Caissie Levy attributed her 2026 Tony Award win, partially, to a support network of babysitters.
“Thanks to … every babysitter who’s made it possible for me to be each a Broadway actor and a mother,” the mom-of-two, 45, said during her Tony Awards acceptance speech inside Latest York City’s Radio City Music Hall on Sunday, June 7.
Winning within the category of Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play for her work as Mother within the revival of Ragtime, Levy also thanked her children, Izaiah, 10, and Talulah, 5, whom she shares with husband David Reiser.
“Thanks to my Ragtime family,” Levy began. “Playing Mother has been considered one of the best gifts of my artistic life, and being mother to my kids has been the best joy of my life. Izaiah and Talulah, I like you, and although I’m not there to tuck you in each night, you could have to know that a part of my heart stays home with you.”
Levy’s speech, which touched on her childhood dreams of becoming a Broadway star while growing up in Canada, concluded, “I like acting, I like theater, I like this incredible community. I’m so honored, thanks a lot.”
Levy also thanked her parents, who joined her on the awards ceremony, and Reiser, a composer and author. “My husband, David, where are you — wave at me, hi —I’m so happy with the life we’ve built together,” she said. “I like you, you’re the very best thing that ever happened to me.”
While Ragtime has kept Levy on Broadway since October 2025, the actress stepped away from the Broadway-bound Lost Boys musical in November that 12 months as a result of the demand of her family. She told Elle in an interview published on May 29 that her children had a “very difficult begin to the college 12 months” and needed more from her. “It became very obvious in a matter of weeks that there was no way I could return right into a [rehearsal] process [for The Lost Boys] and mainly be gone for 3 months straight from my kids’ lives,” she told the outlet.
Paying tribute to the kid care network she referenced in her Tony Awards speech, Levy added that their support has been crucial in getting her to where she is today. “I’m very fortunate to have this support system that definitely is integral to creating a Broadway schedule work. The babysitters and nannies of the world, they’re the heroes of my life, truly, they usually at all times have been,” she said. “I’ve had past students of mine grow to be little sisters who’ve helped me with my children. These young women have literally enabled me to have a profession and have a toddler and be a parent at the identical time.”
Past Chicago stars brought all that jazz to the 2026 Tony Awards to have fun the thirtieth anniversary of the beloved musical. Whitney Leavitt, Julianne Hough, Pink, Queen Latifah, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Alex Newell, Adrienne Warren, Dylan Mulvaney and more performed multiple in the course of the Sunday, June 7, awards show at Radio City Music Hall in Latest […]
Levy continued, “I’m at all times all about lifting up the babysitters and the nannies and the, type of, tribes that we lean on to assist raise our children. To get to boost kids on this environment is so amazing, to have them backstage on the theater and have all these aunties and uncles within the forged and crew. It does take a complete village of individuals to assist you do it.”