The winners of the 2023 Olivier Awards were announced yesterday (2 April 2023) at a ceremony at London's Royal Albert Hall, with Nick Hern Books titles taking the triple-whammy of Best New Play, Best New Musical and Outstanding Achievement in Affiliate Theatre.

Best New Play was awarded to Prima Facie, Suzie Miller's searingly powerful one-woman show about an ambitious female lawyer confronting patriarchal power. The play was a sensation in its West End production starring Jodie Comer, who took the Best Actress award at last night's ceremony.

Best New Musical went to Chris Bush and Richard Hawley's Standing at the Sky's Edge, a gorgeous celebration of community seen through the lives of successive generations of residents of a Sheffield estate. It also took the award for Best original score or new orchestrations, in recognition of Richard Hawley and Tom Deering's work.

The Outstanding Achievement in Affiliate Theatre award went to The P Word, Waleed Akhtar's sharp-witted play about the parallel lives of two gay Pakistani men. The play premiered at the Bush Theatre in 2022, and was described as 'heart-meltingly lovely' (Time Out), a 'tremendous two-man rom-com' (The Times).

Akhtar's play beat off stiff competition from four other plays in its category, all of them published by Nick Hern Books: Haley McGee's Age is a Feeling; Joe White's Blackout Songs; Margaret Perry's Paradise Now! and Sami Ibrahim's two palestinians go dogging.

Congratulations to all the winners!

The Olivier Awards 2023 nominations were announced yesterday (28 February 2023), and they're packed with Nick Hern Books talent including a clean sweep of the Outstanding Achievement in Affiliate Theatre category, with all five nominated plays published by NHB!

Leading the pack is Standing at the Sky's Edge, the musical by Chris Bush and Richard Hawley, nominated for eight awards including Best New Musical. 'The most exciting British musical in years' (WhatsOnStage), it's currently playing at the National Theatre (until 25 March).

Nominated for Best Play is Suzie Miller's Prima Facie, which also received a Best Actress nomination for its star in the West End, Jodie Comer.

The five NHB plays nominated for Outstanding Achievement in Affiliate Theatre are: Haley McGee's Age is a Feeling (currently at Soho Theatre); Joe White's Blackout Songs (returning to Hampstead Theatre in April); Waleed Akhtar's The P Word (which premiered at the Bush Theatre in 2022); Margaret Perry's Paradise Now! (also at the Bush Theatre in 2022); and Sami Ibrahim's two palestinians go dogging (which premiered at the Royal Court Theatre in 2022).

Rob Madge's My Son's a Queer (But What Can You Do?), currently at the Ambassadors Theatre in the West End, is nominated for Best Entertainment or Comedy Play.

Jez Butterworth's Jerusalem is up for Best Revival, while NHB-published playwright Giles Terera is nominated for Best Actor for his performance in Pearl Cleage's Blues for an Alabama Sky at the National Theatre in 2022.

The winners are due to be announced in April. Good luck to all the nominees!

Nick Hern Books' playwrights came away with Best New Play, Most Promising New Playwright and Best Production (Plays) at the 2023 OffWestEnd Awards announced yesterday (12 February 2023) at Alexandra Palace Theatre. The 'Offies', as they're known, are designed to celebrate the achievements of independent, alternative and fringe theatre in London.

Best New Play went to Red Pitch, Tyrell Williams' coming-of-age drama set on a South London council estate, first staged at the Bush Theatre in February 2022. The play has already scooped the George Devine Award, and Williams was named Most Promising Playwright at the Evening Standard Awards, and Best Writer at The Stage Debut Awards.

Waleed Akhtar was named Most Promising New Playwright for his play Kabul Goes Pop: Music Television Afghanistan, which was premiered at Brixton House in 2022, and also for a second play, The P Word, premiered at the Bush Theatre in September 2022.

Best Production (Plays) went to Jack Thorne's The Solid Life of Sugar Water, revived at the Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond last year.

Congratulations to all the winners!

Prima Facie, Suzie Miller's play exploring patriarchal power in the legal profession, was named Best New Play at the 23rd Annual WhatsOnStage Awards announced at the Prince of Wales Theatre in London last night (12 February 2023).

Miller's play, for a single female performer, was first staged in Sydney, Australia, in 2019, and had its European premiere at the Harold Pinter Theatre in the West End in April 2022, in production starring Jodie Comer. It was later screened nationally via NT Live.

Described as 'like a punch to the guts' (Telegraph), 'a play that roars' (Guardian) and 'an unforgettable moment of theatre' (Whatsonstage.com), the play has wowed audiences around the world, and is published by Nick Hern Books.

Jodie Comer also took the award for Best Performer in a Play at last night's awards, for her outstanding performance in Miller's play.

Best Play Revival went to Cock by Mike Bartlett, which is licensed by Nick Hern Books for amateur performance.

It was a clean sweep in the stage categories for Nick Hern Books playwrights last night (16 January) at the Writers' Guild of Great Britain Awards 2023.

The Best Play award went to Ross Willis for his play Wonder Boy, which premiered at Bristol Old Vic in March 2022, directed by Sally Cookson. A startlingly original drama about the power of finding your own voice, it revolves around a twelve-year-old boy with a stammer whose life is turned upside down when he's cast in a school production of Hamlet.

The Best Play for Young Audiences award went to Vivienne Franzmann for her play The IT, which formed part of the 2021 National Theatre Connections Festivals and was premiered by youth theatres across the UK. A darkly comic state-of-the-nation play exploring adolescent mental health and the rage within, it offers opportunities for a large, flexible cast of any size and mix of genders.

Also honoured at the awards was NHB playwright David Edgar, who was presented with the Outstanding Contribution award for his contribution to British playwriting, his four decades of service to playwrights (at the Writers' Guild of Great Britain and Theatre Writers' Union before that), and the instrumental role he played in the WGGB's crisis response in theatre during the pandemic. He is the author of many acclaimed plays, including Pentecost and Playing with Fire, as well as the seminal book How Plays Work.

Several NHB plays and playwrights featured amongst the award-winners at the 2020 Evening Standard Theatre Awards last night.

Tyrell Williams won the Charles Wintour Award for Most Promising Playwright for his play Red Pitch, which premiered at the Bush Theatre, London, in February. A coming-of-age drama about three friends from South London dreaming of success on the football pitch, the play has already won the 2022 George Devine Award, with Williams also being named Best Writer at the 2022 Stage Debut Awards. The Evening Standard's theatre critic said the play was 'pacy and exciting... It's still rare to see a play about young, black, working-class youths on our stages: rarer still to see one in which they are celebrated like this'.

Williams beat off stiff competition from two other NHB playwrights: Waleed Akhtar, nominated for The P Word (Bush Theatre); and Igor Memic, nominated for Old Bridge (also at the Bush Theatre).

Other winners included Isobel McArthur, who took the Emerging Talent Award for her performance in her own play, Pride and Prejudice* (*sort of), and Jodie Comer, who was named Best Actress for her performance in Suzie Miller's play Prima Facie.

Congratulations to all the winners!