How excited am I to be going to the media room for the Tonys for the first time? So excited I have crossed all the way over into a kind of catatonia!

Linda Winer from Newsday made me promise to give her the full report, and asked what I was going to wear--she would be covering at home, wearing a t-shirt and eating pizza. The required garb is formal -- guys have to wear tuxes -- so my dress is a greeny-beigy soft handkerchief hem, spaghetti-strap, kneelength.

Sixth avenue has been closed off all day for a street fair, so Tony guests who are not red carpet nominees had to walk the last part of the way to Radio City (or if they were media, to the Rainbow Room around the corner at Rockefeller Center). As I cross sixth avenue, I join a party of four, also in tuxes and evening dresses. My cab driver from Penn Station (I commute from New Jersey) leaves me off on 50th and Broadway, so I had to walk down two and a half avenues. Fortunately my silver toe-ring sandals are comfortable. The woman in the evening gown ahead of me is prepared; she's wearing flat silver flip-flops. Half the people in the street on their way over are in hot hot hot in-the-city-attire, and the others are in black tie. One of the most surreal elements of Tony night is how in midtown there are all these wandering waifs in evening dress. I even spied a man getting on my train in New Jersey in a tuxedo, too.

All the lookyloos are out on 50th by the corner of Radio City. Merely getting through the four person deep throng on the sidewalk to get to the door is a challenge. Once inside I would not know where to go but a journalist carrying three Starbucks (one of them iced, I noticed wistfully) tells me which elevator to get on to get to the lobby of the Rainbow Room, which is also upstairs on the 64th floor.

As I check in, so does a whole gang ("my Posse," one of them said) from Playbill.com. They sit catty-corner to me, closer to the stage. A lady from "Hello" argues gently at the check-in that she should not have to go get her press credentials downstairs. While she and the registrars go back and forth, another girl checks me in and shows me to my seat. As instructed, I went to the American Theatre Wing Offices on Friday and signed in and picked up my credentials--a Tony media lansard. Given the very interested crowd downstairs, this makes sense to me. There's no way a publicist could recognize us or keep track of us otherwise.

When I arrive in the print room, there are about ten other people there already, and some staff. Most of the men are in tuxes, the women wear dresses, but in my cocktail dress I am by far the most dressed-- I would feel self-conscious except for (A)I know I am going to a party after, so I have an excuse, and (B) I am sitting over by the windows, near the wall.

I am the first one at my table, but I see that I will be joined by two people from WOR Radio 710 and someone from the New York Post. TV reporters and others are in different rooms. Seattle Gay News and Greater Philadelphia Newspaper Group will be at the table behind me, with Reuters the table behind them. If there's a hierarchy involved in where we are seated, it isn't clear.

Today I went to the mall near me and bought some new makeup, a strapless push-up bra (important if you're working and wearing a low-cut dress!) and an ethernet cable. I was told I would need an ethernet cable. But here on the table, we are all set up with one each, so now I have an extra cable I needn't have bought. Since my seat is next to the window, I have a glorious view of the Manhattan skyscape (seen through a heat-dimming scrim).

People began saying "hey, how are you" to one another and catching up.

Through the door behind me, I could see a buffet table. How nice! It makes me feel secure to know there are some calories out there. They are going to take care of us and keep us watered and caffeined. Hurrah! The desserts on the buffet line are amazing. We're talking little cannoli, brownies, tartlets, little strange round chocolate things that are amazing. The plates are teeny tiny though so they clearly don't want us to eat a lot of them or too much at once.

As people get busy setting up their laptops and hooking up to the internet, we are shown the red carpet arrivals on a monitor up front, courtesy of NY1. Sinead Cusack and Jeremy Irons are such a glamorous couple. He hasn't been here since 84 for the Real Thing, but will be coming back next spring. Cusack in my view completely deserves the Best Featured Actress award, but probably has little chance. When he returns, she will be doing something at BAM. That's news to me--good news.

When they interview Mark Rylance on the red carpet and ask him how it compares, he says "it's very red, it doesn't compare to anything."

