Playwright Steven Levenson ’06 (above, center) whose play If I Forget ran from February through April in New York City, won the 2017 Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical for the Broadway hit Dear Evan Hansen, which captured a total of six Tonys (it was nominated for nine). Starring Ben Platt, the musical, which opened in December at the Music Box Theatre, concerns a teenage social misfit who is inadvertently catapulted into high school popularity when a classmate commits suicide. The score, which won the Tony for “Best Original Score,” is by Justin Paul and Benj Pasek (above, who also wrote the lyrics for La La Land). A reviewer for the New York Times called Dear Evan Hansen suitable for theatergoers “looking for something yeastier and more complex than the usual sugary diversions.”
