Claire Foy, Idris Elba, Anna Wintour, Sophie Okonedo, Ralph Fiennes, and the Cast of Hamilton Fete the 64th Evening Standard Theatre Awards

Love and Luvvies: Claire Foy, Idris Elba, Dame Anna Wintour, Sophie Okonedo and Ralph Fiennes and the cast of Hamilton fete the 64th Evening Standard Theatre Awards

Passion prevailed at the 64th Evening Standard Theatre Awards held last night at the splendid Grade I-listed, Georgian Theatre Royal Drury Lane. Sophie Okonedo and Ralph Fiennes are a magnificent match in the National Theatre’s Antony and Cleopatra as much as they were on the red carpet (Okonedo in a full-skirted black-and-gold Emilia Wickstead dress). Sparks flew as they walked away with the Best Actor and Best Actress awards for their contemporary portrayal of Shakespeare’s self-deluded lovers, under Simon Godwin’s factitious and genius direction. “You’re a queen!” nodded Fiennes to Okonedo. “I get to love Ralph Fiennes to death every night” said Okonedo playfully in her acceptance speech, noting that there’s no greater reward in her beguiling 50th year than this production.

The Theatre Awards provide an epic canter through the best and most impactful of the London stage, and this year they were cohosted by Claire Foy, Idris Elba, Anna Wintour, and Evening Standard proprietor Evgeny Lebedev. It’s been a year of optimism, smash hits, and artistic change, with Rachel O’Riordan at the Lyric, Michael Longhurst at the Donmar Warehouse, and Kwame Kwei-Armah keeping the Young Vic full of youthful zeal. The changes on the stage consequently bring change in the audiences. Last year’s compere, Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag, Killing Eve), returned, making an electrifying entrance in a Stella McCartney fringed jumpsuit and wielding an electric guitar accompanied by a troop of violinists. “For some, the theater is a luxury, others a necessity. For most of us, it’s a very expensive night out,” she deadpanned and gave comic spin to a progressive year: “In Antony and Cleopatra, a real snake has been allowed to play a snake!”

With the imminent specter of Brexit turmoil—or the “elephant in the country” (Waller-Bridge’s amusing moniker)—the evening was one that showed the power of community and optimism. People pulled together, as the London String Group accompanied the proceedings, and resounding whoops were heard from the drama students in the balconies. A positive message of diversity thundered through the room, with accolades going to black British playwrights and stars, and the radical revision of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s Company, which won Marianne Elliott the Milton Shulman Award for Best Director. The production switched the gender of the lead man to a woman, giving Rosalie Craig the role of a lifetime and the Evening Standard Award for Best Musical Performance.

The Crown’s Foy swapped her twinset and pearls for a dramatic monochrome Alexander McQueen dress (with spidery black flowers) and custom Louboutins. But her clipped vowels were firmly in place as she welcomed winner Fiennes to the stage. Other “royals” in attendance were Victoria star Jenna Coleman in a toile de Jouy Dior gown and Hamilton’s King George III, Michael Jibson, who gave a regal musical performance that had the theater rocking. Fashion was in force with Stella McCartney (who presented Miriam Buether with Best Design for the brutalist set of the refugee drama The Jungle), Sarah Burton, and Christopher Kane joining the legendary roll call of talent, including Laura Linney, Ian McKellen (nominated for his third King Lear, and with a sky-blue scarf draped over his tux), Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber, Andrew Garfield, and Bodyguard’s Richard Madden. Hari Nef arrived with 13 Reasons Why actor Tommy Dorfman, who was dressed in a spectacular embellished chiffon top by student designer Harris Reed, which he fabulously threw on en route to the red carpet.

