2011 Olivier Award nominations and winners

Revived at the Royal Opera House for the first time in over a cen­tury, Adri­ana Lecouvreur is a fic­tional account of the life of the 18th cen­tury act­ress. David McVicar was acclaimed for direction.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in Opera
• Best New Opera Production
  

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After the Dance

Ter­ence Rattigan’s subtle unmask­ing of the hedon­istic 1920s was revived by the National Theatre as the Rat­tigan renais­sance gathered pace. Its tale of society’s élite offered a glimpse at dec­ad­ence in the face of destruction.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Act­ress
• Best Actor in a Sup­port­ing Role
• Best Dir­ector
• Best Revival
• Best Light­ing Design
• Best Cos­tume Design

All My Sons

Howard Davies’s power­ful revival of Arthur Miller’s poignant drama about for­bid­den love, dev­ast­at­ing secrets and the cor­rup­tion of greed starred David Suchet and Zoe Wana­maker as bereft par­ents, haunted by events of the Second World War.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Actor
• Best Revival

Asphodel Mead­ows

Cho­reo­grapher Liam Scott cre­ated this haunt­ing, abstract bal­let set to Fran­cis Poulenc’s Double Piano Con­certo for his Royal Opera House main stage debut. At just 24-years-old, Scott won crit­ical acclaim for the romantic piece.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in Dance

Babel (Words)

A col­lab­or­a­tion between Sidi Larbi Cherka­oui and artist Ant­ony Gorm­ley, Babel (Words) con­tin­ued the choreographer’s explor­a­tion of the links between eth­ni­city and iden­tity and com­bined west­ern con­tem­por­ary dance with move­ment styles from around the world.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in Dance
• Best New Dance Production

Beauty and the Beast

Katie Mitchell’s inspired take on the clas­sic story saw her multi-media approach mixed with the tra­di­tional as a tom­boy­ish Beauty fell in love with a grot­esque, stil­ted beast amidst some med­dling from mis­chiev­ous fairies.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Enter­tain­ment

La Bête

This comic tour de force about a dram­at­ist, a street clown and a picky prin­cess pitched David Hyde Pierce, Mark Rylance and Joanna Lum­ley against one another in a rauc­ous clash of lit­er­ary egos.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Actor

Bird­song

Dir­ector Tre­vor Nunn and play­wright Rachel Wag­staff cre­ated a dis­tilled ver­sion of Sebastian Faulks’s epic 1993 novel, in which one man clings to memor­ies of a past love as he suf­fers in the trenches dur­ing WWI.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Actor in a Sup­port­ing Role

Blas­ted

Part nat­ur­al­istic drama, part sur­real por­trait of an apo­ca­lyptic world, Sarah Kane’s sem­inal play Blas­ted was revived by Lyric Ham­mer­smith Artistic Dir­ector Sean Holmes with a cast com­pris­ing Aidan Kelly, Danny Webb and Lydia Wilson.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in an Affil­i­ate Theatre

La Bohème

OperaUpClose’s inspired ver­sion of Puccini’s clas­sic tragedy trans­ports the excess, love and pas­sion to mod­ern day Soho where a new gen­er­a­tion of bohemi­ans elec­trify the audi­ence with their immers­ive per­form­ance that goes from stage to bar.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best New Opera Production

Cly­bourne Park

Bruce Nor­ris shines a light on racism and polit­ical cor­rect­ness with this stun­ning satire. In 1959, a black couple mov­ing into a neigh­bour­hood causes dis­quiet; 50 years later the plight of the prop­erty is still rais­ing hackles.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Act­ress
• Best Act­ress in a Sup­port­ing Role
• Mas­ter­Card Best New Play
• Best Dir­ector

Deathtrap

Ira Levin’s devi­ous tale of murder, manip­u­la­tion and sus­pense fea­tured the comic tal­ents of Simon Rus­sell Beale as a down-on-his-luck writer who sees fin­an­cial sal­va­tion in the tal­ents of another. Dir­ector Mat­thew Warchus kept audi­ences in suspense.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Light­ing Design

Design for Living

Lisa Dillon, Tom Burke and Andrew Scott wowed audi­ences at the Old Vic in Noël Coward’s pro­voc­at­ive and uncon­ven­tional romantic com­edy fol­low­ing a trio of friends liv­ing out­side con­ven­tional morality.

