Jake Gyllenhaal Receives His First Nomination at the 2021 Tony Awards, Here Are His Other Performances
The 2021 Tony Awards lift the curtain on Sunday, Sept. 26, 2021. Jake Gyllenhaal is up for his first Tony award among strong Broadway veterans such as Lin-Manuel Miranda, Kristin Chenoweth, and Idina Menzel.
The actor has been a busy bee. Going from Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Spider-Man to the stage is a substantial leap. But Gyllenhaal isn’t a stranger to theatre. Here are his other stage performances.
Jake Gyllenhaal’s Tony Awards 2021 nomination
Gyllenhaal is nominated for Best Actor in a Play for his role in Sea Wall/A Life and two producer awards for Sea Wall/A Life and Slave Play. According to Variety, the double play performance debuted at the Hudson Theatre in 2019.
Sea Wall and A Life take place on the same set. Both convey heavily dramatic material, explicitly focusing on death. Gyllenhaal’s character examines the death of his father and the birth of his child. He then introduces the audience to three different types of death—physical death, emotional death, and eternal death, when people don’t speak the person’s name anymore.
Gyllenhaal was praised for his raw yet subtle performance as Abe. In the end, the two different narrators from Sea Wall and A Life share the space.
Before he joined the Broadway stage, Gyllenhaal’s play premiered at the Public Theater. Unfortunately, the Broadway production ended in 2019. So fans shouldn’t expect to see the star reprise his role anytime soon.
What other Broadway productions has Jake Gyllenhaal starred in?
Gyllenhaal is an A-lister in Hollywood, from Brokeback Mountain to Prisoners, Spider-Man: Far From Home, and his new Netflix movie, The Guilty. However, movie fans shouldn’t underestimate his stage presence.
In 2002, Gyllenhaal was part of the opening cast in This Is Our Youth in the West End production. In 2012 he appeared as Terry, a foul-mouthed and heartbroken drifter, in If There Is I Haven’t Found It Yet.
In 2014, Gyllenhaal made it to Broadway in the production, Constellations. Later, he performed in a 2015 off-Broadway Little Shop of Horrors production. The actor took the lead as Seymour Krelborn.
Next, Gyllenhaal embarked on his journey with Sunday in the Park With George in 2016. He introduced the role in New York City, then reprised the role for the West End revival. However, the pandemic postponed the London revival.
Gyllenhaal wants to reinvent the stage
The Southpaw actor has received countless accolades throughout his career. Gyllenhaal has won an MTV Movie Award and a BAFTA Award for his role in Brokeback Mountain. He also received Academy Awards and Golden Globe Award nominations for other films.
However, the actor considers theatre a lifelong goal. He founded his company Nine Stories Productions in 2015, expanding his theatrical presence.
Per a Variety interview, Gyllenhaal explained how he wants to bring new stories to the stage.
“I want to try to help in any way that I can to bring that same feeling to other people. At Nine Stories, my producing partner Riva Marker and I want to try to take stories that people wouldn’t normally see in the Broadway space and bring them there. Our intentions are to be building a real theater wing of Nine Stories. We’re building it right now. We hope to have film influence the theater section and vice versa.”
