard the set squeaking as it moved, but besides the moving component of the set needing some oil, it was perfect. The music was interesting – definitely something to write home about, as I have not seen a lot of musicals that used jazz and incorporated it smoothly into the plot. 

The cast was small but perfect – I think the fact that the cast was only four people plus one plant helped with the show’s atmosphere. Darren Criss and Helen J. Shen as Oliver and Claire, respectively, were adorable. Darren leaned into the robot part of his character without it seeming over the top, and Claire managed to be both robot and human in the best way possible. I do want to give some love to Helen J. Shen, as she was not nominated for a Tony this season. I understand why this is, as this season has a lot of strong leading ladies, but she really deserved a nomination, in my opinion. 

I have two favorite moments in the show  – one that almost made me cry, and one that did. First, the firefly moment  – this is when Oliver and Claire, after Oliver discovers that his owner James is dead, goes to visit the fireflies on Jeju Island, and the lights make a bunch of fireflies as the pit comes on to the stage in the center and plays as the fireflies fly around them. Now, the moment that did make me cry  – the end. After dating for an undetermined amount of time, Claire is starting to break down quicker, and she knows that she is going to die soon. Because of this, she tells Oliver that they have to break up and erase their memories of each other, since now, thanks to James’s son, both Oliver and Claire have their passwords that enable them to go into their systems and erase memories. Between the music of the title song, “Maybe Happy Ending,” the beautiful set, and how the two actors have perfectly built up their relationship  – let’s just say, everyone was in tears. I know this section is a lot shorter than others, but honestly, I do not think words can do this show justice  – it is one of, if not the most beautiful musical I have ever seen. 

“Maybe Happy Ending” has been nominated for ten Tony awards – Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Original Score, Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical, Best Scenic Design of a Musical, Best Costume Design of a Musical, Best Lighting Design of a Musical, Best Sound Design of a Musical, Best Direction of a Musical, and Best Orchestrations. Based on the awards the show has already won and the general consensus online, I can confidently say that I believe “Maybe Happy Ending” will win Best Musical. Along with this, I would not be surprised if Darren Criss wins for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical. Lastly, though opinions on these vary, “Maybe Happy Ending” has a good chance of taking home Best Book of a Musical, Best Original Score, and Best Direction of a Musical. These last three are more up in the air, as I could see the Tony judges wanting to give other shows these awards, since Maybe Happy Ending will already be winning Best Musical. In general, expect Maybe Happy Ending to sweep at the Tonys. 

I will end with this-the show’s ticket prices have definitely gone up, since it has gotten incredibly popular. But if you have the time and resources to see a Broadway show, you must see this one. 

Tickets for Maybe Happy Ending are available at Broadway.com

Next up is “John Proctor is the Villain.”

“John Proctor is the Villain” is a play originally written by Kimberly Belflower for The Farm Theater’s College Collaboration project, a program meant to help playwrights advance their careers. After smaller regional productions of the show at schools and universities such as Furman University, which was one of the universities chosen to work with Belflower on the production, it was announced on October 17th of 2024, that the show would get a limited Broadway run starting in March 2025. This announcement came with the news that Sadie Sink, known for her role as Max Mayfield in the hit Netflix series “Stranger Things” would play the character of Shelby Holcomb, and that Danya Taymor, who most recently won a Tony for her directing of Tony-winning musical “The Outsiders,” would direct this production. Besides them, we also learned that the show would feature scenic design done by the company AMP Scenography with Teresa Williams in charge, costumes done by Sarah Laux, lighting design from Natasha Katz, sound design created by Palmer Hefferan, and projection design done by Hannah Wasileski. Lastly, movement director Tilly Evans-Krueger, intimacy coordinator Ann James, and voice and dialect coach Gigi Buffington round out the production crew. 

“John Proctor is the Villain” follows a high school English class that is reading The Crucible while dealing with the effects of the #MeToo movement on their small town in rural Georgia. The story follows a friend group made up of five girls – previously mentioned Shelby played by Sadie Sink, Beth Powell (played by Fina Strazza), Raelynn Nix (played by Amalia Yoo), Ivy Watkins (played by Maggie Kuntz), and Nell Shaw (played by Morgan Scott) – as they deal with boy troubles and friendship issues while their lives are rocked by revelations about Ivy’s father inappropriate behavior with his secretary, and even that their teacher had been having an intimate relationship with Shelby.

