25 Days of Tonys: Tootsie’s Santino Fontana

Santino Fontana spends eight shows a week switching back and forth between his characters Michael Dorsey and Dorothy Michaels in Broadway’s Tootsie.

“What’s great is, I love that he is myopic,” he told Playbill on opening night. “He only sees himself at first. He sings about that at the end of the show. ... Dorothy is the great defender of everybody. She's what we all want to be. She is carefree and lovely and funny and kind and warm.

“To get to play both sides of that is great,” he added.

READ: Tootsie Transforms for Broadway—In More Ways Than One

Fontana may be nominated for a Tony Award (and won a Drama Desk Award) for the role, but he started out putting on theatre in his garage. “It was a Thanksgiving play in my garage where I played a turkey,” he says in the video above. “I had a death scene.”

Here, he shares his favorite past Tony Awards performance, his choice for a future Tony Awards host, and his quote to live by.

