2009 Tony Award predictions

WILD PARTY The cast of God of Carnage forgets its manners.

Photograph: Joan Marcus

[Note: Percentages below indicate the nominee’s chance of winning.]

Best Play
God of Carnage 52%
reasons to be pretty 26%
Dividing the Estate 19%
33 Variations 3%
The race: The combination of celebrities, a stylish production and a shiny intellectual veneer means that Yasmina Reza’s farce will win. Missing: Lynn Nottage’s Ruined, still playing Off.

Best Musical
Billy Elliot 72%
Next to Normal 26%
Rock of Ages 1%
Shrek 1%
The race: Emotional heft, eye-popping stagecraft, tremendous scope, leftist politics: Billy Elliot has them all, and is tutu likely to dance off with the night’s big prize.

Best Revival of a Play
The Norman Conquests 41%
Mary Stuart 23%
Joe Turner’s Come and Gone 20%
Waiting for Godot 16%
The race: In an extraordinary year for play revivals, The Norman Conquests’s sheer seven-hour length gives it the edge—not to mention the welcome Norman invasion of its superb English cast.

Best Revival of a Musical
Hair 71%
West Side Story 27%
Guys and Dolls 1%
Pal Joey 1%
The race: Despite some threatening moves by the sold-out West Side Story, Hair is the overwhelmingly beloved return this season: a welcome acid flashback.

Best Special Event
Liza’s at the Palace… 83%
You’re Welcome America. A Final Night with George W Bush 14%
Slava’s Snowshow 2%
Soul of Shaolin 1%
The race: Oh, come on—it’s Liza “Always Let Them See You Sweat” Minnelli, and these are the frickin’ Tony Awards. If she doesn’t win, the aisles of Radio City will be rivers of blood.

Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play
Geoffrey Rush, Exit the King 78%
Jeff Daniels, God of Carnage 11%
Raúl Esparza, Speed-the-Plow 5%
Thomas Sadoski, reasons to be pretty 4%
James Gandolfini, God of Carnage 2%
The race: Gandolfini and Daniels split the Carnage vote; Esparza has been forgotten and Sadoski is unknown. Tony loves a star, and Rush is chewing scenery like mad.

Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play
Marcia Gay Harden, God of Carnage 36%
Jane Fonda, 33 Variations 30%
Janet McTeer, Mary Stuart 27%
Harriet Walter, Mary Stuart 6%
Hope Davis, God of Carnage 1%
The race: Look for Harden to nose out a victory in one of the night’s tightest races—but keep an eye on sentimental favorite Fonda, star of the half-Wit weepie 33 Variations.

Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Musical
David Alvarez, Trent Kowalik and Kiril Kulish, Billy Elliot 58%
Brian d’Arcy James, Shrek 21%
Gavin Creel, Hair 19%
J. Robert Spencer, Next to Normal 1%
Constantine Maroulis, Rock of Ages 1%
The race: Many voters are unhappy that all three Billy Elliot tykes are combined in a single slot—but in the absence of an obvious alternative, the Billy club will beat the adults out.

Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical
Alice Ripley, Next to Normal 87%
Josefina Scaglione, West Side Story 7%
Allison Janney, 9 to 5 3%
Stockard Channing, Pal Joey 2%
Sutton Foster, Shrek 1%
The race: Interesting mix of women who can sing (Scaglione), those who phrase nicely (Channing) and those who can barely carry a tune (Janney). Doesn’t matter, since Ripley’s deranged housewife wins easily.

Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Play
Roger Robinson, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone 59%
John Glover, Waiting for Godot 20%
Stephen Mangan, The Norman Conquests 19%
Paul Ritter, The Norman Conquests 1%
Zach Grenier, 33 Variations 1%
The race: This year it could be called Best Shambolic Weirdo. Robinson blew everyone away with his sly, beguiling turn as a magic man.

Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play
Angela Lansbury, Blithe Spirit 61%
Hallie Foote, Dividing the Estate 24%
Marin Ireland, reasons to be pretty 12%
Amanda Root, The Norman Conquests 2%
Jessica Hynes, The Norman Conquests 1%
The race: In another terrific category (marred only by the absence of The Seagull’s Carey Mulligan), the beloved Lansbury will win her fifth Tony for her rare turn as a medium. Well done!

Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical
Gregory Jbara, Billy Elliot 41%
Will Swenson, Hair 38%
Christopher Sieber, Shrek 11%
Marc Kudisch, 9 to 5 9%
David Bologna, Billy Elliot 1%
The race: Will Swenson’s hyperenergized performance sets Hair on its edge, but Jbara is a well-liked workhorse whose turn has likely come.

Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical
Karen Olivo, West Side Story 52%
Haydn Gwynne, Billy Elliot 40%
Martha Plimpton, Pal Joey 6%
Jennifer Damiano, Next to Normal 1%
Carole Shelley, Billy Elliot 1%
The race: A talented bunch of gals here, but this year it’s Olivo’s to lose; her high-kicking, tough-minded Anita is red-hot.

