Billy Crudup "has the kind of good looks that appeal even to straight guys,” quipped Bill Irwin, setting off the evening’s theme. Jokes about Billy Crudup involve his handsome, age-defying movie star mien. As the actor was honored and roasted at the Edison Ballroom this week by longtime friends and co-stars, among them Sam Rockwell, Jon Hamm, Victor Garber, and Jennifer Aniston, it was clear: no one was letting up on either the praise or the envy. The occasion was the 40th anniversary of The Vineyard Theatre, celebrating its longevity, mission to support theater and the artists who make it, and the long awaited post-Covid coming together at last. Vineyard did it up in grand style.
Speakers included Deirdre O’Connell, who dazzled everyone in Lucas Hnath’s Dana H. and playwright Paula Vogel, whose How I Learned to Drive starred Crudup’s erstwhile girlfriend, Mary Louise Parker with whom he has a child. Both plays are reminders of the truly game-changing drama so valued at the Vineyard. Asking the dinner crowd to call out old New York favorite venues now vanished, Vogel mentioned her own, The Gotham Book Mart, before launching into a pitch for Vineyard support. Playwright David Cale, onstage with her, spoke about his play Harry Clarke, a brilliant tour de force one-man show performed by the guest of honor that proved above all else, Billy Crudup is not just another pretty face.
Busy, Crudup has just wrapped the third season of The Morning Show, and his new series Hello Tomorrow! streams this week on Apple TV+. To top off his many talents and virtues, Crudup is smart, explaining Arcadia and Coast of Utopia to castmates, causing Rockwell, a fount of one-liners, to add, “He should teach a class called Stoppard for Dummies.”
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