Chris Jones from Chicago is here, sitting catty corner to me... So that's at least one person I know! Chris and I met in Alabama when I was the literary manager at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival. It's 7:12 and we were instructed to get here by 7:15 but I would say this room is not even half full yet...

There is a little platform/stage at the front of the room, with a backdrop that says CBS Tony, and three microphones. Somebody just stood up there and had lights focused on him.And a photographer has walked in. And one of the WOR guys, a jolly man with white hair, who brought a transistor radio and headphones to listen to, "can you guess?" he asked. "They would put the US open on on the same night as the Tonys! Tiger Woods was just hurt," he said. His name is David Richardson. Of course, everybody assumes I am from Pittsburgh and I keep having to say I'm just covering for Pittsburgh.

And very quickly, they begin escorting in the winners. The winners for that first hour, the mostly untelevised hour, come thick and fast. There are many questions and full, thoughtful answers. This changes as the evening wears on. The handlers are very good at looking all around the room to see who wants to ask a question, the guy with the microphone is careful to hover in different parts of the room too. Nevertheless, it often feels as though only about 5 people are doing all the question asking. One of them is Isa Goldberg. She tells me later that the print room was unusually subdued this year. It's true that some of the major critics are not there--they could be in other rooms or perhaps don't feel the need to attend at all. Most of the questions aren't very interesting, and "what are you doing next?" gets asked of everyone. Still, it's delightful when flashes of sheer joy and humanity flash through a "I want to thank the world; I'm humble and honored" speechifying.

Sonia Friedman, one of the producers of the surprise hit farce "Boeing-Boeing" suggests that one reason the play is funnier now than it was forty years ago is that "we're through political correctness and we're out the other side." I do think the play has a kind of refreshing candour about the battle of the sexes, but to suggest that "we're out the other side" strikes me as optimistic. Linda Winer is still one of the only female first-string critics around. Asked about her next project, Friedman says, "We're going to be doing 'The Seagull,' it is coming here, we haven't announced it yet but I suppose we have now."

A girl enters in a short blue sequined dress. I am no longer, officially, the most overdressed person in the room.

At 8 p.m. a bunch of journalists come in. These are obviously the jaded creatures who know the ropes and know exactly how much time they have. I can't imagine! Many of the seats are never filled at all, despite their being assigned. It's so competitive to be accredited--not every outlet succeeds. Why wouldn't you show up?

Even though the questions asked of the winners are often mundane the answers are sometimes revealing. Todd Rosenthal, who won for Best Scenic Design of a Play for "August: Osage County" answers a question about the "statement he wanted to make with the set design" by saying, "I was interested in combining the whimsy of 'A Doll's House' with something more gothic." It's a startlingly vivid phrase, and it's also true. He also describes how the first preview at Steppenwolf is always shown to vets, and how he thought to himself that they would walk out of this three and a half hour family drama. Instead, they loved it. "One said, that was screeching tires, I enjoyed that." 'August: Osage County' is one of the big winners of the night; we will hear more about its process more than four more times.

The televised Tony Award Ceremony is now on, and we can hear it on our headsets, while in the press room winners are handling press questions. It's a funny, difficult, way to split your focus. I'm relieved that coverage of the awards themselves is not up to me! One of the things that happens is that journalists will sometimes applaud what's going on on the monitor while a winner is in the room talking. But on the plus side, a few times a winner is talking to us while someone else from her show wins an award, and we get to see her reaction before anybody else when we shout to her the news.

They've put the sound on the monitors because it will be a while until they send the next winner up. Michael Riedel is at my table! Michael Riedel, of Theatre Talk! He is the guy from the New York Post. He asks where Chris Rawson is, and I tell him. I give him my card that says critic chick, and he gives me his number!

Rondi Reed comes in, who won for "Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play." She's leaving the show to return to a contracted run of "Wicked" in Chicago, but tells us that the play may be going to Britain's National Theatre. Just as Jim Norton, on the monitor, who has won "Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Play" for his role in Conor McPherson's "The Seafarer," shouts "I Love New York," Reed begins to tell us how wonderful New York has been to her. For this New York critic, it's really nice to hear. It sounds sincere. It isn't until later, when I am talking to people at the "Passing Strange" party, that I remember that all the people who come to talk to us in the media room have just had dreams come true. The producers and casts of shows who are facing closing and needed the Tony to keep going have slightly different impressions of How Wonderful It All Is. Reed actually says, "if you can make it here you can make it anywhere." Her description of how conflicted Steppenwolf used to be about taking shows to New York rings true, though.