Now, on to my thoughts. Going in, I knew next to nothing about the musical, barring that it was about high schoolers reading “The Crucible” and that Sadie Sink was in it. And honestly, after seeing the show, I was glad I knew nothing about the plot. I had even bought the script ahead of time since I saw it in a bookstore the last time I was in New York, but never got around to reading it. I have never been so glad that I was too busy to read a book, since I think this show is one that is best to go into blind. The experience was pretty good all around, but there are two main parts of this show I want to talk about  – the acting and the writing. 

To start, all of the actors were phenomenal. I know I feel like I am saying this about most of the shows, but this one especially. They are helped by an amazing script (which I’ll get to in a second), but I felt like they played off of each other very well, and that the show would have been just as good even if they did not have Sadie Sink there. Speaking of Sadie Sink, despite being on all of the posters and Playbills, I would count her character of Shelby as more of a side character, which I think actually helps her and the show. It gives her big moments to shine and show off how good of an actress she is, while also giving the other characters time to lead the story. Besides Sadie Sink, my other favorite actor from the show is probably Gabriel Ebert, who played Mr. Smith, the class’s English teacher, who we discover groomed Shelby, and in the show is shown to be in the process of grooming Shelby’s classmate Beth. Once again, he was supported by the script, but the fact that he can pull off this character that has to essentially manipulate the audience like he is manipulating his students to believe he is a good person is astounding to me. 

Finally, what I have been raving about this entire review is the script. Oh my god. It is so perfect that I will be mad if this show does not win at least one Tony. First of all, Kimberly Belflower, the author, writes her teen characters so naturally to the point that I felt like the conversations the characters were having were ones that my friends and I could have had at some point. Also, as someone who has dabbled in creative writing, I can not begin to express how hard dialogue writing can be at times. So the fact that she not only has such a rich understanding of her characters that she can do this, but also write dialogue for characters younger than her, is impressive. Not only that, but Mr. Smith is written so amazingly. I love how he is crafted so perfectly as a manipulator that you essentially love him until you learn the truth about him, but have no idea that he is a bad person until Shelby reveals the truth. I especially like the scene where he and Beth are talking about the green light metaphor in “The Great Gatsby,” not just because I like the musical, but because it is one of those scenes that you only really understand and see his manipulation after the fact. However, my one complaint with the script is also about Mr. Smith. After it was revealed that he groomed Shelby, I felt like the character got a lot sloppier with his manipulation of the other characters, especially Beth, which doesn’t make sense since at that point even if most of the town didn’t believe Shelby he still would not want to give anyone a reason to think that Shelby might be right. This might be because the script writer wanted the audience to have zero doubts about what Shelby was saying, but I still feel like he was getting a little too obvious, especially with how mean he was being towards Shelby in the last scene when he claims that he feels bad for her since according to him she’s mentally unstable. His behavior ramping up could make sense with his manipulation of Beth, since he was probably trying to get her to the place that he had Shelby when he assaulted her, but I still felt like he was being a little too obvious, given how subtle his manipulative behavior had been up until that point. Besides that small issue, I feel like the script was really strong, and the show was overall great, definitely something I would recommend, especially to teen girls my age, as they will feel very seen. This and “Maybe Happy Ending” are the two main shows that I’m recommending on this list, and I think this is definitely something you should see if you get the chance, especially if you are a teenager.

Now, on to what Tonys the show has been nominated for and which ones I think it will win. The show is nominated for Best Play, Best Lighting Design of a Play, Best Sound Design of a Play, and Best Direction of a Play, while the actors from the show that got nominated are Sadie Sink for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play, Gabriel Ebert for Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play, and Fina Strazza for Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Play. Unfortunately, I don’t think “John Proctor is the Villain” is going to win any of the Tonys it is nominated for. While I’m a huge fan of the show, it is going up against some of the best of the season, such as “The Pictures of Dorian Grey,” “Oh Mary!” and Kara Young in “Purpose.” 

