The Evening Standard is currently in list-making mode, mainly in advance of hosting a couple of parties so they can presumably get people interested in actually attending it. Last week they published a “long list” of those under consideration for the annual Evening Standard Theatre Awards, and this week whittled it down to a shortlist ahead of announcing the winners in a ceremony to be held at the Royal Opera House on November 23.
But in fact both lists and the winners were all selected at the same judging meeting: the “longlist” presumably emerged from all the names that were thrown into the ring, while the shortlist that followed must have been the frontrunners that the judges then selected out of them. But never mind: by dividing it into two, they are at least milking it for all its worth on the “news value” front, and it’s fun to see a paper making the news itself, as well as breaking it.
It’s good news, too, for London theatre that, despite the paper’s change of ownership, editorship and even the cover price, they’ve maintained their commitment to these awards, the longest-running of all of the major theatre awards in London by a long chalk. (They’ve been in existence since 1955; by contrast, the Olivier Awards only got going in 1976 as the unfortunately acronymed SWET Awards, before being renamed in Laurence Olivier’s honour in 1984; while the Critics’ Circle Theatre Awards started in 1989).
But has anyone noticed that the prize money for the Most Promising Playwright award has gradually been whittled down? Actually, it didn’t originally carry a cash prize at all, but Mark Ravenhill, who won it in 1998, once told me he was one of the last not to get one. Two years later, in 2000, a £30,000 prize was introduced - and named in honour of the late, former Standard editor Charles Wintour, whose daughter Anna co-funded it then to the tune of £15,000, a sum that was then matched by Lord Rothermere, chairman of the then-Standard owner Daily Mail and General Trust plc.
In a news story at the time, Rothermere said, “Charles Wintour was responsible for creating the Evening Standard’s emphasis on the arts and was greatly concerned that our company should do more to promote them. That his daughter is willing to fund the award in the name of the Evening Standard is a great tribute to him and we are only too delighted to be able to support promising new playwrights in this way.”
As Patrick Marber commented at the time, “Never happened in my day - could I be promising?” (If Lenny Henry, nominated this year in the Outstanding Newcomer category, can still be a newcomer, I guess anything is possible). And Sam Mendes, too, pointed out then, “In its new form, the Evening Standard Most Promising Playwright award will make a serious impact on every author that wins it. We need all the help we can get to encourage people to write for the theatre and this award is further evidence of the Evening Standard’s commitment to London’s artistic community.”
That commitment remains, but in a dramatically reduced form. The prize money last year saw £10,000 go to the winner (Tarell Alvin McCraney for In the Red and Brown Water and The Brothers Size), and £2,500 to each of the runners-up, Bola Aqbaje and Anupama Chanreaskhar. And this year, it is reduced even more: the shortlisted trio of Alexi Kaye Campbell, Alia Bano and Katori Hall are vying for cheques of £5,000 for the winner and £1,000 for the runners-up.
Still, awards are never just about the money, but about kudos and validation… and a party invite, of course. This week the Standard have duly published another list - their reckoning of the thousand most influential Londoners. It comes with the claim that some might dispute that “Anybody who is anyone knows that, in order to do business, to get ahead and meet with the best in almost any given field, they must come to London”; but they must certainly come to London if they wanted to attend the party that the Standard duly threw on Tuesday evening at Burberry’s in the list’s honour.
The Stage, of course, annually publishes its own Stage 100 list every January, of whom this paper considers to be the theatre world’s hundred prime movers and shakers; and we at least allow our reach to go beyond London, since theatre doesn’t, of course, stop beyond the M25, thank goodness.
But in choosing their own Top 40 from the theatre world to make the cut in the 1000, the Standard have made some odd choices - and some even weirder omissions. The Standard includes, for example, Michael Frayn, who hasn’t had a new play premiered in London this year, and whose sole appearance in the capital this year with a revival of Alphabetical Order at Hampstead earned it just one star in the Standard’s own review by Nick Curtis, which stated that “this excruciating 1975 comedy does not show him at his best”.
Yet Howard Panter and Rosemary Squire, who have recently concluded a deal that puts their Ambassador Theatre Group at the top of the commercial theatre chain nationally as well as in London, are missing. Just the other day the Standard even profiled them as “Mr and Mrs West End” - and wrote of their acquisition, “In a stroke, the Ambassador Theatre Group became arguably the biggest in the country with a total value of £150 million.”
Also conspicuous by his absence is Michael Boyd, artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company which may be headquartered in Stratford-upon-Avon, but is regularly to be seen in the capital. As he commented in September when he announced that the RSC are to return to the Roundhouse next year with a repertoire of plays, “In all, we will see 28 weeks of RSC shows playing in London, over the next 18 months.” And prominent commercial producers like Bill Kenwright and David Pugh, who regularly keeps Shaftesbury Avenue alight, are also missing.
The commentary that accompanies those that are listed is also littered with errors and omissions of their own. Acording to the entry on Josie Rourke, the Bush Theatre that she runs scored a hit with Alexi Kaye Campbell’s Affinity (which was in fact called Apologia, and helped him secure his nomination for Standard’s own Most Promising Playwright nod). Trevor Nunn’s entry points out that “he came back this year, after the disaster of Gone With the Wind, with Sondheim’s A Little Night Music, taking it from the Menier Chocolate Factory to the West End”, but fails to mention that it is transferring to Broadway next month or that Nunn is also currently represented in London by a hit production of Inherit the Wind at the Old Vic.
Meanwhile, in another little list, the Daily Telegraph have just today posted their own list of the best culture websites, and top of the list is The Stage! According to the citation, this site “has all the latest theatre news and reviews - and the most comprehensive coverage of bickering among critics.” Bravo… to us!
