Although the world of theatre should be used to fate reversals and plot twists, most of the British stage stars were still surprised by the outcome of the Olivier Awards as many unexpected winners made it up to the podium, while some previously predicted shoe-ins such as Keira Knightly and Jude Law stayed in their seats.
Even the Royal Court which was thought to be a sure thing for the Best New Play category lost the award to a Battersea pub theatre.
The winning play by Katori Hall was titled the Mountaintop and was a reconstruction of the night that Martin Luther King Jr. spent in his hotel before his assassination. It stole the award from the crowd favorites, Jerusalem and Lucy by Jez Butterworth and Enron by Lucy Prebble. This was Hall’s second play and the first play by her to make it onto the West End stage.
The win by Hall was also monumental given the fact that she is the first black woman to ever receive the award for Best New Play since the inception of the awards in 1976, and only the fourth female. The first black male writer to take an award was August Wilson in 2002.
Hall’s win should make her an international playwright from here on out with The Mountaintop already scheduled to debut on Broadway.
The newly acclaimed writer was overcome and surprised by her win stating that she did not even think that at age 28 she would ever have a shot at an Olivier.
Although the play debuted in London, Hall is originally from Memphis, TN in the US prompting her to say that it’s ironic that she made it big in London with a play about a historic American figure.
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