First off, I do not think Sadie Sink is going to win over Sarah Snook. Given the fact that “The Pictures of Dorian Grey” is not nominated for Best Play and that the general buzz is that Sarah Snook will win, the odds do not appear to be in Sink’s favor. Now, for Best Play, my reasoning is while “John Proctor is the Villain” did win the Outer Critics award for Best Play against a lot of the same shows that are nominated for the Tony category (mainly “The Hills of California” and “Purpose”) it was not up against “Oh Mary!” a very popular show that many, including myself, predict will take the award, that being said, I have seen people who believe that “John Proctor is the Villain” is more deserving in this category. 

Next, Kara Young seems to be a standout for Best Featured Actress in a Play, and with both this and the fact that I do not see this show winning a lot in the other categories it is nominated for, it would make sense if Kara Young wins this. The one category that I have seen a mix of opinions on is Best Featured Actor in a Play, and this may be the one category that “John Proctor is the Villain” could win. I have seen some support for the nominee from “Oh Mary!” for this award, but I feel like if “Oh Mary!” wins Best Play AND Best Leading Actor in a Play (I would not be surprised if that would happen), then they might want to give this Tony to another play, such as “John Proctor is the Villain.” Overall, though many others and I believe that “John Proctor is the Villain” does deserve to win many of its Tony nominations, I would not be surprised if it doesn’t win any, or at most, wins one.

Overall, I think that while this show is not going to win many of the Tonys it is nominated for, people should definitely see it. Tickets are available at Broadway.com, though the show does close on July 6th of this year.

Our last show of this article is “Stranger Things: The First Shadow.”

Something that not a lot of people who aren’t close to me don’t know is that during middle school, I was a huge fan of the Netflix series “Stranger Things.” While I still enjoy the show, my love of theater has basically taken over my life. So, when I heard that the West End “Stranger Things” play was transferring over to Broadway, I knew I had to see it. Even better, our spring break week lined up perfectly with their opening night. I was glad to have managed to see this show on its very first Broadway run. 

The production, written by Matt and Ross Duffer (the original creators of “Stranger Things”), Kate Telfrey (one of the writers for the TV show), and Jack Thorne (known for being the playwright behind “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child”), debuted in London’s West End in 2023. There, it won two Olivier Awards during the 2024 season for Best Entertainment or Comedy Play and Best Set Design, and was nominated for three others (Best Director, Best Lighting Design, and Best Sound Design). Later that year, it was announced that the show would be transferring to Broadway in March of 2025, with Louis McCartney, who starred in the show as Henry Creel, also making the transfer. The cast itself consists of 34 actors in total, and Louis McCartney is joined by his cast members Gabrielle Nevaeh (Patty Newby), Juan Carlos (Bob Newby), Alison Jaye (Joyce Maldonado, better known as Joyce Byers), Burke Swanson (Jim Hopper Jr), Rosie Benton (Virigina Creel), Alex Breaux (Dr. Brenner), and T.R. Knight (Victor Creel) leading the cast 

On to the topic of the show itself, which was great. To summarize the plot, it is the story of how the main villain of season four of the television series, Henry Creel (AKA Vecna,) became evil, starting with him and his family moving to Hawkins, a fictional small town in Indiana, and showing him going to high school and interacting with the adults we know from the show, and falling in love with Patty Newby, the sister of the character Bob Newby from season two of the TV show. As the play goes on, Creel’s character starts to become closer to the villain we see in the series, starting with killing town pets and going as far as killing his mother and sister. That being said, we also see that he was never inherently evil, just a kid with powers he didn’t know how to control, who was labeled a monster by his family and manipulated by Dr. Brenner (another character from the show). 

The plot and Henry Creel’s character are very interesting, but you can tell both were written for people who have already seen the television series, and I feel like you need that prior knowledge to understand what is going on. Along with this, my only complaint is that even as someone with extensive knowledge of this show, I was getting confused at some points, not often, mainly just with Henry and Patty’s parents’ backstories. I could see if you have not seen any of “Stranger Things” how it might not be for you, since firstly, a lot of the show relies on the fact that you understand the alternate dimension of the “Upside Down” and how Henry’s powers work, and second, you would probably just be very confused why people are applauding when characters from the TV series get introduced.