Nom­in­ated for:

• XL Video Award for Best Set Design
• Best Cos­tume Design

A Dog’s Heart

Complicite’s Artistic Dir­ector Simon McBur­ney made his oper­atic debut with Alex­an­der Raskatov’s sur­real mas­ter­piece about a stray dog that becomes human after a Franken­stein–like exper­i­ment, bring­ing the theatre company’s dis­tinct­ive style to opera.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best New Opera Production

Earth­quakes in London

Rupert Goold dir­ec­ted Mike Bartlett’s roller­coaster of a play that took audi­ences from 1968 to 2525 and back again, look­ing at the dis­lo­cated lives of three sis­ters and their dys­func­tional father.

Nom­in­ated for:

• XL Video Award for Best Set Design

Elegy for Young Lovers

The third col­lab­or­a­tion between the Young Vic theatre and the ENO, Fiona Shaw dir­ec­ted WH Auden and Chester Kallman’s eclectic opera about a poet who feeds on those around him for artistic inspiration.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best New Opera Production

The Elixir of Love

Jonathan Miller’s crit­ic­ally acclaimed pro­duc­tion of Donizetti’s clas­sic romantic opera trans­por­ted the story from 19th cen­tury rural Italy to small town 1950s Amer­ica cre­at­ing an innov­at­ive update to one of the most pop­u­lar operas of all.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in Opera

The Empire

DC Moore’s war drama explored the polit­ics of occu­pa­tion, at home and abroad. Set in Afgh­anistan, the crit­ic­ally acclaimed pro­duc­tion was dir­ec­ted by Mike Brad­well and trans­formed the Jer­wood Theatre Upstairs into a dilap­id­ated war zone.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in an Affil­i­ate Theatre

End of the Rainbow

Peter Quilter’s bio­graph­ical play cap­tur­ing the drama of Hol­ly­wood icon Judy Garland’s final per­form­ances in Lon­don and her con­tro­ver­sial life, fea­tur­ing a host of clas­sic Gar­land songs and a breath­tak­ing per­form­ance by Tracie Bennett.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Actor in a Sup­port­ing Role
• Best Sound Design
• Mas­ter­Card Best New Play
• Best Act­ress

Fela!

Bill T Jones’s col­our­ful, sexy and ener­getic bio­graph­ical musical of Nigerian afrobeat musi­cian and polit­ical act­iv­ist Fela Kuti’s life trans­formed the Olivier into Kuti’s legendary club where Sahr Ngaujah wowed crowds with his cap­tiv­at­ing performance.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best New Musical
• Best Actor in a Musical
• Best Theatre Choreographer

Ghost Stor­ies

This spooky offer­ing, which was first a hit with scream­ing audi­ences at the Lyric Ham­mer­smith, con­tin­ues to dish up the­at­rical scares aplenty to audi­ences at the Duke of York’s theatre.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Sound Design
• Best Enter­tain­ment

Gnosis

Akram Khan’s elec­tri­fy­ing piece explored ideas of inner know­ledge and clouded vis­ion, tak­ing the Mahabharata story of Queen Ghandari as inspir­a­tion. Gnosis fea­tured live drum­ming from acclaimed per­cus­sion­ist Yoshie Sunahata and pup­petry by Blind Sum­mit Theatre.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in Dance

Ham­let

A pro­duc­tion years in the plan­ning, National Theatre Artistic Dir­ector Nich­olas Hyt­ner had been wait­ing for the right time to unleash Rory Kin­near as the troubled Dan­ish prince.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Actor
• Best Actor in a Sup­port­ing Role