The Theatre Royal Drury Lane itself was dressed for the occasion too, with an exuberant flower wall and a riot of floral arrangements provided by McQueens (and donated post-event to St Joseph’s Hospice), matching the riotous floral dresses donned by Suki Waterhouse (in powder blue Brock Collection and accompanied by her girl gang, sister Immy and business partner Poppy Jamie) and two-time Grammy and two-time Tony Award winner Patti LuPone, who described the night as “a pure validation” of the work of the theater community. Predinner champagne was glamorously served as theater chat and glamour was emitted, with a diverse crowd of swans, stars, and directors chattering in anticipation, including Fiona Shaw and Garfield. Dinner was a chic Italianate affair: a symphony of glistening Richard Ginori porcelain and colorful Venetian glass goblets, with a menu of crab and langoustine cocktail followed by individual (and very cosy) shepherd’s pie and petit fours. Event designer (and Met Gala veteran since 2007) Raúl Àvila joined the awards team this year, adding flourishes.

The theater is a happily serried family. Vanessa Redgrave gave a shout-out to Cornelius Redgrave, before admitting her dynastic digression was a stalling tactic as she was “so f**king thrilled” to award Matthew Lopez with the Best Play award for the wonderful E. M. Forster-inspired play in two parts, Inheritance. “No one goes into a career as a playwright, as they are all adjusted,” said Lopez, but conceded that you start “act one as strangers and by act six you are family.” Befittingly, Bee Carrozzini, dressed in embroidered McQueen, took to the stage to present the award named for her grandfather, who introduced her to her first production (“And the initial thrill has remained,” she said). The Charles Wintour Award for the Most Promising Playwright went to the extraordinary voice of Natasha Gordon for the tragi-comedy Nine Night. Receiving a standing ovation, actress and playwright Gordon shimmied to the stage in a vintage metallic Versace dress. “I thought, Honey, you are pushing your luck,” she joked, about pitching a play about a wake and starring predominantly black women over 40. She has been hailed as the first black British female playwright to have a play in the West End. Gordon, sweetly unaware that the award came with a generous check, also thanked her husband for “holding the fort and, tonight, the coat and handbag.” Excitingly, she will take over the starring role in Nine Night when it transfers to Trafalgar Studios next month.

A tribute was also given to the dressers who work tirelessly behind-the-scenes, presented by a famed former dresser, John Galliano, in partnership with Maison Margiela. In the early ’80s he worked at the National and “loved it, loved, loved it,” and, whilst trudging in “soggy white denims” underneath the boards, managed to learn the tricks and magic he ushered into his own fashion theatrics—“the care and repair, preparing fabric as if exposed to light, sunlight, dust.” With a mischievous nod, he exclaimed, “I have dressed more than one of you tonight and barely recognize you with your clothes on,” before inviting 26 dressers to join him onstage to take a bow. Sir Cameron Mackintosh reminded the room of the important machinations behind the curtain; as he started his career at 19 as “a cleaner and stagehand on £14 a week in this very theater.” Last night, the coproducer of Hamilton humbly took the Lebedev Award for his contribution over 50 years to musical theater. The force that is Hamilton continues apace. Jamael Westman bounced up to the stage to receive his Emerging Talent Award from Letitia Wright and Royal Shakespeare Company actor Paapa Essiedu (soon be seen on stage together in The Convert). Westman thanked “all the regional theaters, the communities that got me here.” Hamilton also took Best Musical, which is perhaps no surprise, but the surprise was Idris Elba presenting the award and confessing that he’d not actually seen it (“I’m a fraud!”).

“So much more pressure second time around!” confided Waller-Bridge at the end of the evening, but, like the bias-cut floral Richard Quinn dress she wore at the afterparty, she was captivating. ’Tis true that a good play needs no epilogue, however, with such a brilliant evening for the Bard and the standout performances (Sharon D. Clarke’s heart-wrenching Lot’s Wife had the crowd in tears), the evening may not have needed further pomp, but the postlude to a great award is surely the after-party. Hosted by Evgeny Lebedev with cohost Cressida Bonas, guests gathered on the Georgian stage for a puckish mix of cocktails and congratulations.