However, that is just one small complaint underneath a pile of praise. For one, if you did not know ahead of time that a lot of these young actors were making their Broadway debut, you would have thought they had been doing shows for years. This can be said for every character, but it applies the most to Louis McCartney, the actor playing Henry Creel. He played the character over in the West End, and as I previously mentioned, the production brought him over for the show, and you can see why. He is perfect for the role – his abilities astounded everyone in that theater in ways that I can not even describe. He is not the only amazing actor in the show, though, and I want to shout out Juan Carlos, Alison Jaye, and Burke Swanson. The three of them all did an amazing job playing Bob, Joyce, and Jim. I especially loved Alison Jaye, as while I was always going to love that they made Joyce into a theater kid, she played the character so accurately that it was like the casting director had managed to find a younger Winona Ryder, who played the character in the television show. And while her character is original to the play, Gabrielle Nevaeh’s Patty Newby and her plot of wanting to find her mother was really interesting. A standout moment was when Henry Creel was hallucinating and believed that he was fighting Patty, which was just a great scene acting-wise. All the adults were amazing as well, but it was really the kids that tied this show together.

However, amazing acting and a great plot probably would have still made me feel like the almost three-hour play was a little too long. What makes the length of this show worth it is the special effects. At the beginning of the show, the director came out and warned us that they might have to hold during moments since this was only the second time they had done the entire production on this stage. Despite this, there was only one tech problem, and it was so small that I completely forgot about it until my dad brought it up later. There were so many different special effects in the show that I legitimately can not even remember them all. My three favorite special effects were Henry Creel opening the gate to the “Upside Down,” Henry killing Claudia’s cat with his powers, and the giant Mind Flayer that came down on to the stage and even moved, with an honorable mentions going to the giant boat set at the beginning of the show and every single time that actors levitated. Overall, the special effects were the star of the show, and I would even say that if you have not watched the TV show but are interested in the production and staging of theater, either watch the show or go in ready to not fully understand the production just so you can see those special effects.

After the show, I stagedoored despite the rain, and the cast was all very friendly. The crowd was not huge, but a decent size, which makes sense for opening previews. The actors seemed unorganized at the stage door, but that can be expected because this is, for a lot of them, their first Broadway show, so it would be understandable if they were still trying to learn how the stage door works. 

Now, when it comes to this Tony season, this show is in a slightly different position than both “Maybe Happy Ending” and “John Proctor is the Villain,” as this show is already going to win a Tony. This is not a prediction of mine or anyone else; we have already found out it will win an award. This is because “Stranger Things: The First Shadow” is being honored with a Special Tony Award. The Special Recognition Tony Awards recognize extraordinary contributions to the world of theatre. This year, the crew behind the illusions and technical effects of “Stranger Things: The First Shadow” is being honored for their work with one of these Tonys. And while this does not guarantee it will win any other Tonys, I do believe it shows us how the Tony Awards voters are leaning. “Stranger Things: The First Shadow” and its cast is nominated in five categories – Louis McCartney is nominated for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play, and the show itself is nominated for Best Scenic Design of a Play, Best Costume Design of a Play, Best Lighting Design of a Play, and Best Sound Design of a Play. First of all, as I previously mentioned in the “John Proctor is the Villain” section, the consensus amongst Broadway fans is that Cole Escola will win for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play for their performance in “Oh Mary!” Sadly, though he is my personal choice to win in this category, I do not see Louis McCartney winning, especially given how young he is (though there are exceptions, most of the youngest Tony winners were in their twenties when they won). However, I believe that the show will win all of its other Tony nominations. I know that is a bold thing to say, but many others seem to agree. And sure, they might lose costume design, but that is the only category I can see there even being a small possibility of them losing. Yes, I am biased as I have loved this piece of media for years, but as a person who has practically dedicated her life to theater, this show has the production level that is nothing short of magic, and even if one hates this show, they can not deny the fact that its scenic, lighting, and sound design is something truly special.

Overall, a great show for a “Stranger Things” fan who’s also interested in theater, however if you want to see it I would recommend watching the TV show because that is probably the only way you will understand what is going on. 

Tickets to “Stranger Things: The First Shadow” are available at Broadway.com.

So there we have it, my thoughts and predictions on three of the Tony-nominated shows this season! Given that the ceremony is only a little over two weeks away, on June 8th, 2025, we will see soon if my predictions were correct – let’s hope this article does not age like milk.