Fordham Alumnus Wins Tony Award

John Benjamin Hickey, a 1985 alumnus of Fordham College at Lincoln Center, won a Tony Award Sunday night for his featured performance in The Normal Heart, playwright Larry Kramer’s semi-autobiographical drama about the early HIV-AIDS crisis in New York City.

After receiving the award, Hickey, who stars as Felix Turner in the play, said his Tony win was “the proudest moment in [his] career.”

Hickey’s Tony Award is impressive—especially considering how he had to juggle his appearance on Broadway with his work on the Showtime series The Big C, which stars Laura Linney. While performing in The Normal Heart eight times a week, Hickey, who plays Linney’s eccentric and off-the-grid brother, also filmed episodes of the show three or four times a week on location in Stamford, Conn.

During his acceptance speech, Hickey also thanked Linney for always getting him to “the stage door on time.”

After earning his bachelor’s degree in English at Fordham College at Lincoln Center in 1985, Hickey trained at the Juilliard School. He made his Broadway debut in 1995 in the original cast of Terrence McNally’s Tony Award-winning play Love! Valour! Compassion! His other Broadway credits include Cabaret, The Crucible and Mary Stuart.

He’s also appeared in the films The Ice Storm, The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 and Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen, and has landed various roles on NBC’s Law & Order franchise.

—Miles Doyle, FCRH ’01