'Billy Elliot' dances away with 10 Tonys

NEW YORK - "Billy Elliot" has won the Tony as Broadway's best musical.

The show about a British coal miner's son who dreams to dance was the biggest musical hit of the season.

The show won 10 awards, all told, including for the three young actors who star in the title role.

But the show and its composer Elton John were upset for best score.

That award was taken by "Next to Normal" - which seemed to stun "Normal" composer Tom Kitt and lyricist Brian Yorkey.

"God of Carnage," the satiric comedy by French playwright Yasmina Reza, took the best play prize.

The play about the clash between two liberal, middle-class couples whose children get into a fight, stars James Gandolfini, Marcia Gay Harden, Jeff Daniels and Hope Davis.

Harden also won the actress-play award and the production's director, Matthew Warchus, also picked up a prize.

The director/musical award went to Stephen Daldry of "Billy Elliot."

He said the award belonged to everyone connected to the show and especially to "three great gifts of Broadway, our three little Billys."

"Billy" also received design prizes for featured actor, sets, lighting, sound and a tie with "Next to Normal" for best orchestrations, which Kitt shared with Michael Starobin.

Geoffrey Rush's extravagant portrait of a dying monarch in "Exit the King" took the top actor prize.

Angela Lansbury received her fifth Tony, this time for her performance as the dotty medium Madame Arcati in a revival of Noel Coward's "Blithe Spirit." Her win in the featured-actress category tied the record for acting prizes held by Julie Harris, who has five plus a special lifetime achievement award given in 2002. *