"Spring Awakening" tipped to sweep Tony Awards

08/06/2007 18:56

By Claudia Parsons

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Sunday is Tony night -- and not just for Tony Soprano whose fate will be sealed in the final episode of "The Sopranos." It’s also the night Broadway hands out its biggest prizes of the year, the Tony Awards.

Hot favourite to walk away with a string of theatre awards, including best musical, is "Spring Awakening," a dark rock-musical about teen-age sexual angst, which goes in with 11 nominations and rave reviews all around.

On the dramatic side, playwright Tom Stoppard is a likely winner after picking up several lesser prizes for his trilogy "The Coast of Utopia" about 19th century Russian revolutionaries.

But critics say best play could also go to Peter Morgan’s "Frost/Nixon," about David Frost’s 1977 television interviews with the disgraced president Richard Nixon.

New York Times pundit Campbell Robertson was predicting few surprises in his preview based on a poll of voters.

"Several categories seem to be all but wrapped up," he wrote, predicting a shower of awards for "Spring Awakening" and a best actor award for Frank Langella as Nixon.

The New York Post and the Daily News agreed, and all three papers also predicted a win for "The Coast of Utopia" as best play and acting awards for "Grey Gardens," a musical .....continued below

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about two reclusive, eccentric relatives of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.

Veteran Broadway star Christine Ebersole is the favourite for best actress in a musical, and her "Grey Gardens" co-star Mary-Louise Wilson could also take a prize, critics say.

One category where opinions appeared divided is best actress in a play, where veterans Angela Lansbury and Vanessa Redgrave are nominated despite being in plays that were not critical hits. Julie White, star of "The Little Dog Laughed," and Eve Best in "A Moon for the Misbegotten" are in the running too, as well as longshot Swoosie Kurtz.

The League of American Theatres and Producers and the American Theatre Wing are hoping to lure viewers to the live broadcast on CBS television with big name presenters such as Harry Connick Jr., Felicity Huffman, Liev Schreiber, Kevin Spacey and R&B star Usher.

But New York Post theatre writer Michael Riedel predicted a sharp fall in ratings from last year. "Insiders joke about the ’dead hour’ between 9 and 10 p.m., when most of the U.S. will be watching the final episode of ’The Sopranos,’" he wrote.

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