Tony Awards Struggle to Attract Viewers

The 76th edition of the Tony Awards - Broadway’s answer to the Oscars - aired from the United Palace theater, New York City on Sunday night, with Tom Stoppard’s family drama Leopoldstadt winning Best Play and Kimberly Akimbo taking home the trophy for Best Musical. Due to the ongoing WGA’s writers strike which started May 2, this year’s event was unscripted, marking just the second time in the ceremony’s history that had happened.

Data collected by Nielsen shows how the Tony Awards’ viewership has plummeted in the past three decades. Where more than 10 million people tuned in to watch the show in 1990, the figure had dropped to a record low of only 2.62 million people in 2021. Looking even further back provides an even more extreme difference, with viewership having hit more than 20 million in 1974.

Live televised awards ceremonies in general have seen declining audience rates over the years, with the Oscars falling from some 43 million viewers in 2014 to 23 million in 2020, while the Emmys fell to an all-time low of 5.92 million viewers in 2022. According to Forbes, this is partly due to the increase of competition from other entertainment sources, particularly with the growth of streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon Prime. At the same time, figures might have been impacted by scheduling clashes with sporting and other televised events.

While the Tonys saw an uptick of viewers in 2022, hitting 3.86 million viewers, the number was still the second lowest on record.