Tuesday, March 19, 2024

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The A.R.T. is crowing about taking home four Tony Awards for its new take on “Pippin,” which played Cambridge from Dec. 5 to Jan. 20 before opening on Broadway April 25.

It won Best Revival of a Musical; Patina Miller won Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical; Andrea Martin won Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical; and the Harvard theater’s artistic director, Diane Paulus, won Best Direction of a Musical.

The show was nominated in five other categories as well. It was beaten by Cyndi Lauper’s “Kinky Boots” in two, Sound Design of a Musical and Choreography, and by “Matilda: The Musical” in the Featured Actor in a Musical and Scenic Design categories. In Costume Design of a Musical, the winner was “Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella.”

Paulus’ award shows she succeeded in her goal of breathing new life into Stephen Schwartz’s 1972 musical. The tale – a product of its era, about a prince seeking meaning – started as a typically provocative Bob Fosse production but over the years was considered bleached by amateur productions. Paulus said choreographer Chet Walker would be returning to the style of Fosse and add elements of Fellini and circus, aided by the modern circus troupe Les 7 Doigts de la Main and its choreographer, Gypsy Snider. It was a “bold new staging of the dark and existential musical you thought you knew,” and Paulus said she hoped audiences would “be knocked out by the subject matter, by the journey, by the emotional power that is built into this story of a young man trying to find meaning in his life.”

“Pippin” has also won four 2013 Drama Desk Awards; the 2013 Drama League Award for Outstanding Revival of a Broadway or Off-Broadway Musical; and seven 2013 Outer Critics Circle Awards, according to Broadway World.