A Bermudian actor who was nominated for a Tony Award for his performance in Chess fell short of winning the accolade at the award show in New York on Sunday night.

Nicholas Christopher featured among a host of celebrities at the glitzy event at Radio City Music Hall.

Last month, he said he was stunned to be nominated for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical in the awards, which recognises the top Broadway performances and productions.

The award, however, went to Joshua Henry for his role in Ragtime, the actor’s first Tony win.

Other nominees in the category were Luke Evans for his role in Richard O’Brien’s The Rocky Horror Show, Sam Tutty in Two Strangers (Carry a Cake Across New York) and Brandon Uranowitz, who also appeared in Ragtime.

Mr Christopher was all smiles when he appeared on the red carpet accompanied by his wife, Jennifer Locke Christopher, and posed for the cameras.

On the red carpet, the actor told CBS Mornings that he did not want the team to post a clip of a 20-second note he held in the musical which went viral recently.

He said: “It just kind of went viral … to be honest I didn’t want them to post that clip.

“I thought it was just my emotional climax of the show and I just didn’t feel like I should post it and then they posted it and then it kind of took off and took a life of its own.”

He admitted that he was glad the clip was posted.

Mr Christopher said the note did not feel like “I’m trying to hold something but I’m actually trying to release something”.

Chess, written in 1984, features a chess tournament between an American and a Soviet player to the backdrop of Cold War tensions.

Mr Christopher, the son of Hamilton town crier Ed Christopher, plays the stoic and tortured Anatoly Sergievsky, who falls for Florence Vassy, the second to Anatoly’s American opponent.

His father told The Royal Gazette that the family were hosting a watch party as they awaited the announcement of the nominees.