The Brief

Sarah Paulson and Wendell Pierce announced the nominations for the 78th Annual Tony Awards on Thursday morning. The full list is below.

The awards ceremony, hosted by Wicked star Cynthia Erivo, will be June 8 at Radio City Music Hall in New York City.

No one show is sweeping the nominations of this year's Tonys — and that's a good thing. It was one of the strongest seasons in memory. Sure, there were celebrities — those nominated for awards include film and TV stars George Clooney, Nicole Scherzinger, Sadie Sink, Sarah Snook and Mia Farrow, plus Broadway legends such as Audra McDonald, James Monroe Iglehart, Brooks Ashmanskas and Jeremy Jordan. (That list doesn't include those who were/are on Broadway this season and aren't nominated, like Denzel Washington, Robert Downey Jr., Kieran Culkin and Nick Jonas.)

But it wasn't a great season because (or just because) of so many famous people on stage.

It was great because the shows are spectacular.

That's likely why three shows are tied for most nominations: Buena Vista Social Club, Death Becomes Her and Maybe Happy Ending with 10 each, including best musical. These are excellent productions, but there is so much goodness here. Operation Mincemeat, also nominated for best musical, managed to be simultaneously moving and zany — perhaps the most fun show I saw this year. And the other musical nominated, Dead Outlaw, is wildly original, with earworm tunes.

And that list doesn't include the shows that were nominated for things other than best musical … but were fantastic, nonetheless. There was the warm charm of BOOP!, based on the Betty Boop cartoon character; the glitz of SMASH, based on the TV show; the joy radiating from Real Women Have Curves.

Then there are the plays. Plays are often overshadowed during Tony season — it's the musicals that will tour, after all, and plays tend to have shorter runs. But this year, it was often the plays that dazzled. The Picture of Dorian Gray has six nominations (though not for best play) — and it is a wonder. Sarah Snook becomes 26 characters and the production uses live video and recorded video to have her interact with … herself. Purpose is a funny, incisive look from Tony-winning playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins about how racism warps one American political family. John Proctor is the Villain has a punch of an ending. Oh, Mary! is a raunchy farce.

All this is to say — if you're in New York, go see a show that opened this season on Broadway. Any show, whether it is nominated for a Tony Award or not. This is the rare year when no matter what you choose, you're likely to be moved to cry or dance or laugh. There is spectacle. There is diverse representation. There are majestic performances. There is intensity. This season, Broadway is not just back — it is raising the bar. Here's the list:

<em>Buena Vista Social Club</em>

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Matthew Murphy

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2025 Tony Nominations

Best Musical
Buena Vista Social Club
Dead Outlaw
Death Becomes Her
Maybe Happy Ending
Operation Mincemeat: A New Musical

Best Play
English
The Hills of California
John Proctor is the Villain
Oh, Mary!
Purpose

Best Revival of a Play
Eureka Day
Romeo + Juliet
Thornton Wilder's Our Town
Yellow Face

Best Revival of a Musical
Floyd Collins
Gypsy
Pirates! The Penzance
Sunset Blvd.

George Clooney in <em>Good Night & Good Luck.</em>

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Emilio Madrid

)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play
George Clooney, Good Night, and Good Luck
Cole Escola, Oh, Mary!
Jon Michael Hill, Purpose
Daniel Dae Kim, Yellow Face
Harry Lennix, Purpose
Louis McCartney, Stranger Things: The First Shadow

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play
Laura Donnelly, The Hills of California
Mia Farrow, The Roommate
LaTanya Richardson Jackson, Purpose
Sadie Sink, John Proctor is the Villain
Sarah Snook, The Picture of Dorian Gray

<em>Dead Outlaw</em>

(

Matthew Murphy

)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical
Darren Criss, Maybe Happy Ending
Andrew Durand, Dead Outlaw
Tom Francis, Sunset Blvd.
Jonathan Groff, Just in Time
James Monroe Iglehart, A Wonderful World: The Louis Armstrong Musical
Jeremy Jordan, Floyd Collins

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical
Megan Hilty, Death Becomes Her
Audra McDonald, Gypsy
Jasmine Amy Rogers, BOOP! The Musical
Nicole Scherzinger, Sunset Blvd.
Jennifer Simard, Death Becomes Her

Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play
Glenn Davis, Purpose
Gabriel Ebert, John Proctor is the Villain
Francis Jue, Yellow Face
Bob Odenkirk, Glengarry Glen Ross
Conrad Ricamora, Oh, Mary!

Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Play
Tala Ashe, English
Jessica Hecht, Eureka Day
Marjan Neshat, English
Fina Strazza, John Proctor is the Villain
Kara Young, Purpose

Alana Arenas (Morgan) and Kara Young (Aziza) in <em>Purpose.</em>

(

Marc J. Franklin

)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Musical
Brooks Ashmanskas, SMASH
Jeb Brown, Dead Outlaw
Danny Burstein, Gypsy
Jak Malone, Operation Mincemeat: A New Musical
Taylor Trensch, Floyd Collins

Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical
Natalie Venetia Belcon, Buena Vista Social Club
Julia Knitel, Dead Outlaw
Gracie Lawrence, Just in Time
Justina Machado, Real Women Have Curves: The Musical
Joy Woods, Gypsy

Best Direction of a Play
Knud Adams, English
Sam Mendes, The Hills of California
Sam Pinkleton, Oh, Mary!
Danya Taymor, John Proctor is the Villain
Kip Williams, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Best Direction of a Musical
Saheem Ali, Buena Vista Social Club
Michael Arden, Maybe Happy Ending
David Cromer, Dead Outlaw
Christopher Gattelli, Death Becomes Her
Jamie Lloyd, Sunset Blvd.

Best Book of a Musical
Buena Vista Social Club, Marco Ramirez
Dead Outlaw, Itamar Moses
Death Becomes Her, Marco Pennette
Maybe Happy Ending, Will Aronson and Hue Park
Operation Mincemeat: A New Musical, David Cumming, Felix Hagan, Natasha Hodgson and Zoë Roberts

Best Original Score (Music and/or Lyrics) Written for the Theatre
Dead Outlaw, Music & Lyrics: David Yazbek and Erik Della Penna
Death Becomes Her, Music & Lyrics: Julia Mattison and Noel Carey
Maybe Happy Ending, Music: Will Aronson, Lyrics: Will Aronson and Hue Park
Operation Mincemeat: A New Musical, Music & Lyrics: David Cumming, Felix Hagan, Natasha Hodgson and Zoë Roberts
Real Women Have Curves: The Musical, Music & Lyrics: Joy Huerta and Benjamin Velez

Best Choreography
Joshua Bergasse, SMASH
Camille A. Brown, Gypsy
Christopher Gattelli, Death Becomes Her
Jerry Mitchell, BOOP! The Musical
Patricia Delgado and Justin Peck, Buena Vista Social Club

Best Orchestrations
Andrew Resnick and Michael Thurber, Just in Time
Will Aronson, Maybe Happy Ending
Bruce Coughlin, Floyd Collins
Marco Paguia, Buena Vista Social Club
David Cullen and Andrew Lloyd Webber, Sunset Blvd.

Best Scenic Design of a Musical
Rachel Hauck, Swept Away
Dane Laffrey and George Reeve, Maybe Happy Ending
Arnulfo Maldonado, Buena Vista Social Club
Derek McLane, Death Becomes Her
Derek McLane, Just in Time

Best Costume Design of a Play
Brenda Abbandandolo, Good Night, and Good Luck
Marg Horwell, The Picture of Dorian Gray
Rob Howell, The Hills of California
Holly Pierson, Oh, Mary!
Brigitte Reiffenstuel, Stranger Things: The First Shadow

Best Costume Design of a Musical
Dede Ayite, Buena Vista Social Club
Gregg Barnes, BOOP! The Musical
Clint Ramos, Maybe Happy Ending
Paul Tazewell, Death Becomes Her
Catherine Zuber, Just in Time

Best Lighting Design of a Play
Natasha Chivers, The Hills of California
Jon Clark, Stranger Things: The First Shadow
Heather Gilbert and David Bengali, Good Night, and Good Luck
Natasha Katz and Hannah Wasileski, John Proctor is the Villain
Nick Schlieper, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Best Lighting Design of a Musical
Jack Knowles, Sunset Blvd.
Tyler Micoleau, Buena Vista Social Club
Scott Zielinski and Ruey Horng Sun, Floyd Collins
Ben Stanton, Maybe Happy Ending
Justin Townsend, Death Becomes Her

Best Sound Design of a Play
Paul Arditti, Stranger Things: The First Shadow
Palmer Hefferan, John Proctor is the Villain
Daniel Kluger, Good Night, and Good Luck
Nick Powell, The Hills of California
Clemence Williams, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Best Sound Design of a Musical
Jonathan Deans, Buena Vista Social Club
Adam Fisher, Sunset Blvd.
Peter Hylenski, Just in Time
Peter Hylenski, Maybe Happy Ending
Dan Moses Schreier, Floyd Collins

