LONDON — The not-for-profit sector divided the spoils at London’s 2010 Critics’ Circle Theater Awards, with the nine prizes shared among the Royal Court (four wins), the Donmar Warehouse (three) and the Lyric Hammersmith (two), and acting prizes going to Rachel Weisz and Mark Rylance, among others.
Four of the winners — Lyric Hammersmith’s “Spring Awakening” (musical), Donmar’s Jude Law topliner “Hamlet” (Shakespeare performance) and the Court’s “Enron” (director, Rupert Goold) and “Jerusalem” (play and actor, Rylance) — have already had or are about to have further commercial life in the West End and on Broadway.
Furthermore, an announcement is expected imminently on the Broadway transfer of design winner “Red,” which will open in Gotham swiftly upon its Feb. 6 closing at the Donmar.
Tom Sturridge, who nabbed the kudo for most promising actor, may also get to reprise his performance, as there are plans for a return of Simon Stephens’ “History Boys”-meets-Columbine play “Punk Rock,” which was a big hit for the Lyric Hammersmith.
The lunchtime ceremony at the Prince of Wales Theater yielded few surprises. All the winners attended, including Weisz, who drew her nod for her Blanche in Rob Ashford’s Donmar production of “A Streetcar Named Desire.” Five of the awards — play, actor, actress, director and most promising playwright — duplicated the winners at the 2009 Evening Standard Awards.
The results represent a significant shutout of the West End as well as the National Theater and the Royal Shakespeare Company, the U.K.’s two largest not-for-profits.
