'Billy Elliot' big favorite to win Tonys
It's the ultimate morning after for a few dozen actors. Fewer than 24 hours ago, they were nominated for Tony Awards, and now they're posing on a red carpet when they're usually asleep.
"I'm an actress in theater," Martha Plimpton says. "I don't know from 8 in the morning."
At 8 p.m. Sunday, they will be in their element — the theater at night — when CBS broadcasts the 63rd Annual Tony Awards live from Radio City Music Hall in New York. Neil Patrick Harris will host, and expect to hear him constantly introducing cast and crew from "Billy Elliot: The Musical."
As the lead in "Rock of Ages," Constantine Maroulis ("American Idol") is pitted against the three boys playing Billy Elliot, and he isn't bothering to write an acceptance speech. "All those kids from 'Billy Elliot,' this is their year," he says.
"Billy Elliot," with 15 nods, matches the record held by "The Producers." Several of the main contenders have been hit movies, such as "Shrek The Musical," which has its three leads up for awards.
"Shrek," the silliest musical of the season, is the only Broadway show in memory with a song where stars supposedly pass gas.
"It's just a role of a lifetime," says Sutton Foster, up for best actress in a musical, as Princess Fiona. "I love her. It's so much fun to play a princess who gets to fart and burp."
Brian d'Arcy James, who plays Shrek, raves about the production's stage design, which is incredibly clever with a castle and a dragon. "One thing I love so much is a lot of kids come to see this, and they are introduced to theater," he says.
Among the funnier gags on Broadway is Christopher Sieber's Lord Farquaad, who plays the role on his knees, with little toy legs in front of him. "It's not the knees, it's the rest of the body" that aches after, he says. "The audience knows how it's done, but it's such a funny illusion."
Another sight gag audiences love is when Marc Kudisch, the chauvinistic boss in "9 to 5," is strung up. He does such a fine job, he's hissed during curtain calls. "I like when I get a reaction," he says. "I like that not-typical reaction to most pieces of musical theater."
His co-star Allison Janney, nominated for lead actress in a musical, looks as if she's having a blast as she struts more than dances with a chorus of tuxedo-clad men.
"I do have a great time," she says. "And no matter how tired I am, it helps. You need to have a great time, especially if you are doing eight shows a week, or you're kind of screwed."
Just as Dolly Parton's upbeat score for "9 to 5" makes misery in the workplace fun, Elton John's music and Peter Darling's choreography in "Billy Elliot" have people on their feet cheering during numbers about a 1984 coal miners strike. Billy is sent for boxing lessons, as all the tough lads learn to fight. He falls in love with ballet and is a terrific dancer. The three boys playing Billy — Trent Kowalik, Kiril Kulish and David Alvarez — are the first trio to be jointly nominated for best actor in a leading role in a musical.
David Bologna, who plays Billy's fabulous best friend and steals the show in a cross-dressing, tap-dancing number, was with his mom in a downpour in Times Square as nominations were announced. "This is really, really, really cool," he says, beaming.
Even cooler? The other nominees aren't in eighth grade and are just as excited.
Jeff Daniels of "God of Carnage," for which all four leads are nominated, says, "I'm stunned, absolutely stunned. You have no control over this, and you can either hope for this and risk being disappointed, or put up the brick wall and pretend it doesn't matter. I can see over the wall."
Daniels is in the same category with co-star James Gandolfini, Broadway vet Raul Esparza ("Speed-the-Plow"), movie star Geoffrey Rush ("Exit the King") and newcomer Thomas Sadoski ("reasons to be pretty.")
Rush is the king who must die (after all, he's 400 years old) in Ionesco's absurd play. "It broadens the horizons to be in an obscure Ionesco," he says. "That it plays to a full house has been great."
As obscure as that is, the curtain rises on three shows in which the audience knows the lyrics. "Rock of Ages" encourages rowdiness by selling drinks and passing out plastic lights for folks to wave during the '80s anthems. "Hair" has the cast dancing in the aisles and with some patrons.
And "West Side Story," which won six Tony Awards when it was first staged in 1957, nabbed nominations for the two top parts for women, Maria and Anita, played by Josefina Scaglione and Karen Olivo, respectively.
