Glad you asked.

My daughter Myrna is involved with Camp Broadway. Last year she spent a week at Camp Broadway taking dance, singing, and acting classes in the heart of the theater district and getting backstage looks at the workings of musicals such as Wicked and Fiddler on the Roof (how cool is that...).

Every year Camp Broadway runs a great Tony Master Class weekend. Sunday started with a two-hour dance class where they study the different dance styles from nominated shows (dancing like the Cagelles from La Cage Aux Folles, like Fosse from Sweet Charity, or hoofing it from Spamalot). Then it's back to the hotel to get glammed up for the mocktail party at Alfredo's of Rome at Rockefeller Center.

Myrna looked amazing in a brand new pink dress from Camari, with black crinoline and two little black bows (very Sarah Jessica Parker, very New York). She wore sparkling little sandals and looked gorgeous. They had a group of about 20 kids at Alfredo's all dressed up, all very excited to be going to the Tonys. They offered a limited number of tickets to the parents -- so motherhood paid off big time and I got a ticket to the Tonys as well!

Even the tickets are classy -- all silver and black and glossy -- not yer average theater ticket, my friend. And it does say black tie only!

And starting early on Sunday, Radio City Music Hall gets busy! The police vans park, the red carpet goes up, the crowds start to gather. This is big time stuff for New York!

So my husband took Myrna over in style, in a pedicab, at 4:30pm while I started to get ready (the parents don't get dinner -- just the kids). I wore my best fancy black gown with my black pumps and sparkly black handbag. The best part of meeting the kids at 6:30pm is all the tourists looking at you, trying to figure out if you are somebody famous!

We filed in (squished in, really) to Radio City, opening our handbags to security. Once inside my daughter spied the I LOVE HUGH (I HUGH) t-shirts for sale. We went up to the second mezzanine where we bought one of those t-shirts and got our program. They are special bound versions -- one ticket, one program. We tentatively went to our seats and discovered all of Camp Broadway was front row second balcony -- w00t! Awesome seats! And there were two very large TV screens on either side of the stage. Myrna went nuts with excitement.

The beginning of the untelevised portion of the show was already in progress as we took out seats. Immediately we went on "celebrity watch" with our binoculars, scoping out famous people in the orchestra. Myrna "eagle-eye" Conn found Marcia Cross sitting in the front row and we followed her every move the whole night (stalkers anyone?). It was so much fun picking out the celebs -- including Kathleen Turner, Billy Crystal, and Matthew Broderick.

Idina Menzel came out and gave a number of awards before the show started and Sally Field (who is she? Asked Myrna -- yikes!) gave Edward Albee the lifetime achievement award.

Then it started!! Of course the bit between Billy Crystal and Hugh Jackman was hilarious. We furiously passed the binoculars back and forth the whole night. The sound was awesome. Hugh sounded amazing in his opening number. The live numbers from the musicals were great, lots of energy and electricity. And of course nothing was bleeped out, so we were able to hear the lyrics "Hummer in my Hummer" sung by Norbert Leo Butz!

During commercials Hugh Jackman would come out and chat with the audience, occasionally bringing a seat filler or crazed audience member up on stage for some schtick. That man is so damned charming! Also, they played video bits (a la Letterman) after every show performance where a Tony reporter would be out on the streets of Manhattan asking questions (after Dirty Rotten, the intrepid reporter asked people what they thought of Norbert Leo Butz's name, and how would they rearrange the letters to come up with a new name!).

I thought it was an interesting choice to sing "Somewhere" from West Side Story to honor Sondheim's 75th...didn't it always bug him that he was only asked to do lyrics and not music as well on that project? And thank God he wasn't?

Myrna and I screamed and hooted and then hooted and screamed. And then we did it again, even louder. And then we got up and shook our respective booties! What a night! And I've already told you in another post about how Hugh Jackman confessed his love for Myrna.

It was kind of cool sitting up high. We could see the "Christina Applegate" stunt woman fall onto a mattress and then watch the real Christina crawl out of the pit.

Walking out after it was over we rubbed elbows with Celia Keenan-Bolger of Spelling Bee and Adam Guettel who had won for Light in the Piazza (Myrna thought it was supremely cool that he was not only the grandson of Richard Rodgers, but the son of Mary Rodgers who had written the music for The Mad Show!)

Of course we took a pedicab home, pointing out all the celebrities and producers as we drove by, so elegantly outfitted in our Sunday finest.

It was an honor just to be there!

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