Henry IV Part 1 & 2

Shakespeare’s Globe treated fans of alfresco theatre to six hours of Shakespeare with this his­tor­ical double bill telling of Prince Hal’s trans­form­a­tion from juven­ile rogue to regal king, with Roger Allam as the comic knight Falstaff.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Actor

An Ideal Husband

A study of human frailty amid mor­al­istic Vic­torian soci­ety, Oscar Wilde’s play was revived by Lind­say Pos­ner in a styl­ish pro­duc­tion with a uni­formly strong cast, led by Alex­an­der Han­son as a flawed gov­ern­ment minister.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Act­ress in a Sup­port­ing Role

Into the Woods

Com­poser Stephen Sondheim’s 1987 musical found its per­fect home in the leafy sur­round­ings of Regent’s Park Open Air theatre, with its darkly comic fairytale char­ac­ters going into the woods for real.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Musical Revival
• Best Per­form­ance in a Sup­port­ing Role in a Musical

Ivan and the Dogs

A co-production between Soho theatre and ATC, Hat­tie Naylor’s har­row­ing drama looked at a reces­sion rid­den Moscow through the eyes of a child, inspired by the true story of Ivan Mishukov.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in an Affil­i­ate Theatre

King Lear

Derek Jac­obi stepped into the role of one of Shakespeare’s most tra­gic char­ac­ters under the dir­ec­tion of the Donmar’s dis­tin­guished Artistic Dir­ector Michael Grand­age, who cre­ated a min­im­al­ist pro­duc­tion filled with Jacobi’s bleed­ing emotions.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Actor
• Best Act­ress in a Sup­port­ing Role
• Best Dir­ector
• Best Revival
• Best Sound Design

Leg­ally Blonde The Musical

London’s pinkest musical, based on the hit 2001 Reese With­er­spoon film, tells the story of home­com­ing queen Elle Woods, who fol­lows her ex-boyfriend to Har­vard Law School and dis­cov­ers there was more to her than she knew.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Theatre Choreographer
• Best New Musical
• Best Act­ress in a Musical
• Best Actor in a Musical
• Best Per­form­ance in a Sup­port­ing Role in a Musical

The Little Dog Laughed

Douglas Carter Beane’s New York-set tangled tale of a love tri­angle between a closeted movie star, a rent boy and the rent boy’s girl­friend, with the addi­tion of a deli­ciously acerbic agent.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Act­ress
• Mas­ter­Card Best New Play

Lon­don Assurance

Silly walks, even sil­lier dis­guises and a remote con­trol rat fea­tured in this joy­ous revival of Dion Boucicault’s 1841 farce, star­ring Simon Rus­sell Beale and Fiona Shaw in a com­edy double act that brought the house down.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Cos­tume Design

Love Never Dies

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s much anti­cip­ated sequel to The Phantom Of The Opera reunites Christine and the Phantom 10 years later in his new Coney Island home. The musical fea­tures impress­ive spe­cial effects, soar­ing melod­ies and heart­break­ing ballads.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Light­ing Design
• XL Video Award for Best Set Design
• Best Cos­tume Design
• Best New Musical
• Best Act­ress in a Musical
• Best Actor in a Musical
• Best Per­form­ance in a Sup­port­ing Role in a Musical

Love Story

Howard Goodall and Stephen Clark’s musical retells Erich Segal’s iconic and heart­break­ing story of a love affair between two very dif­fer­ent people. Dir­ec­ted by Rachel Kavanaugh, Emma Wil­li­ams gives an emotive per­form­ance as the feisty lead.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best New Musical
• Best Act­ress in a Musical
• Best Actor in a Musical

Mambo 3XXI

Blend­ing tra­di­tional Cuban music and dance with street, trip hop and disco, Mambo 3XX1 mixed group dance with indi­vidual exploits, show­ing off the grace and strength of Danza Con­tem­por­anea De Cuba’s dancers.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best New Dance Production

