Meet the Nominees: Camille A. Brown
NEW YORK -- Broadway is abuzz after nominations for the 75th Annual Tony Awards were announced.
The trophies will be handed out on June 12 on CBS2, and CBS2's Dave Carlin got the chance to interview some of the nominees in person at the annual "Meet the Nominees" event.
Camille A. Brown earned two nominations for her work on the revival of the play "for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf." She's up for Best Direction of a Play and Best Choreography.
The play opened at the Booth Theatre in April and was originally scheduled to run through Aug. 14, but in May, they announced it would be closing early on May 22.
The announcement led to an outpouring of support from theater fans, however, and the show extended its run to June 5.
"I think everyone should see it. I think there's a way. There's a way to get more and more and more and more people to see something. They better see it before before it goes away," Carlin said.
"Yes, and really a shoutout to the community who was really behind keeping this show together and alive and moving it forward. Just really grateful to our community," Brown said.
When the show first announced it would be closing early, fans on Twitter began offering to purchase tickets for those who could not afford them.
"How do you feel that people are gifting the show to other people?" Carlin asked.
"With my vision and what I wanted to share, I wanted to contribute in a really powerful way and the fact that people are responding to it in the way that they are and gifting people and encouraging people to attend and posting about it, I mean, I think it's just glorious," Brown said.
The trailblazing choreopoem first appeared on Broadway in 1976.
"You just took this jewel, and you turned it and showed us new facets of it and blew it out over the stage," Carlin said.
"It's a legacy piece, and it's been done, even though it's been 40 years since it's gone to Broadway, it's been a movie, there's been so many iterations of it. So it's like, well, what am I going to do? What am I going to say? How am I going to contribute to it? ... I focused on, well, what do I want to say with this material? How do I want to bring and support [creator] Ntozake [Shange]'s poems?" Brown said.
Brown added, "It's about the perseverance. Like yes, people experience devastating stories that you think as a person, how am I ever gonna get through this, but you believe that within the power of yourself and finding the power within yourself that you can persevere and move forward. So that's also what I think the show is really beautiful in saying."
"For colored girls..." is running at the Booth Theatre through June 5.