Best Scenic Design of a Play
Marsha Ginsberg, English
Rob Howell, The Hills of California
Marg Horwell and David Bergman, The Picture of Dorian Gray
Miriam Buether and 59, Stranger Things: The First Shadow
Scott Pask, Good Night, and Good Luck

Special Tony Awards will be presented to:

The musicians who make up the band of Buena Vista Social Club - Marco Paguia (Music Director, Conductor/Piano); David Oquendo (Associate Music Director, Guitar); Renesito Avich (Tres); Gustavo Schartz (Bass); Javier Días, Román Diaz, Mauricio Herrera (Percussion); Jesus Ricardo (Trumpet); Eddie Venegas (Trombone); Hery Paz (Woodwinds); Leonardo Reyna (Piano);

The Illusions & Technical Effects of Stranger Things: The First Shadow (Jamie Harrison, Chris Fisher, Gary Beestone & Edward Pierce). 

As previously announced, the 2025 Tony Honors for Excellence in the Theatre will be presented to Great Performances, Michael Price, New 42, and The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. The Isabelle Stevenson Tony Award will be presented to Celia Keenan-Bolger. Harvey Fierstein will receive the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre.

Copyright 2025 NPR

The Justice Department found Thursday that the law school at the University of California, Los Angeles, illegally considered race in admissions.

The announcement follows a similar finding against the university’s medical school and comes as President Donald Trump’s administration ramps up scrutiny of colleges’ processes for selecting students. The administration also has accused the UC Berkeley Law School and the medical school at the University of California, San Diego, of illegally discriminating against white and Asian applicants.

The UCLA School of Law said in a statement that it was committed to making admissions decisions in compliance with all applicable laws.

“Students are admitted through a comprehensive, merit-based review process that considers each applicant’s achievements and experiences,” the statement said. “We are confident in our process.”

Affirmative action in college admissions has been illegal since a 2023 Supreme Court ruling forbade it. The same ruling said colleges could continue to assess how applicants’ backgrounds might speak to broader characteristics, but Trump has accused colleges of using applicants’ personal statements and other proxies to consider race in admissions — which conservatives view as illegal discrimination.

The Justice Department’s investigation found UCLA’s law school discriminated against white and Asian American students by favoring Black and Hispanic applicants in its 2023, 2024 and 2025 incoming classes. Its analysis found the mean LSAT score was lower for admitted Black applicants than for admitted white applicants.

The department also said admissions staff at the law school instructed applicants during recruitment efforts, including one called the “Diversity Admissions Open House,” how to reveal their race in essays.

“Like many of its peer institutions, UCLA Law School runs a two-tiered admissions system whose academic bar for acceptance shifts up or down depending on the color of your skin,” said Harmeet Dhillon, head of the department’s Civil Rights Division, in a news release.

California voters ended affirmative action in college admissions in a 1997 ballot measure. In a brief filed in the Supreme Court case, the UC system said the change led to a precipitous drop in underrepresented minorities, especially at the system’s most selective campuses. The brief said UC went on to implement a range of race-neutral measures to increase diversity.

The Trump administration also has sued over the main UCLA campus’s response to allegations of antisemitic harassment. The administration’s latest finding sets the stage for a voluntary resolution to bring UCLA into compliance with the Justice Department’s legal interpretation or, if none can be reached, potential legal action.

___

The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

Artist Hedy Torres asked a 20-something student from Cal State Northridge to sit for a portrait nearly a decade ago. Using charcoal on paper, she drew the dark-haired young man in black and white — but she deliberately kept the portrait unfinished.

The idea was that she would complete the piece if her subject, a DACA recipient named Lino de Jesús Pérez Cuevas, ever attained lawful permanent residency.

And now he has.

DACA, which stands for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, is a program that provides two-year work permits and deportation relief for people who were brought to the U.S. as children. The permits can be renewed, but the program does not grant a pathway to citizenship. 

In late September, Pérez Cuevas — who is now married, a father, a green card holder and an adjunct instructor at his alma mater — sat with Torres once again.

Torres’ project involves interviewing subjects as she sketches them. This year, she invited the public to watch her complete the portrait as she spoke to Pérez Cuevas about what it took for him to get a green card and what that means for his life.

About two dozen people gathered at a community center in West Hollywood’s Plummer Park to see her add details to the piece that speak to the passing of time.

“I just wanted to make people empathetic to what [immigrants] go through during this process,” she said. “You have to be very patient. There is a lot of uncertainty.”

Responding to the potential loss of relief

Pérez Cuevas, who was born in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, was brought to the U.S. by his parents when he was 2.

