According to this Playbill article, the Tony Committee has decided that the 2008 Tonys will include awards for Best Sound Design of a Play and Best Sound Design of a Musical. I’m happy for my friends and colleagues who are sound designers and engineers who have had their contributions ignored for so long. It’s just too bad that it took so damn long and that so many worthy shows in past seasons did not have the opportunity to be recognized.
The big question is whether the voters will have any idea how to judge good sound, or if they will even care enough to think about it, or simply use it as an opportunity to throw another vote in for their favorite show. But there’s so much wrong with the Tonys that this is hardly a problem unique to sound, although I think it will be magnified in this category because most people tend not to notice sound unless it’s bad.
At any rate, it’s a tiny bit of progress, and it’s good to see the Tony Committee joining the late 20th Century.
