The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known informally as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway productions and performances, and an award is given for regional theatre. Several discretionary non-competitive awards are also given, including a Special Tony Award, the Tony Honors for Excellence in Theatre, and the Isabelle Stevenson Award. The awards are named after Antoinette Perry, co-founder of the American Theatre Wing.

The rules for the Tony Awards are set forth in the official document "Rules and Regulations of The American Theatre Wing's Tony Awards", which applies for that season only. The Tony Awards are considered the highest U.S. theatre honor, the New York theatre industry's equivalent to the Academy Awards (Oscars) for motion pictures, the Grammy Awards for music and the Emmy Awards for television, and the Laurence Olivier Award for theatre in London, England.

Neil Patrick Harris (born June 15, 1973) is an American actor, singer, director, and magician. He is best known for the title role in Doogie Howser, M.D., the womanizing Barney Stinson in How I Met Your Mother, a fictionalized version of himself in the Harold & Kumar series, and the title role in Joss Whedon's musical web series Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog.

Harris was named as one of Time magazine's 100 most influential people in 2010, and was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in September 2011.

Harris was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico and grew up in Ruidoso, New Mexico. His parents, Sheila and Ron Harris, ran a restaurant. He attended La Cueva High School in Albuquerque, where he acted in school plays and musicals. Harris graduated as an honors student in 1991.

Harris began his career as a child actor and was discovered by playwright Mark Medoff at a drama camp in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Medoff later cast him in his 1988 film Clara's Heart, a drama starring Whoopi Goldberg based on the novel of the same name by Joseph Olshan. Clara's Heart won Harris a Golden Globe nomination. The same year, he starred in Purple People Eater, a children's fantasy.

Patrick Burnet Harris is a retired Church of England bishop who served in two episcopal positions.

He was born on 30 September 1934 and educated at St Albans School and Keble College, Oxford. He was ordained in 1961 and his first post was as a curate at St Ebbes' Oxford after which he became a missionary in South America. He became the Archdeacon of Salta in 1969 before being ordained to the episcopate four years later as Bishop of Northern Argentina. After seven years he returned to England firstly as Rector of Kirkheaton and then Secretary of the Partnership for World Mission where he remained until 1988 when he was appointed Bishop of Southwell, a post he held for 11 years. In retirement he continues to serve as an assistant bishop in the Diocese of Gloucester.

Jennifer-Yvette Holliday (born October 19, 1960, Riverside, Texas) is an American singer and Tony Award-winning actress. She started her career on Broadway in musicals such as Dreamgirls, and later became a successful recording artist. She is best known for her debut single, the Dreamgirls showstopper and Grammy Award-winning R&B/Pop hit, "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going." She is also known as the Queen Of Broadway Gospel.

Jennifer landed her first big role on Broadway in 1979. At age 19, she landed a part the same day she auditioned for the Broadway production of Your Arms Too Short to Box with God. Her performance in that musical earned her a 1981 Drama Desk nomination. Her next role, which she began to act at 21, was the role for which she became best known: the role of Effie Melody White in the Broadway musical Dreamgirls. Jennifer originated the role of Effie and remained with the show for nearly four years after its December 20, 1981 opening. Her performance in the role was widely acclaimed, particularly in her iconic performance of the musical number that ends Act I, "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going."

Hugh Michael Jackman (born 12 October 1968) is an Australian actor and producer who is involved in film, musical theatre, and television.

Jackman has won international recognition for his roles in major films, notably as action/superhero, period and romance characters. He is known for his role as Wolverine in the X-Men film series, as well as for his leads in Kate & Leopold, Van Helsing, The Prestige, Australia, and Real Steel. Jackman is a singer, dancer, and actor in stage musicals, and won a Tony Award for his role in The Boy from Oz.

In November 2008, Open Salon named Jackman one of the sexiest men alive. Later that same month, People magazine named Jackman "Sexiest Man Alive."

A three-time host of the Tony Awards, winning an Emmy Award for one of these appearances, Jackman also hosted the 81st Academy Awards on 22 February 2009.

Jackman was born in Sydney, New South Wales, the youngest of five children of English parents Chris Jackman and Grace Watson, and the second child to be born in Australia (he also has a younger half-sister, from his mother's re-marriage). One of his paternal great-grandfathers was Greek. His parents divorced when he was eight, and he remained with his accountant father and siblings, while his mother moved back to England. As a child, Jackman liked the outdoors, spending a lot of time at the beach and on camping trips and vacations all over Australia. He wanted to see the world: "I used to spend nights looking at atlases. I decided I wanted to be a chef on a plane. Because I'd been on a plane and there was food on board, I presumed there was a chef. I thought that would be an ideal job."