When Torres drew him in 2017, he was pursuing a master’s degree in kinesiology at Cal State Northridge. That year, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced intentions to rescind DACA, which had enabled him to set goals without the fear of being deported. A 2020 Supreme Court decision allowed the program to continue.

Torres was once undocumented herself, so she understood the 2017 announcement was earth-shattering for the approximately 800,000 people who were then in the program, she said.

The original, unfinished portrait of Lino de Jesús Pérez Cuevas.

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Courtesy

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Hedy Torres

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That year, Torres was also a student at CSUN, working toward a master’s in fine art.

She recalled recently that she wanted people to see DACA recipients as people, not numbers. And so, for her master's project, she proposed creating portraits of DACA beneficiaries.

The portraits would be rooted in interviews conducted as she drew her subjects. Leaving them unfinished, she said, would symbolize the precarity of the moment.

The pieces would have enough detail for viewers to see the subjects’ faces clearly, particularly their eyes and expressions. Other elements, including their bodies and clothing, would be more of an initial sketch.

The university greenlit her project and gave her a grant to pursue it. There was just one problem: Torres had to convince reticent DACA recipients to share their stories.

Building trust 

When Torres first messaged Pérez Cuevas about the project, he ignored her for two weeks, he said. But because they had a mutual friend, he eventually agreed to meet with her.

“I was trying to see whether this person was just an academic trying to complete a project for her own benefit, or whether she really cared about the community,” he told LAist.

They met at a coffee shop. Pérez Cuevas learned about the artist’s journey from the Mexican state of Colima and everything she’d lived through since.

Before 2015, for example, an undocumented person in California could not get a driver’s license. When she was undocumented, Torres was stopped by police and had her car impounded. She said she had to cobble together thousands of dollars to get her car back from a tow yard.

Pérez Cuevas could relate. He had experienced the same thing.

He decided to trust her.

After she drew him, Pérez Cuevas helped Torres connect with more DACA recipients at the university. She drew four other portraits, which were also left unfinished.

These works were acquired by the university, with the agreement that Torres would be able to borrow and complete them when — and if — her subjects attained lawful permanent residency.

Community members watch Artist Hedy Torres update the portrait at Plummer Park in West Hollywood.

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Julia Barajas

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LAist

)

‘A sense of freedom’  

As she worked on the portrait, Torres added soft lines rendered in charcoal to the image of Pérez Cuevas’ face, along with a robust mustache. And she continued the interview.

“What did you imagine your life would be like when you were young?” Torres asked.

Thinking back to high school, Pérez Cuevas said he realized then that not having a social security number barred him from decent-paying work.

“I didn't really understand what I was doing with my life,” he said, adding that he used to not think higher education was for him even while he was at CSUN. “My state of mind was really dark back then.”

He credited a college counselor with helping him navigate school. He earned his degree in 2017.

Pérez Cuevas said he has intimate knowledge of what it’s like to live with constant uncertainty: not knowing how he would pay for college because he did not qualify for federal financial aid; not being able to travel outside the country; and waiting anxiously for federal officials to make decisions on immigration laws that could transform his life.

“I can't stress enough how difficult it is psychologically to wait because it's something that can revolutionize your life,” he said. “You're betting your whole life on this approval and just that suspense of waiting, waiting, waiting, living with that anxiety.”

Torres completed her portrait of Pérez Cuevas in September 2026. Four other portraits remain unfinished.

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Julia Barajas

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LAist

)

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services continues to process renewal requests for existing DACA recipients, but the agency is no longer approving first-time applications.

Under the second Trump administration, DACA recipients are also experiencing significant delays with renewals. Some have lost their jobs. Recipients have been deported. According to the agency, the median processing time for DACA renewals was one month in 2023. Currently, it’s taking seven months to process most cases.

Pérez Cuevas said he was able to adjust his immigration status after marrying a U.S. citizen and consulting with an attorney. His lawyer helped him secure a document that allowed noncitizens to travel abroad and seek legal re-entry.

“Did getting permanent residency give you a sense of freedom, a freedom you probably didn't have when you were under DACA?” Torres asked him.

“Absolutely,” Pérez Cuevas said. “The biggest freedom was psychological freedom. You have this weight that you've been carrying all these years that finally just gets thrown off your shoulders.”

One of the things he feared most was long-term separation from his parents, he said.

When his mother and father migrated to the U.S., they did not see their own parents — his grandparents — for 40 years, Pérez Cuevas added. After his parents moved back to Mexico during the pandemic, he feared they would also go decades without seeing each other.

But having a green card enables him to travel and see his family.

Pérez Cuevas told Torres that, paradoxically, the threat of losing DACA made him “weirdly ambitious."

