Many Broadway stars have made the transition to TV recently, but for the majority of them, it didn't exactly work out.
At Sunday night's 2013 Tony Awards, Andrew Rannells of the now-canceled "New Normal," Megan Hilty of the long-suffering "Smash" and Laura Benanti of the late comedy "Go On" took the opportunity to poke fun at their efforts on the small screen.
The trio teamed up with Tonys host and "How I Met Your Mother" star Neil Patrick Harris to perform a musical number (above) lamenting the struggle of landing a gig on a network series and leaving the New York stage behind for LA.
Rannells kicked things off with "I Want To Be On A TV Show," a spoof of "West Side Story's" "America." Then Hilty appeared, parodying "Gypsy's" “You Gotta Have a Gimmick." After she sang, "You gotta have a series if you want a shot at fame," Tony-winner Benanti popped up, with a bottle of liquor in hand. "I'll drink to that!" she replied, before kicking off her take on “The Ladies Who Lunch" from "Company."
"Both my shows were canceled, it's true. No joke. Haha! Not one show, but two! And so I raise a bottle to you ... Television sucks!" sang Benanti, poking fun at her ill-fated Matthew Perry series and last year's "The Playboy Club," both of which were on NBC.
The Broadway alumni took a jab at "Smash's" Will Chase, who was nominated for "The Mystery of Edwin Drood," before Harris joked, "Doing TV has its pros and cons, right? But just like the theater -- sometimes you have a hit and sometimes you don't. We can't all have long-running hit TV shows like my own."
The quartet finished off the number with their take on "What I Did for Love” from "A Chorus Line" and received a rousing round of applause from the audience.
