NEW YORK — The bittersweet musical “Once” captured eight Tony Awards on Sunday, including best musical direction, best lead actor in a musical and the top musical prize itself. ‘Once,’ wins 8 Tony Awards ADVERTISING NEW YORK — The bittersweet
‘Once,’ wins
8 Tony Awards
NEW YORK — The bittersweet musical “Once” captured eight Tony Awards on Sunday, including best musical direction, best lead actor in a musical and the top musical prize itself.
The inventive play “Peter and the Starcatcher” was next with five awards. Audra McDonald was named best lead actress in a musical and her “The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess” was named best musical revival.
Nina Arianda, a rising star, won best leading actress in a play, beating stiff competition from Tracie Bennett, Stockard Channing, Linda Lavin and Cynthia Nixon.
In perhaps the biggest shock of the night, James Corden nabbed the lead acting Tony Award in a play for his clownish turn in the British import “One Man, Two Guvnors.” He beat out the favorite, Philip Seymour Hoffman in “Death of a Salesman.”
Pastor denies choking, punching daughter
COLLEGE PARK, Ga. — Megachurch pastor Creflo Dollar staunchly denied Sunday that he punched and choked his 15-year-old daughter in an argument, telling his congregation the allegations made in a police report are nothing but “exaggeration and sensationalism.”
“I will say this emphatically: I should have never been arrested,” Dollar said in his first public appearance two days after police charged him with misdemeanor counts of simple battery and cruelty to children.
The pastor got an enthusiastic ovation from the packed church as he took the pulpit Sunday at the World Changers Church International in metro Atlanta. He addressed the criminal charges head-on for several minutes before moving on to his sermon.
“I want you all to hear personally from me that all is well in the Dollar household,” Dollar said.
The 50-year-old Dollar is one of the most prominent African-American preachers based around Atlanta, with 30,000 members in the Atlanta area and a ministry of satellite churches across the U.S.
Trendy pedicures
arrive in Baghdad
BAGHDAD — The latest luxury spa in Iraq’s capital offers another small sign of life creeping closer to normalcy — if your definition of “normal” includes having tiny fish nibble on your feet.
Billed as Baghdad’s first fish pedicure salon, the enterprise aims to bring in Iraqi customers who have recently begun to venture out again as the violence that engulfed the country after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion ebbs. Bombings and shootings are still common, but daily life has improved for most people in recent years. Dozens of beauty salons, cosmetic surgery centers and other enterprises have sprung up to cash in on war-weary Iraqis looking for pampering.
Doctor’s Fish Spa opened this year in western Baghdad’s upscale Mansour area. Owner Musbah Saleh, 37, was looking for a unique service to offer customers when he hit on trendy fish pedicures, in which small carp in a tank eat dead skin to make feet extra smooth.
The practice of using the toothless garra rufa fish as a treatment for skin diseases became popular in Asia in 2006. But Saleh found in his research that it originated decades ago in Iraq’s neighbor, Turkey. He traveled there earlier this year and imported 600 of the fish at a cost of about $10,000.
Now, dozens of his scaly, hungry employees dart around in a tank attached to a pedicure chair, waiting for a new pair of feet to munch on. The pink-walled reception area is decorated with floral stencils and an elaborate aquarium filled with plastic fish.
6 die in Nigeria
church attacks
ABUJA, Nigeria — At least six people were killed and more than 50 injured Sunday when two churches in Nigeria attacked by unknown assailants.
Authorities said at least five churchgoers were killed in a suicide blast around 11 a.m. as they left a Sunday service in the central city of Jos.
Police said more than 52 worshippers were injured by the explosion, which destroyed the Christ Chosen Church of God
The church’s pastor and his family were reported by local media to be critically injured in hospital.
Emeka Obi, a witness, said the bomb was detonated by a suicide bomber who drove a car into the entrance of the church.
In a separate attack in the town of Biu in Borno state, gunmen opened fire, spraying bullets into the congregation of a church. Police said scores were injured and a woman died.
No group claimed responsibility for the blasts. Last year, the radical Islamist sect Boko Haram scaled up its attacks on churches, killing dozens in coordinated Christmas Day blasts that hit churchgoers close to Abuja, the capital.
Military: Syria chemical stocks threaten Israel
JERUSALEM — Israel’s deputy military chief is warning that Syria has the biggest chemical weapons stocks in the world and missiles and rockets that can reach any point in Israel.
Maj. Gen. Yair Naveh also said if Syria had the chance, it would “treat us the same way it treats its own people.”
Israel radio stations carried Naveh’s remarks today. He made them the night before at a ceremony in Jerusalem commemorating fallen soldiers.
Syrian activists estimate more than 13,000 people have died since the uprising in Syria erupted 15 months ago.
Israel has been watching the carnage in neighboring Syria with increasing concern.
The two countries have fought major wars and Syria backs violent anti-Israel groups. Multiple attempts to reach a peace deal have failed.
By wire sources