The Mas­ter Builder

Dir­ector Travis Pre­ston cre­ated a mod­ern, sparse pro­duc­tion of Ibsen’s strange and chilling 1892 play about the power of the mind and the price of ambi­tion. Stephen Dillane, Gemma Arter­ton and nom­inee Ana­stasia Hille led the cast.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Act­ress in a Sup­port­ing Role

Mat­thew Bourne’s Cinderella

Award-winning cho­reo­grapher Mat­thew Bourne brought a touch of the Blitz spirit to his new adapt­a­tion of the clas­sic fairytale bal­let, with the title char­ac­ter meet­ing an RAF pilot instead of a prince.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best New Dance Production

Les Par­ents Terribles

Staged as part of the Don­mar Tra­fal­gar sea­son, young dir­ector Chris Rolls dir­ec­ted a cap­tiv­at­ing Frances Barber in Jean Cocteau’s manic farce about an eccent­ric Paris fam­ily and their dys­func­tional relationships.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in an Affil­i­ate Theatre

Pas­sion

Staged as part of the 80th birth­day cel­eb­ra­tions of Stephen Sond­heim, the Don­mar Ware­house presen­ted an intim­ate, cham­ber pro­duc­tion of the tale of the sickly Fosca and her obsess­ive love for a solider.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Musical Revival
• Best Act­ress in a Musical
• Best Actor in a Musical

Pot­ted Panto

Seven pan­to­mimes were crammed into eighty minutes in this Christ­mas com­edy romp by the former CBBC presenters and mas­ter­minds behind Pot­ted Pot­ter and Pot­ted Pir­ates Daniel Clark­son and Jef­fer­son Turner.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Enter­tain­ment

The Rail­way Children

This innov­at­ive adapt­a­tion of E Nesbit’s pop­u­lar novel pulled into the former Eurostar ter­minal at Water­loo Sta­tion com­plete with its very own steam engine and the Gentleman’s saloon car­riage from the much-loved film.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Sound Design
• Best Enter­tain­ment

Sucker Punch

Roy William’s elec­tri­fy­ing play explored what is was to be young and black in the 1980s. Trans­form­ing the Jer­wood Theatre Down­stairs into a box­ing ring, the drama fea­tured stun­ning cho­reo­graphy by Leon Baugh.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Theatre Choreographer
• Mas­ter­Card Best New Play

Sweet Char­ity

The Men­ier Chocol­ate Fact­ory pro­duced another hit in this revival of Cy Cole­man and Dorothy Fields’s musical about a dance hall host­ess who always gives her heart to the wrong man, but never gives up hope.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Musical Revival
• Best Per­form­ance in a Sup­port­ing Role in a Musical
• Best Theatre Choreographer

Tan­nhäuser

Tim Albany dir­ec­ted the Royal Opera House’s seduct­ive pro­duc­tion of Wagner’s battle of the sen­sual and spir­itual, revived at the venue after more than 20 years and star­ring a cast of illus­tri­ous opera greats.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Out­stand­ing Achieve­ment in Opera

Tribes

Nina Raine’s affect­ing drama about a charm­ingly dys­func­tional fam­ily deal­ing with the prob­lems young­est son Billy faces as a res­ult of being the only deaf mem­ber of their uncon­ven­tional and noisy unit.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Act­ress in a Sup­port­ing Role
• Mas­ter­Card Best New Play

When We Are Married

A true ensemble piece, this revival of JB Priestley’s com­edy about class, mor­als and the north-south divide bene­fit­ted from a hugely exper­i­enced cast and a dir­ector who is fast becom­ing a mas­ter of farce, Chris­topher Luscombe.

Nom­in­ated for:

• Best Revival

The White Guard

Dir­ector Howard Dav­ies and adaptor Andrew Upton cre­ated this highly enga­ging pro­duc­tion of Mikhail Bulgakov’s story of a fam­ily liv­ing dur­ing the Ukrain­ian civil war. Con­leth Hill and Anthony Calf led the cast.

Nom­in­ated for:

• XL Video Award for Best Set Design
• Best Light­ing Design
• Best Dir­ector

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