Winners Of The Olivier Awards 2014 Announced

The ceremony featured a showstopping finale from ABBA’s Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus to celebrate 15 years of the hit show MAMMA MIA!, as well as special performances from Broadway star and two-time Tony Award©-winning actress Bernadette Peters and international opera sensation Joseph Calleja, and live performances from all the nominated productions in both the MasterCard Best New Musical and BBC Radio 2 Audience Award categories.

Lucy Kirkwood’s Chimerica, which enjoyed sell out runs at the Almeida Theatre and Harold Pinter Theatre, was the evening’s biggest winner with five Awards including American Airlines Best New Play, Best Director for Lyndsey Turner and the XL Video Award for Best Set Design for Es Devlin.

Chimerica’s Tim Lutkin and Finn Ross also shared the White Light Award for Best Lighting Design with Paul Pyant and Jon Driscoll for Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, and Carolyn Downing jointly won Best Sound forChimerica with Gareth Owen for Merrily We Roll Along.

Lesley Manville was crowned Best Actress for her performance in Ghosts, another Almeida Theatre transfer, this time to Trafalgar Studios, which also won Best Revival and Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Jack Lowden.

Rory Kinnear won Best Actor for his portrayal of Iago in Othello and Sharon D Clarke was named Best Actress in a Supporting Role for The Amen Corner, both National Theatre productions.

The Book Of Mormon dominated the musical categories winning four Awards including MasterCard Best New Musical, Best Actor in a Musical for Gavin Creel, Best Performance in a Supporting Role in a Musical forStephen Ashfield and Best Theatre Choreographer for Casey Nicholaw.

Zrinka CvitešiÄ� won Best Actress in a Musical for Once at the Phoenix Theatre, which was also awarded the Autograph Sound Award for Outstanding Achievement in Music won by Martin Lowe for composition and arrangements and Glenn Hansard and Markéta Irglová for music and lyrics.

Merrily We Roll Along was named Best Musical Revival for its critically acclaimed run at the Harold Pinter Theatre, Jeeves & Wooster In Perfect Nonsense at the Duke of York’s Theatre was awarded Best New Comedyand the Royal Opera House’s first West End transfer The Wind In The Willows at the Duchess Theatre won Best Entertainment and Family.

Mark Thompson was awarded Best Costume Design for Charlie And The Chocolate Factory at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane and Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre was presented to Handbagged at the Tricycle Theatre, which has now begun a West End run.

In the dance categories, Best New Dance Production was won by Eastman – Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui & Sadler’s Wells for Puz/zle at Sadler’s Wells and Oustanding Achievement in Dance went to Michael Hulls for his body of lighting work including Ballet Boyz – The Talent also at Sadler’s Wells.

In the opera section, Les Vêpres Siciliennes at the Royal Opera House was named Best New Opera Production andOutstanding Achievement in Opera was won by English Touring Opera for its brave and challenging touring productions at the Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House.

This year’s Special Award winners for outstanding achievement were legendary theatre impresario Michael White, who was presented his Award by Kate Moss and Nigel Planer, and the National Theatre’s Sir Nicholas Hytner andNick Starr, who received their joint Award from James Corden and Rory Kinnear in recognitionof their decade in charge of the Southbank venue.

The publicly voted BBC Radio 2 Audience Award was presented to Les Misérables for a second time.

On the night the live BBC Concert Orchestra was conducted by David Charles Abell, with orchestrations and original music by Larry Blank, and further orchestrations by Mark Cumberland.

The evening’s show also included a live link to a free public Olivier Awards celebration on the ITV stage in Covent Garden Piazza hosted by Mylene Klass and West End leading man Michael Xavier where hundreds of theatre-lovers enjoyed West End performances and a live big screen relay of the ceremony.