'Billy Elliot' tops Tonys

June 07, 2009 "Billy Elliot," the tale of a young boy rising from the ashes of a hardscrabble coal-mining town to soar as a ballet dancer, nabbed 10 Tony Awards Sunday, including best musical. Faced with the worst economic downturn in eight decades, the nation's premier theater showcase managed to set a record at the box office and find enough investors to stage 43 productions, the most in a quarter century. Blockbuster musicals such as "Billy Elliot" played a major role in that success, as did star-studded plays such as Yasmina Reza's "God of Carnage," which took home the award for best play and two other Tonys -- for best actress (Marica Gay Harden) and best direction (Matthew Warchus).

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