Jim Norton comes in and describes the difference between winning awards shows in London and here--another running theme of the evening (Sonia Friedman had said, "I don't understand all of this, I'm English). "They're understated and quiet, as you'd expect in London," he says. "Here people in the street are shouting at me!" he goes on happily. Asked what he will do next, he lists a few projects, including a movie Conor McPherson has written, and a recording of "Finnegans Wake," but then concludes "First of all, I'm going to lie down for a week and recover." Lots of winners speak yearningly about a day off.

Bartlett Sher wins for Best Direction of a Musical for "South Pacific." He explains that the reception has been affected by hitting a "weird crease in the culture with the election and all of that." My tablemate David Richardson mouths "he did it! He did it!" and gives a thumbs up sign. He's talking about Tiger Woods. Michael Riedel is excited too, and mentions that he really always wanted to be a sports writer. When Sher is done speaking, Riedel leaves to buy a drink. He never returns!

The "South Pacific" staged medley comes on while Sher is still with us, so he stays to watch it on the monitor. When it ends, we all applaud and he gives a little mock swoon.

While Laura Benanti, who won for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical, is talking to us, her castmate Boyd Gaines wins over at Radio City. When we shout "Boyd just won!" she cries a little and fans herself. She tells us who designed her gorgeous dress, who made her earrings and bag, and asks whether she thinks it would be too much if she wore the Tony as a necklace. "I'm going to start referring to myself as tony award winner on my answering machine," she says. "I just realized that I won a Tony and I'm flipping out, it comes in waves."

A young man from I think one of the Broadway websites says to her, "I think you're awesome. Seriously, you're awesome. Where do you, like, get that from?"

Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play is announced. And it's Mark Rylance! I knew it would be! I'm excited and also terrified because I need to ask him something and what will it be? His speech is a strange, deadpan, hilarious description of what to wear in town and in the city. It's all the more remarkable that he'd do something like this for his first Tony win (his first Broadway play), and it certainly makes him memorable! Nothing could declare "original artist" more loudly than this.

Anna D. Shapiro, who won for Best Direction of a Play for "August: Osage County" declares, "If you heard a rumor that we are coming to the National and the original cast is coming, that's a good rumor." She's a little startled that we know that members of the original cast had their last performance today, but we've heard it several times this evening.

Deanna Dunagan, who won for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play, comes in, and shrieks "Oh WOW!!!" when we tell her that "August: Osage County" has just won "Best Play." It is really fun when that happens. "There is no way to be prepared for New York; it's astonishing," she says. "In Chicago, I might be recognized once a month in a store. Here I walk out my door and someone says, 'may I hug you?' It gets to be quite overwhelming it almost makes you numb." Well, I certainly understand that!

As she leaves critics are lined up to greet her; some seek autographs.

When Lily Tomlin says "I l-m-a-o" both Chris Jones and David Richardson say what? So I explained to them that it's laugh my ass off in internetese and they thank me.

Tracy Letts is here. Where is Mark Rylance?

"This is bizarre!" Letts says. "It's a Kubrick moment of staring into lights and all of you are at computers." Asked about the meaning of the play he says, "I had it in my conscious mind to write about America now; I hope it's in the play and it's there for people to see. If people choose not to see it they can see it as sweet little family play; I hope it has something to do with state of our nation." So much for dismissing it as "television" as a few critics have done. The producers of the play join him on our little stage and field some questions as well.

Ah! There Rylance is! Finally!!! Letts stops him as he comes to the stage to compliment him on his terrific work. Rylance tells us that his acceptance speech is a prose poem by Louis Jenkins, a prose poet from Duluth, Minnesota. I ask him if he's concerned he'll be stereotyped as a comic actor, which he seems to find funny, and says he isn't worried about that at 48. "Most of Shakespeare is about people's desires," he says. As he leaves I run up to him and now he recognizes me--I don't think he could see who I was before. I ask him if being in the play is affecting his literary style and he says he thinks it already has, that he wrote a farce about Shakespeare. But the play he's writing about Carnegie and Frick will be more like a Shakespearean cycle, 6 or 7 hours, with no farcical elements. He's working on it now.