Best Original Score
Billy Elliot, Elton John and Lee Hall 49%
Next to Normal, Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey 47%
9 to 5, Dolly Parton 3%
Shrek, Jeanine Tesori and David Lindsay-Abaire 1%
The race: Next to Normal has a very serious shot—this is a category where voters have often rewarded smaller shows—but Billy Elliot will likely ride its flash to a photo finish.

Best Book of a Musical
Billy Elliot, Lee Hall 51%
Next to Normal, Brian Yorkey 41%
[title of show], Hunter Bell 7%
Shrek, David Lindsay-Abaire 1%
The race: We love Next to Normal’s intimate drama, but Billy Elliot weaves together so many themes so skillfully, it will win. Meanwhile, no one is more thrilled (or surprised) than Bell that he was nominated.

Best Direction of a Play
Matthew Warchus, The Norman Conquests 44%
Matthew Warchus, God of Carnage 35%
Bartlett Sher, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone 16%
Phyllida Lloyd, Mary Stuart 5%
The race: It’s the War of the Warchus this year as the ace British director competes against himself. The winner: Warchus!—for the more complicated of the two.

Best Direction of a Musical
Stephen Daldry, Billy Elliot 55%
Diane Paulus, Hair 41%
Michael Greif, Next to Normal 3%
Kristin Hanggi, Rock of Ages 1%
The race: The wizardly Daldry ensured that Billy Elliot is so much more than the sum of its parts. Still, there’s not a weak link here, from Paulus’s vibrant ecstasy to Hanggi’s shameless sight gags.

Best Choreography
Peter Darling, Billy Elliot 82%
Karole Armitage, Hair 15%
Randy Skinner, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas 1%
Andy Blankenbuehler, 9 to 5 1%
The race: The dynamic breadth of Peter Darling’s choreography in Billy Elliot may be the finest Broadway has seen since Michael Bennett.

Best Orchestrations
Martin Koch, Billy Elliot 53%
Danny Troob and John Clancy, Shrek 23%
Michael Starobin and Tom Kitt, Next to Normal 20%
Larry Blank, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas 4%
The race: Honestly, Elton John’s score is a little substandard, so it’s to Koch’s credit that the tunes are so effective.

Best Scenic Design of a Play
Derek McLane, 33 Variations 49%
Dale Ferguson, Exit the King 40%
Michael Yeargan, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone 7%
Rob Howell, The Norman Conquests 4%
The race: No clear frontrunner here, but McLane’s clever and evocative use of musical sheet paper to create various environments has Tony voters humming the set.

Best Scenic Design of a Musical
Ian MacNeil, Billy Elliot 76%
Mark Wendland, Next to Normal 20%
Scott Pask, Pal Joey 2%
Robert Brill, Guys and Dolls 2%
The race: Bigger is almost always better in this category, and Ian MacNeil’s great sinking staircase island is nothing if not big.

Best Costume Design of a Play
Anthony Ward, Mary Stuart 48%
Dale Ferguson, Exit the King 41%
Martin Pakledinaz, Blithe Spirit 6%
Jane Greenwood, Waiting for Godot 5%
The race: Budgetary restrictions was the original reason why Ward devised half-period, half-contemporary for Mary Stuart, but it’s ingenious nonetheless.

Best Costume Design of a Musical
Tim Hatley, Shrek 43%
Nicky Gillibrand, Billy Elliot 40%
Michael McDonald, Hair 16%
Gregory Gale, Rock of Ages 1%
The race: Gillibrand’s purposefully dowdy Billy Elliot costumes actually deserve to win—but Hatley’s ultrabright fairy-tale creations have an undeniable pop.

Best Lighting Design of a Play
David Lander, 33 Variations 44%
David Hersey, Equus 42%
Brian MacDevitt, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone 9%
Hugh Vanstone, Mary Stuart 5%
The race: Two Davids, two striking lighting designs. We suspect the winner will be the one fresher in voters’ minds.

Best Lighting Design of a Musical
Rick Fisher, Billy Elliot 53%
Kevin Adams, Hair 41%
Howell Binkley, Next to Normal 1%
The race: In a remarkably good year for lighting in musicals, the Billy juggernaut will pick up another design prize.

Best Sound Design of a Play
Russell Goldsmith, Exit the King 44%
Gregory Clarke, Equus 36%
Paul Arditti, Mary Stuart 15%
Scott Lehrer and Leon Rothenberg, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone 5%
The race: We hope Tony voters were listening carefully, because Goldsmith crafted a rich, hallucinatory range of noises for the absurdist Exit the King.

Best Sound Design of a Musical
Paul Arditti, Billy Elliot 54%
Acme Sound Partners, Hair 24%
Brian Ronan, Next to Normal 21%
Peter Hylenski, Rock of Ages 1%
The race: Arditti’s exemplary work keeps one of Broadway’s largest, busiest casts sounding balanced and crisp—and that final mine effect leaves a haunting echo in audience’s ear.

The 2009 Tony Awards will be broadcast on CBS Sun 7 at 8pm. Visit tonys.org.

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