NEW YORK (Reuters) – Famous stage actors, Hollywood stars and big-name musicians are set to gather at the Tony Awards on Sunday, when American theater’s top honors are announced.

U.S. critics were split on who will win some of this year’s awards, but Hollywood names including Denzel Washington, Scarlett Johansson, Jude Law, Laura Linney and Catherine Zeta-Jones are scattered among the nominees for the show, which will be broadcast from New York’s Radio City Music Hall.

U.S. rock band Green Day was expected to perform along with appearances by well-known figures including Cate Blanchett, Will Smith, Katie Holmes, Antonio Banderas and rapper and now Broadway producer Jay-Z.

Two shows that transferred from London, “Red,” a play that uncovers the angst of artist Mark Rothko, and a revival of campy musical “La Cage aux Folles,” were heavily favored to win best play and best musical revival.

Unlike previous years, competition for the best new musical award is fiercest, with “Fela!” a dance musical telling of Nigerian Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti favored along with “Memphis,” about the roots of rock’n'roll and at lesser odds, U.S. rock band Green Day’s musical “American Idiot.”

The Jay-Z produced “Fela!,” which blazed its way onto Broadway in November and tied for the highest number of Tony nominations with “La Cage aux Folles,” would be the first musical to center on the lives of black characters to win best musical since “Ain’t Misbehavin” in 1978.

TOSS-UPS

NEW YORK (Reuters) – “Memphis,” a romp that discovers the roots of rock’n'roll and “Red,” a play about artist Mark Rothko, took American theater’s top honors at a star-studded Tony Awards held on Sunday at Radio City Musical Hall.

“Memphis” an original musical loosely based on Memphis disc jockey Dewey Phillips that features a rock, soul and gospel score, won for best musical as well as awards for best original score and best book.

“Red,” a production transferred from London that stars British actor Alfred Molina as Rothko, won best play.

But Denzel Washington beat Molina to win best actor in a play for his role in a revival of the August Wilson play “Fences.”

“My mother always says, man gives the award, God gives the reward. I guess I got both tonight,” Washington, 55, said in his acceptance speech for his first Tony Award.

Viola Davis won best actress for her role opposite Washington playing a long married couple in “Fences,” which also won for best play revival.

“La Cage aux Folles,” won the award for best musical revival while British actor Douglas Hodge who starred opposite Kelsey Grammer in the production that was also a London transfer won the best performance by a leading actor in a musical.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – “Memphis,” a romp that discovers the roots of rock’n'roll and “Red,” a play about artist Mark Rothko picked up early Tony Awards for the past Broadway season at a star-studded ceremony held on Sunday at Radio City Musical Hall.

“Memphis” an original musical loosely based on Memphis disc jockey Dewey Phillips, picked up early behind-the-scenes awards including for best original score and best book in a musical while “Red,” also won several early awards including best scenic design and best director of a play.

Hundreds of fans lined the streets in light rain to catch glimpses of Hollywood names nominated for the 64th Tony Awards that include Denzel Washington, Scarlett Johansson, Jude Law, Laura Linney and Catherine Zeta-Jones.

Johansson was the first big Hollywood name to win an award for best featured actress in a play for her performance in a revival of Arthur Miller’s “A View from the Bridge.

“Being welcomed in this community has been an absolute dream come true,” she said.

English actor Eddie Redmayne won the best featured actor in a play for “Red,” and said “this is the stuff that dreams are made of,” before commending Alfred Molina, who plays Rothko in the production that was transferred from London.

“Will & Grace” actor Sean Hayes hosted the awards and shared the stage with punk rock band Green Day who performed songs from their album turned musical “American Idiot” in front of well-known figures who attended including Cate Blanchett, Will Smith and Antonio Banderas.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The play “Red” and a revival of campy musical “La Cage aux Folles” are among the top contenders heading into U.S. theater’s top honors for Broadway, the Tony Awards, that will be handed out on Sunday.

Among the well-known actors and actresses nominated for the awards being broadcast from New York’s Radio City Music Hall on June 13 are Denzel Washington, Scarlett Johansson, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Christopher Walken and Jude Law.

Critics are split on whether Washington, 55, who has returned to Broadway in a hailed performance in the August Wilson play “Fences,” or British actor Alfred Molina will win best actor, while Viola Davis is widely tipped to win best actress playing Washington’s wife in “Fences.”

Molina received strong reviews for his performance as abstract artist Mark Rothko in “Red,” which is widely tipped to win best play after being transferred from London’s West End. “Red” competes with “Next Fall”, “Time Stands Still and “In the Next Room or the Vibrator Play” for the Tony’s top award.

But U.S. critics are split on their choice for best musical between rock band Green Day’s “American Idiot,” “Memphis,” a romp that looks at the roots of rock ‘n’ roll, and “Fela!” a dance musical telling of Nigerian Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti.

“Fela!” is the surprise critical hit of last season, and it picked up the most Tony nominations along with “La Cage aux Folles.”

British stage veteran Douglas Hodge, who made his Broadway debut alongside Kelsey Grammer in “La Cage aux Folles” as a gay couple dealing with their son’s impending marriage, has earned the most buzz for best musical actor, along with lesser odds for Sahr Ngaujah from “Fela!”.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Singer Belinda Carlisle reveals a double-edged life in a new memoir from her burgeoning glory days in the all-girl band the Go-Go’s to decades of cocaine use that masked her personal insecurities.

“I was like the good girl, bad girl, there were no grey areas for me,” Carlisle said in a recent interview recalling how her days growing up in poor suburban Los Angeles where the contrast between being both a shoplifter and popular high school cheerleader formed patterns for her life.