After he leaves, I go to the ladies' room--- the first time since I've arrived--and that's when they announce Best Musical. Darn! People are cheering in the print room. And the show really is now over. But we aren't leaving yet, since not all of the stars and producers have made it back to us. They collect our headsets, but still we wait.

Stew comes in. "What's up?" he says. He talks about wanting to write a musical with music people actually listen to, what's on their ipods, whether it's punk or gospel??? not the dee dee dee dee of musical theatre. I think to myself, he's got to stop doing that, especially now that he's working on another musical.

Patti Lupone comes in, and Stew kisses her as she comes up. She admits that she was joking about not having a prepared acceptance speech. How does it feel to hold a Tony again after 29 years? She spins it around. "Whee!" She talks about the hunger people have for emotional connection, how we need to develop our art and how art is the soul of a nation. She gets a standing ovation in the print room. Aww. Critics are all really theatre slaves at heart.

Paolo Szot, winner for Best Performance by Leading Actor in a Musical, is even more handsome in person. Should opera singers be so good looking? I'm not sure. He says "in this theatre we are so close to the audience; we have no pit; we can hear them; we can feel them whispering, singing along the songs and that makes me very happy. They sing 'Some Enchanted Evening' and I hear them singing and feel like if I forget a word, they will help me." Later I see him standing outside waiting to get a cab, but I haven't had champagne yet (I will at the "Passing Strange" party) and am too shy to talk to him.

Lin-Manuel Miranda, who won for Best Original Score for "In the Heights," which also won Best Musical, describes working on the show in his dorm room, and how over the years he has cut over 60 songs. "It's like the best prom ever, dude," he says. He goes on, "I'd like to reintroduce popular music and theatre music. They used to be friends, and I want them to be friends again." Pay attention, Stew! (Note: I loved "Passing Strange," and hoped it would win for Best Musical. But I love the musical theatre Stew seems to diss, too).

Asked if he's surprised the show won, after the recent momentum for "Passing Strange," the show's producers go all diplomatic but Miranda says "I was happy! Brown people on Broadway gotta stick together!"

It's nearly six a.m. so I have to wrap this up--I could write six more pages on the "Passing Strange" show party, the rather subdued energy there, the delightful chat I had with one of my first bosses in theatre, Tony Taccone from Berkeley Rep--the show was workshopped there--co-composer Heidi Rodewald's earnest, somewhat sad comments and the fact that the loss of the Tony award means the show will post closing notices soon. Such a shame--I told her that maybe people who have seen "Keys" televised will now want to see it. They certainly should!

But I'll be brief and just say that awards parties are a little odd -- there are so many people there who know only one or two other people. Although, as Taccone pointed out, they were probably really having fun over at the "August: Osage County" and "In the Heights" parties.

That the gala itself, at Radio City, was a little lame was something I suspected--it seemed to be winding down so early and was clearly ending as I had walked past earlier at only 12:15.

A homeless man accosted me and said, "hey are the Tonies over?" I said they were, that only the party was going on. "Who won?" he shouted. I knew he was homeless although he was quite clean. "Who do you want to know about?" "Everything, tell me everything!" So I told him that Patti Lupone won. "Good!" he shouted. And that "August: Osage County" had won a lot of awards. That "South Pacific" had won for Best Revival of a Musical. That Mark Rylance had won for Best Leading Actor in a Play.

"But you can read about it in the papers," I said. "I don't get the papers! Or watch TV! Or get the internet! The Secret Service won't let me!"

On seventh avenue, people in tuxes and evening dress drift along, going from party to party. The night is misty and pleasantly cool. Taccone and I drift back to Rockefeller Center around 2:30, but the place is deserted now. The fairy lights in the trees twinkle. I don't care what they say. The Tonies totally rock.