NEW YORK – For its 46th annual induction, the Theater Hall of Fame gathered theater professionals, families and friends to celebrate eight additions to the 536 already adorning the upper lobby walls of the Gershwin Theater in raised gold letters.

The occasion also served as a testimonial to James M. Nederlander, one of the lords of Broadway, who passed away at 94 last summer. Along with celebrity columnist Earl Blackwell, the legendary “Jimmy” co-founded the Hall of Fame and gave it a home in the Gershwin.

Speaking of him, producer Emmanuel Azenburg (Hall of Fame 2008) noted how appropriate it is that his name now goes up on the Hall of Fame walls, since it is “already on a few other walls,” referring to the nine theaters the Nederlanders own on Broadway, along with 20 more around the country and in London.

This year’s eight inductees included three actors and a producer, designer, lyricist, librettist and librettist/playwright.

The evening’s mistress of ceremonies was Susan Stroman, a director/choreographer with a golden touch (“The Producers”), inducted herself in 2014, who moved the awards along as briskly as possible. As each inductee had their Hall of Fame medal draped around their neck, pianist Mat Eisenstein greeted them with snippets of song reminiscent of their careers. Behind the whole thing, including the convivial dinner to follow, was Hall Executive Producer Terry Hodge Taylor.

One of the liveliest introductions was by Christopher Durang of his fellow playwright Marsha Norman (Pulitzer Prize for “’Night, Mother,” Tony Award for “The Secret Garden”). Himself a Hall member (2012), Mr. Durang started out by congratulating her for finally being “indicted.” Then, referring to “’Night Mother,” he admitted, “It’s a big thing to write a classic.”

The two have long had a close connection, co-teaching a playwriting course at Juilliard “every Wednesday for 24 years,” according to Ms. Norman. “It felt like a perfect marriage,” said Mr. Durang, noting that two of their students have won Pulitzer Prizes.

Ms. Norman says she fell in love with the theater at age 11 when she first saw “The Glass Menagerie.” After college she taught fifth grade, worked at a state mental institution and more, but always wanted to write for the theater. “Getting Out” was her first success and “’Night Mother” made it her career.

“Thank you, universe,” she said. But to conclude, she noted that the Hall contains just two living women playwrights and just five who have passed on. She vowed as a teacher, “to send you as many more women playwrights as I can.”

Inducting producer Paul Libin, Jordan Roth, president of Jujamcyn Theaters, said that in a negotiation, “there’s no one you want more in your corner than Paul, or across the table,” because he’s a loyal partner and an honorable opponent. “When he commits to you, he sees it all the way through.” He then paid tribute to Mr. Libin’s marriage of 60 years, “the true achievement of a lifetime.”

Looking up at the walls, Mr. Libin said -- apparently not in jest – that he saw names of “about 194 people I collaborated with.” He remembered that famed designer Jo Melziner gave him his first Equity (theater union) contract on Broadway, as a stage manager, just 60 years ago. His most famous partnership, with co-producer Ted Mann, lasted nearly 50 years, 1963-2012. In ending, he cracked, “the last time I was inducted was in 1953 into the US Army.”

Glenn Close was the one inductee unable to be present, since she is starring in a revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Sunset Boulevard” in London. Representing her was Lonny Price, who directed her in London and will do the same when the show comes to Broadway in February.

Although Ms. Close is known to most people as a movie actor, in a message she said, “the New York theater is my home, where I started and where I hope to end.” Mr. Price sketched in the evidence, starting with her being inspired to be an actor when she saw Katherine Hepburn (another movie star who loved the stage) on the Dick Cavett TV show. Her first big break was in 1974 in Hal Prince’s production of the William Congreve classic, “Love for Love.” The star dropped out, Ms. Close took over and she’s been working since.

Mr. Roth described how actors bring different colors to their roles. “But Glenn doesn’t bring just the eight color Crayola box or the 16 or even 32, she brings the whole 64 color box with a sharpener.”

Presenting Phylicia Rashad was her younger sister, actor-director Debbie Allen. Growing up in Texas, Ms. Rashad showed her talent early: when she was 11, at a time when African Americans couldn’t go to many restaurants or the zoo, the local school board chose her to be mistress of ceremonies at a school music festival.

After Howard University in Washington, Ms. Rashad joined New York’s famed Negro Ensemble Company, one of a cadre of future stars. She was in “The Wiz” and “Dreamgirls” on Broadway, where Bill Cosby discovered her and “she became the mother of the whole planet” on TV’s “The Cosby Show.”

In a 2004 revival of “A Raisin in the Sun,” she was the first black to win the Tony for best actress in a drama. She is revered in the August Wilson universe for playing the ancient Aunt Ester in his “Gem of the Ocean” and she was directed by her sister in a 2008 all-black revival of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” With tears in her eyes, Ms. Allen placed the Hall of Fame medal around her neck.