Her recently released book, “Lips Unsealed,” — a play on the hit Go-Go’s's 1981 smash hit song “Our Lips Are Sealed” — details much of Carlisle’s early days forming the band in L.A’s punk scene and becoming “the first female band (formed by women) to write our own songs and play our own instruments. It was pretty revolutionary,” said Carlisle.

After obsessions with bands like Queen and the Sex Pistols, Carlisle and guitarist/songwriter Jane Wiedlin helped start the new wave band but were clueless about how to perform.

“The punk scene was great in that anybody could be in a band and be terrible, including us,” said Carlisle, now 50. “We started from zero, we didn’t have a Svengali. We had no idea how to play our instruments.”

But soon they played in L.A. clubs such as the Whisky a Go Go and gained a following with their high energy and punk image that saw Carlisle sporting a crew cut, changed hair colors and experimenting with outrageous outfits.

“It was never a contrived image. We just looked that way. It was a combination of punk, rockabilly and tiaras, torn stockings and stilettos,” Carlisle said. “And we just had these angelic faces that hid a multitude of sins.”

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Canadian teen pop star Justin Bieber may be just 16 years-old, but he’s already an old hand at promoting his music and image and handling the attentions of swarms of teenage girls.

Famously launched on video-sharing website YouTube and signed to a record deal at age 14, he now travels the world promoting his latest album “My World 2.0″ and preparing for his upcoming tour.

In public he is often mobbed, but despite sometimes dangerous situations, he says fame doesn’t get to him.

“I definitely like girls so that’s a bonus to have girls all the time,” he told Reuters this week. “I just have fun with it, I am a teenager and everything’s just been a blast.”

His high-pitched voice, stylish clothes and distinctively blown-forward hair has led to hysterical mob scenes, including an incident in Sydney, Australia in April when his mother was knocked over.

“My fans, sometimes they overreact but, you know, it’s hard for them in the moment to always act right,” he said.

Bieber’s latest album debuted in March at the top of the U.S. Billboard 200 chart, selling over 283,000 in its first week, making him the youngest solo male act to top the chart since Stevie Wonder in 1963.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Unlike most emerging Hollywood stars, there’s nothing Russell Brand won’t talk about. At 34, he’s practically already said and done it all.

The British, brash, self-confessed former sex, heroin and crack addict, whose pranks and antics included being forced to resign as a BBC radio host after lewd phone calls, is now rising through the ranks of Hollywood movie stars in roles that show off his famous, fast-talking ways.

This week he tests out his first major starring role on U.S. movie audiences in “Get Him to the Greek,” which gives top billing to his old role as music pop star star Aldous Snow from the 2008 film “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.” It opens in U.S. theaters on Friday.

Brand says the character, who in the film takes a naive record label intern on a hedonistic descent into the world of sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll, reminds him of his dark and wild days chronicled in his irreverent 2007 memoir “My Booky Wook.”

“It’s like being able to, for a very brief stint, live out the dark fantasies of the past that were troublesome to actually live the first time,” he told Reuters in his usual tongue-in-cheek tone in a recent interview.

“Get Him to the Greek” — a spin-off of sorts from “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” in which the Aldous Snow character was only one part of a broader story — co-stars Jonah Hill as the intern (Aaron Green) who struggles to take Snow from London to Los Angeles for a concert at the city’s Greek Theatre.

Along the way, the pair get into tricky escapades and, of course, learn what is truly important in life.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Old-fashioned Broadway is moving into the digital age.

A current round of shows depend on million-dollar multimedia displays like never before, bringing video upstage after years of being relegated mostly to backdrop status.

New musicals like “Sondheim on Sondheim” use sophisticated swirling computer screens that flash thousands of still and moving images and are central to the storytelling action.

“Sondheim” and productions such as “Everyday Rapture” feature YouTube for comical effects. “Sondheim,” for instance, includes a montage of people, from celebrities like Barbra Streisand to budding singers, lending their voice to the composer’s famed song, “Send In The Clowns,”

Rock band Green Day’s “American Idiot,” “Enron” and “Fela!” project news broadcasts of war, conflict, corruption and politics that boldly make video more than just a small part of set design.

“More and more we are seeing it in a lot of productions on Broadway,” said “Sondheim” video designer Peter Flaherty. “And the sophistication level with the use of video is definitely starting to increase on Broadway.”

“Sondheim,” which tells the real-life story of American composer Stephen Sondheim, blends live action on stage, including singers such as Vanessa Williams, with archival video footage and taped interviews with Sondheim himself, who at the age of 80 is only seen on screen.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Giants and upstarts of publishing gathered at the annual BookExpo America here this week agreed e-books will transform the business, although exactly how it will all shake out remains unclear.

From biggest publishers to newcomers there was agreement on one thing — the big change will come when there is a standard format across which all e-books can be published and shared.

The industry has been going through a tumultuous period as Apple and Amazon duke it out for dominance in the nascent market for electronic books.

Both want their devices — the iPad and the Kindle — to be the one consumers use to read e-books, and each wants to be the biggest virtual store were such content is sold.

For Michael Serbinis, chief executive of Kobo, a company that allows users to buy e-books and read them on most devices, that battle is a distraction to the real changes coming.

“Today you can buy a book at Barnes and Noble and you can buy a book at Walmart and you don’t have to keep them in separate rooms in your house,” he said. “You buy a book from Apple and Amazon and you have got to keep it tied up with your Apple universe or your Kindle universe.”

Ultimately, consumers want freedom, said David Shanks, chief executive of leading publisher Penguin Group USA.