Corey Brunish nabs his fifth Tony Award

The longtime Portland theater figure and Broadway producer wins again, this time for the musical revival of "Parade."
Corey Brunish at Monday’s Tony Awards, holding his newest.

This is beginning to be a habit: Corey Brunish walked away from Sunday evening’s annual Tony Awards ceremony with yet another trophy, this one as a producer of Alfred Uhry and Jason Robert Brown’s Parade, this year’s winner for best revival of a musical.

It was Brunish’s fifth Tony win, following last year’s award as a producer of Company, also in the best musical revival category, and earlier wins as a producer of Porgy and BessPippin, and Once on This Island.

Brunish, a longtime Portland actor, singer, and director who has gone on to produce or invest in many Broadway and Broadway touring shows, maintains a home in Lake Oswego as well as residences in New York and Tennessee.

Parade made its Broadway debut in December 1998, and the current revival is timely in a period of political and ethnic strife. The musical is based on the 1913 trial and 1915 lynching of the Jewish Leo Frank in Georgia.

Other big winners in Sunday’s 76th annual Tony Awards ceremony included Tom Stoppard’s Leopoldstadt (best play), David Lindsay-Abaire’s Kimberly Akimbo (best musical), and Suzan-Lori Parks’ Top Dog/Underdog (best revival of a play). You can read recent ArtsWatch takes on Leopolstadt by Martha Ullman West, and on Leopoldstadt and sever other major shows by Misha Berson. See NPR’s story on the major winners here.

Bob Hicks, Executive Director of Oregon ArtsWatch, has been covering arts and culture in the Pacific Northwest since 1978, including 25 years at The Oregonian. Among his art books are Kazuyuki Ohtsu; James B. Thompson: Fragments in Time; and Beth Van Hoesen: Fauna and Flora. His work has appeared in American Theatre, Biblio, Professional Artist, Northwest Passage, Art Scatter, and elsewhere. He also writes the daily art-history series "Today I Am."

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