In her turn, Ms. Rashad paid tribute to their mother, who was “so fierce and ferocious about the development of her children,” discovering “what would be right for each of us.” Ms. Rashad started college at Howard in Washington, D.C., but at 19, she moved to New York to stay at the famed Barbizon Hotel and start her career.

Her own daughter, Condola, now an actress, when asked at age eight what she’d like to be when she grew up, said, “I want to be a magic lady like my mother.” The theater is indeed magic, Mr. Rashad said, ending, “it’s wonderful to be part of this magic world.”

The oldest inductee was librettist Joe Masteroff, 96, famous for two wildly dissimilar hit musicals: the sweet, witty comedy, “She Loves Me” (1963, revived several times on Broadway), and the sardonic account of frantic Berlin on the verge of Nazism, “Cabaret” (1966, revived even more often).

Presenting him was composer Howard Marren, with whom Mr. Masteroff has collaborated on two musicals, “Paramour” and “Imitation of Life.” He noted that Mr. Masteroff is valued as a candid “show doctor,” whose brisk assessment, when once asked what to do with a show struggling during previews, was “close it.”

Mr. Masteroff rose to accept plaudits and his medal, said something funny to those right around him, and sat down.

Presenter of the charismatic and charming actor, singer, dancer Brian Stokes Mitchell was to have been veteran Broadway producer Roger Berlind (Hall of Fame 2009). Confined by illness, he sent at the last minute his son, William Berlind, who noted his father and Stokes (Mr. Mitchell’s universal nickname) had met in 1977 working on a musical in Los Angeles, where Mr. Mitchell went on to appear for seven years in TV’s “Trapper John, M.D.”

His most famous Broadway roles were in “Oh, Kay!,” “Ragtime,” “Kiss Me, Kate” (for which he won the Tony), August Wilson’s “King Hedley II,” “Man of LaMancha” and “Shuffle Along,” which closed precipitously in July. He has also served since 2004 as active chairman of the board of the Actors Fund of America, which supports ill and indigent actors.

Mr. Mitchell began by paying tribute to a ninth grade drama teacher who had him do the same scene from “Taming of the Shrew” which he later did on Broadway. “I call myself so lucky to be able to do the work I do,” he said.

He acknowledged it had been a “wacky week” (since the election), then speaking of both theater and politics, said, “It’s when we feel the most divided, most fractured, that’s when the real work needs to be done. ... I’m grateful to be a member of a community.”

Accomplished, busy director Bartlett Sher has worked regularly with costume designer Catherine Zuber, whose credits include 46 Broadway shows and six Tony Awards. Among other factoids, he said that as a kid, “Cathy used her Catholic school uniform to gain entrance to Warhol’s Factory.” She recently designed her 6,000th costume. And “I can’t imagine the walls of the Hall of Fame could stand without Catherine Zuber.”

In response, Ms. Zuber thanked the American Theater Critics Association, which provides the bulk of the Hall’s electors, and noted that her first Broadway production (after many years designing regionally) was the famous 1993 flop, “The Red Shoes.”

The last presenters were the most entertaining, the team of Donald and Eva Rice, film director son and novelist-songwriter daughter of inductee Sir Tim Rice. Knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 1994, Sir Tim is the prolific lyricist for the early Andrew Lloyd Webber hits, including “Jesus Christ Superstar” and “Evita,” and since then, with other composers, for “Aladdin,” “The Lion King” and Chess.”

But his kids took an entertainingly ironic approach, focusing on his “mishaps, disasters and sheer ineptitude.” For example, on his way to a premiere of “Chess,” he got out of the hired car to pee, with the driver realizing he’d left him beside the road only when he arrived and opened the door to find him gone. Or the time he wore a striped shirt to a PR event for “Lion King,” to discover that the real lion on the set thought he was a zebra and fair game. Or a number of stunningly bad reviews from which they gleefully quoted.

They then praised their father’s ability to laugh at himself, before describing him as the perfect example of the “actor who’s forgotten his spear and then trips over it on his way in.”

Sir Tim took the same tack, describing his whole career as a series of lucky accidents, starting with “Jesus Christ, Superstar,” which began as an album before it was a show, and since you can’t have dialogue on a record, “by mistake we created something quite original,” a musical that was both more operatic and radio friendly.

“My career has been shambolic,” he said. “We just stumbled into it.” And then he thanked the Hall of Fame profusely, clearly enjoying the whole joke, as well as the occasion.

Senior Theater Critic Chris Rawson is at 412-216-1944.

First Published: November 19, 2016, 9:52 p.m.