John Lithgow Never Thought He’d Make It to Broadway—Now He’s a Tony Nominee for Giant
The two-time Tony winner on portraying Roald Dahl, wrestling with uncomfortable truths and the career that exceeded every expectation
(Photo by Sergio Villarini for Broadway.com)
What to Know
- 2026 Tony nominee John Lithgow stars in Mark Rosenblatt’s Best Play contender Giant, directed by Nicholas Hytner
- Lithgow researched the controversial children’s author through Maria Tucci, gaining insight into both Dahl’s celebrated gifts and his documented cruelty and bigotry
- A central theme of Giant is the coexistence of genius and moral flaws, a contradiction Lithgow says he has encountered throughout his own career
John Lithgow is a 2026 Tony Award nominee for his performance in Mark Rosenblatt’s pressingly relevant Giant, following his Olivier Award-winning run in the West End. The two-time Tony winner stars alongside Aya Cash, who is a first-time nominee for the play. Directed by Tony nominee Nicholas Hytner, Giant is a contender for Best Play.
Lithgow plays children’s book author Roald Dahl, and the emotional bandwidth of the role is the size of the play’s title. In order to find Dahl, Lithgow turned to a friend. “Maria Tucci—whom I worked with many times 30, 40 years ago—is the widow of Robert Gottlieb. He was the Alfred Knopf editor who fired Roald Dahl for being insufferable to everyone he worked with,” Lithgow tells Broadway.com Editor-in-Chief Paul Wontorek. “Maria was an extraordinary resource because she knew him well.”
Lithgow touches on the dichotomy of Dahl, noting that Tucci understood both his gifts—his wit, charm and devotion to children and reading—and his darker side, including his cruelty and bigotry. “All these were simply fascinating bits of information that I just gathered together in playing the part,” he says.
The clashing truths in Giant are one of many topics audiences must wrestle with, and one Lithgow has dealt with himself. “I have worked with directors who were ruthlessly cruel and who seemed to believe in it as a way of smashing an actor to bits so that something pure would emerge from the rubble,” he recalls. “You think, ‘How can this person treat other human beings that way?’ And yet this was a genius director.”
The idea that seemingly incompatible realities can coexist has echoed throughout Lithgow's own life. His rise to prominence, for instance, was far from the future he imagined for himself as a young actor. Before making his Broadway debut in The Changing Room, for which he won his first Tony Award, Lithgow admits he never thought he’d make it to the Great Bright Way. “My father was a producer in regional theater and I thought that was my career,” he admits. “Two weeks after we opened, I won a Tony Award—when I never thought I would even be on Broadway, let alone be in movies and television.” As Oscar Wilde famously pointed out, life imitates art.
Watch the full interview below!
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