Jumbo, Dee, Phillips And Sheffield Theatres Big Winners At 2013 UK Theatre Awards

The Theatrical Management Association (TMA) has announced the winners of the 2013 UK Theatre Awards - the only nationwide awards to honour creative excellence and the outstanding achievement seen on and off stage throughout England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Sheffield Theatre productions are the big winners with Best New Play for Mike Bartlett's BULL, Best Musical Production for THIS IS MY FAMILY, and Best Touring Production for THE FULL MONTY.

Women dominate acting categories as Cush Jumbo wins Best Performance in a Play for A DOLL'S HOUSE, Janie Dee takes Best Performance in a Musical for HELLO, DOLLY! and Siân Phillips is awarded Best Supporting Performance for THIS IS MY FAMILY.

As previously announced, Simon Callow CBE receives The Stage Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Theatre and rising star Blanche McIntyre is crowned Best Director for THE SEAGULL.

The 60-seat Bike Shed in Exeter is announced as winner of the public vote for My Theatre Matters! UK's Most Welcoming Theatre Award, which was open for the first time to any professional theatre that offers legal and fair terms to all performers and stage management in line with or better than the Equity Fringe Agreement. To ensure a fair and competitive process, the public voting system was weighted by theatre capacity with the winner decided by number of public votes divided by number of venue seats, with more than 55,000 cast in total.

Best Show For Children and Young People was shared by Northern Stage's THE BORROWERS and Unicorn Theatre's MISTER HOLGADO, and Best Design goes to Jonathan Fensom and Charles Balfour for THE ACCRINGTON PALS at the Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester.

In the opera and dance categories, Achievement in Dance goes to the independent dance artist Wendy Houstoun for her insightful and funny solo 50 ACTS, Achievement in Opera is awarded to Welsh National Opera for the productions of LULU & LOHENGRIN, conducted by Lothar Koenigs, and Scottish Opera wins The Renee Stepham Award for Best Presentation of Touring Theatre.

In the Awards for off-stage excellence, Northern Ballet wins Achievement in Marketing, Brenda Walliss of the Princess Theatre, Torquay, is named Theatre Employee/Manager of the Year and the Contact Theatre Manchester is recognised for Promotion of Diversity.

The Awards were given at a glamorous ceremony at London's historic Guildhall compèred by musical theatre star Michael Xavier, with performances from Janie Dee and Frances Ruffelle, and appearances from guest presenters Gina Beck, Christopher Biggins, Sharon D Clarke, Louise Dearman, Paul Michael Glaser, Jonathan Andrew Hume, Katherine Kingsley, Maureen Lipman, Hattie Morahan, Ben Richards and Ed Watson.

A full list of results is published below and available online at www.tmauk.org.

Julian Bird, Chief Executive of the TMA and the Society of London Theatre, said: "It has been a year of great achievement for theatre throughout the length and breadth of the UK, as demonstrated by the range of nominations celebrating skill and variety, both on and off stage. All the shortlists were hotly contested and we offer special congratulations to the winners."

The UK Theatre Awards continue to be sponsored by a number of major organisations involved in theatre across the UK - The Stage, Harbottle & Lewis, John Good, Theatre Tokens and White Light - and for the first time, Global Radio's national classical music station Classic FM.

Winners 2013 UK Theatre Awards

Best New Play

• BULL by Mike Bartlett a Sheffield Theatres production

Best Performance in a Play

• Cush Jumbo for A DOLL'S HOUSE a Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester production

Best Supporting Performance

• Siân Phillips for THIS IS MY FAMILY a Sheffield Theatres production

Best Musical Production

• THIS IS MY FAMILY directed by Daniel Evans a Sheffield Theatres production

Best Performance in a Musical

• Janie Dee for HELLO, DOLLY! a Curve, Leicester production

Best Show for Children and Young People

• THE BORROWERS a Northern Stage, Newcastle production
• MISTER HOLGADO a Unicorn Theatre production

Best Director

• Blanche McIntyre for THE SEAGULL a Headlong and Nuffield, Southampton production in association with Derby Theatre

Best Design

• Jonathan Fensom and Charles Balfour for THE ACCRINGTON PALS, a Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester production

Best Touring Production

• THE FULL MONTY a Sheffield Theatres production, presented by David Pugh and Dafydd Rogers

Achievement in Dance

• Independent dance artist Wendy Houstoun for her insightful, funny solo 50 ACTS

Achievement in Opera

• Welsh National Opera for the productions of LULU & LOHENGRIN, conducted by Lothar Koenigs

The Renee Stepham Award for Best Presentation of Touring Theatre

• Scottish Opera

Achievement in Marketing

• Northern Ballet

Theatre Employee/Manager of the Year

• Brenda Walliss - Princess Theatre, Torquay

Promotion of Diversity

• Contact Theatre Manchester

My Theatre Matters! UK's Most Welcoming Theatre in association with Classic FM

• The Bike Shed Theatre

The Stage Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Theatre

• Simon Callow

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