Liberal Hollywood film director Harvey Weinstein’s Broadway production Finding Neverland failed to bring in a single Tony Award nomination this week, and while the Miramax founder is publicly taking the high road, behind closed doors he reportedly told the show’s crew the snub was a personal attack aimed at him.
Shows including An American in Paris, Hand to God, The King and I and Bradley Cooper’s The Elephant Man will be considered for the June 7 awards show, but count Neverland out.
The production, based on the Johnny Depp 2004 Miramax film of the same title, was absent from all the Tony Award conversation, and Harvey Weinstein is taking it personally.
Deadline reports the producer took the high road, and said of the snub Tuesday:
With 27 nominations today for Fun Home, The Elephant Man, The Audience and Wolf Hall, shows that we either co-invested or co-produced, we couldn’t be more thrilled. As as for Finding Neverland, our passion for it remains unwavering. I could not be more proud of the magic created on our stage by Diane Paulus and the entire Neverland team night after night, which has made this show a smash hit.
However, according to Page Six, Weinstein told the cast and crew of the Broadway show that the Tony snub “was a missile, squarely aimed at me” and “had no reflection on them or what takes place onstage every single night.”
Weinstein reportedly attended the show Tuesday night and went backstage to directly address the cast and crew, where he reassured them, and urged them not to take the awards diss personally.
A witness tells the site, Harvey then presented a cake decorated with the words, “We nominate you the best cast on Broadway.”
Weinstein has announced the show has success, having grossed more than $1 million weekly for seven weeks straight, but New York Post theater columnist Michael Riedel said of the snub: “This is Broadway telling Harvey to go away, to take his bulldozing tactics back to Hollywood and leave the business of theater to theater people.”