He said he doubled down on his studies and took on every internship he could. He figured that if the U.S. decided to deport him, he’d still have his education and work experience.

“Even on the days where I didn't necessarily have the greatest energy or the greatest state of mind, I showed up for myself,” Pérez Cuevas said.

Southern California is expected to see the longest heat wave of the season.

The National Weather Service has issued an extreme heat warning for the greater Los Angeles area from Friday through at least next Thursday, and forecasters say it’ll likely extend beyond that.

Temperatures are expected to be in the mid-90s to mid-100s, even in coastal areas.

“Unfortunately, we don't really see an end to it as far as we can tell, and that's probably the biggest thing we wanna highlight, is that while we have had hotter events this season already, this one might be the longest-lasting,” said Ryan Kittell, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

Kittell said they expect to see a few daily records to be broken.

Southern California saw a record-breaking 10-day heat wave in the summer of 2022.

What does the hot weather mean for fire risk? 

Forecasters say conditions likely won’t meet the threshold for issuing red flag warnings (extremely dry air and windy conditions), but the risk of fire is still going to be high during the heat wave.

“It’s still concerning, and if a fire were to get started in the wrong area, it could grow pretty fast,” Kittell said. “ We do have a history of large fires in similar environments with similar heat, similar time of the year.”

As of Thursday afternoon, Southern California Edison said nearly 10,000 customers in parts of Riverside County were under consideration for power shutoffs, which are used to reduce the risk of electrical equipment starting a fire.

How do we manage through the heat? 

Kittell said people should make plans to stay cool during the long heat wave, and check in on neighbors who are elderly, or on families with young children.

Officials say residents should limit outdoor activities to the early morning hours, stay in air-conditioned places in the afternoon and evening hours, and stay hydrated.

When Naoko Takei Moore, the author of Simply Donabe, was growing up in Tokyo, some of her earliest memories were of the family donabe.

Donabe, which means “clay pot” in Japanese, is an earthenware cooking vessel that has been part of Japanese home cooking for centuries.

On weekends, her mother would set the donabe on a tabletop burner at the center of the table, with the broth already made and the ingredients prepped. She would let Moore, then about 4, add them to the pot.

"It made me feel like I was cooking it," Moore said. "I was a hero."

Her late mother had one piece of advice about the pot: “Just let the donabe do the work for you."

That’s what Moore wants to do at our latest Cookbook Live at the Crawford in Pasadena on Thursday Oct. 8, in partnership with the James Beard Foundation.

What a donabe can do 

"Just let the donabe do the work for you," Moore's late mother used to say.

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Matt Russell

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Courtesy Naoko Takei Moore

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Because the clay is porous, a donabe heats slowly and retains heat long after the flame is off, allowing savory, umami-rich flavors to build without heavy seasoning. It handles almost anything: hot pots, rice, braises, soups, stews and steamed dishes.

"If you have good ingredients, you really don't need to cover up the flavors with so many different things," Moore said.

In Japan, it's often served as a communal pot meal, set at the center of the table so everyone can cook and eat together.

Donabe in L.A.

When Moore moved to L.A. in 2001, she found that her friends loved sushi and ramen, but thought Japanese home cooking was too complicated. The donabe dinners she hosted changed their minds.

On a trip home to Tokyo, she tasted rice cooked in a donabe made by Nagatani-en, an eighth-generation kiln in Iga founded in 1832.

"Oh my gosh, what is this about this particular donabe?" she remembered thinking. She contacted the kiln and began importing its pots.

Moore's West Hollywood shop, TOIRO, carries an array of artisan donabe that she selects herself.

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Courtesy Naoko Takei Moore

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Moore launched TOIRO in 2008 as an online import business, shipping orders from her basement and teaching donabe classes in her home kitchen. She opened the West Hollywood shop in 2017.

"First I had to start by telling people how to pronounce it," she said. (It's doh-nah-bay.)

Now, she said, major publications print "donabe" without translating it, and in 2015 she co-wrote her first book on the subject. Simply Donabe is her second.

What's cooking Oct. 8

Naoko Takei Moore's new cookbook, Simply Donabe: Japanese One-Pot Recipes.

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Courtesy Naoko Takei Moore

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For Moore, the upcoming cooler weather means hot pot season.

"The season is changing, and it's getting cooler, which I love," she said. "I love making all different kinds of hot pot dishes."

Onstage, she'll make a chicken-and-lemon hot pot from the new book, with sweet saikyo miso, kabocha squash, enoki mushrooms, spinach and thinly sliced lemon.

"I hope you'll be surprised how simple it is," she said. "And I hope you get to smell it."