The Duke of Cambridge hailed Sir David Attenborough for a lifetime of work which has “shaped the culture of this country” at this year’s Evening Standard Theatre Awards. Billie Piper was named best actress, Ralph Fiennes was crowned best actor and Sir Kenneth Branagh received the Lebedev Award for his season of plays at the Garrick. The prince told the stars assembled at the Old Vic in Waterloo that he was “delighted” to present Sir David with the Beyond Theatre Award for his contribution to broadcasting.
Praising Sir David’s “deep concern for the natural world”, William also lauded his work as a BBC executive, when he commissioned shows including Monty Python’s Flying Circus. William said: “The recipient of this particular award is a man who has shaped the culture of this country and the way we look at the world.”
Other winners included Harry Potter And The Cursed Child, which won the best play award with Hiscox, official arts partner, the Good Chance Theatre, which claimed the Editor’s Award for its work in the Jungle refugee camp in Calais, and Glenn Close, who won best musical performance.
The event was co-hosted by Sir Elton John, who performed Circle Of Life from The Lion King, and Evening Standard proprietor Evgeny Lebedev, who also paid tribute to Sir David as the “honorary grandfather to the whole blue planet”.
Fiennes, named best actor for his title roles in The Master Builder and Richard III, thanked the Old Vic and the Almeida, the two theatres which staged the shows. As Piper accepted the Natasha Richardson Award for best actress, for the title role in Yerma, she paid tribute to director Simon Stone, saying she would work with him again “in a heartbeat”.
The play, described by Evening Standard chief theatre critic Henry Hitchings as “devastatingly good”, sold out at the Young Vic and produced queues around the block as people tried to get their hands on a return ticket. It is rumoured to be in line for a West End transfer.
Accepting his award, Sir Kenneth praised the “enthusiastic, necessarily critical and engaged voice” of the Evening Standard and told the audience that theatre matters. He said: “There has never been a greater need to have great stories in great theatres for large audiences, to entertain, to divert, and also to know that we and they are not alone.”
Close, whose appearance in Sunset Boulevard was her West End debut, said the show was “a once in a lifetime experience” and praised the orchestra of the English National Opera who supported her on stage at the Coliseum.
She said: “It was a combination that made for an extraordinary revelatory experience for me. On top of that was the amazing response from our audiences that proved every night we had connected emotionally in some very profound way, so it was a huge honour to be here and I hope to come back again some time to the theatre in London.”