The idea of stringing together snippets from Tony Award telecasts over the years made for such a logical, breezy PBS special last year that it’s no surprise there’s a follow-up.
“Broadway’s Lost Treasures” is now officially a series, with the second installment (7:30 p.m. Thursday, WTTW-Ch. 11) playing as painless and pleasurable as the first. True, the name is a tad hyperbolic: Most of these clips are familiar to denizens of certain North Side video bars, where they’ve been a regular feature for decades. But others may only remember them from their original network telecast.
Most of the Tony excerpts collected in “Broadway’s Lost Treasures II” date from the 1980s, and many actually reprise performances themselves, revived briefly as part of the award show’s perennial retrospectives. Still, some are knockouts, beginning with Patti LuPone’s brassy lead to the tap extravaganza from the Lincoln Center revival of “Anything Goes” to Jerry Orbach’s reprise of his comic striptease as Billy Flynn in “Chicago.”
Sadly, some of these clips evoke performers no longer with us, providing a kind of impromptu in memoriam: Michael Jeter’s career high as the rubbery milquetoast in “Grand Hotel,” Nell Carter’s key role as a member of the sensational original cast from “Ain’t Misbehavin'” and Gregory Hines as Jelly Roll Morton in a scene from “Jelly’s Last Jam.”
Although television is a medium normally more effective in close-up, the special shows how cagey the Tonys have been over the years showcasing choral extravaganzas. There’s the deliciously febrile rendition of “Sit Down, You’re Rockin’ the Boat” from the Jerry Zaks “Guys and Dolls” revival to “One Day More,” the Act 1 finale to “Les Miserables,” a bit of Broadway history memorably and thankfully archived here.
An offering from “Great Performances,” “Broadway’s Lost Treasures II” is the next best thing to being there, proof that the magic of live theater can make for magical TV too.
