Sunday night’s Tony Awards had no shortage of show-stopping moments, from wins for queer icons like Jonathan Groff and Sarah Paulson to appearances from Alicia Keys, Jay-Z, and Broadway’s hottest stars. But one of the evening’s performances has captured the internet’s attention for all the wrong (or right?) reasons: Eddie Redmayne as the Emcee in Cabaret.
The Broadway revival’s performance of the show’s opening number “Willkommen” at the Tonys started with a close-up on Redmayne looking…strange. His movements were puppet-like, his back was hunched, and his face was fixed in an eerie smirk.
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The moment quickly went viral, with people comparing themselves to Redmayne’s freakish energy and poking fun at his out-there interpretation.
Others weren’t so much creeped out as they were amused by Redmayne’s resemblance to a certain genre of TikTokers and cosplayers who’ve mastered the art of moving like animated characters.
“People are roasting him but if he did this on TikTok to an electroswing song while dressed like Hazbin Hotel he’d have like 40 million views,” quipped influencer Jenny Nicholson.
But Redmayne’s defenders think that most people are missing the point of Cabaret. The Emcee isn’t supposed to be charming or attractive, they say, but off-putting and strange to reflect the show’s themes around political unrest and rising fascism in Nazi Germany. Even if you’re not a fan of Redmayne’s performance, the issue shouldn’t be that he’s being weird, but that he’s “being weird wrong,” as one user put it.
If being off-putting was the goal, Redmayne nailed it — but that hasn’t kept his performance from getting memed into oblivion.
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