The Offies Awards Ceremony 2021 was held online on Sunday 21 February 2021 and broadcast via Scenesaver.
In a shift from the usual ceremony, prompted by the Coronavirus pandemic, the event went online and focused on the creative activity of the year both in-person and online.
The online event was peppered with filmed messages from distinguished friends and supporters including Dame Judi Dench, Mayor of London Sadiq Khan, Julian Bird (CEO of SOLT and UK Theatre), Sir Nicholas Serota (Chair of Arts Council England), producer Sonia Friedman, Chair of the National Campaign for the Arts Sam West, as well as actors including Sharon D Clarke, Maureen Lipman, Paterson Joseph and Stephen Fry.
The ceremony announced winners for each of the following awards – click on the name of the award below to find a list of finalists & winners for each award
Offies – for live theatre
OffFest – for theatre in festivals
OnComms – for online theatre
The 2020 awardees for the OffComm award (for short run live shows) were acknowledged at the ceremony – click HERE for details.
The 2020 recipients of the OneOff (special award) were also acknowledged at the ceremony and, in addition, some new OneOff awards were announced – click HERE for details.
The ceremony also included selected clips / trailers from live and online shows in 2020.
In my view, I was most excited to see Jessica Rhodes win the Lead Performance Award for her work in Lucy Prebble’s THE SUGAR SYNDROME at The Orange Tree in Richmond. This was a hugely deserving win, with an incredibly detailed and nuanced performance signalling a new talent to watch. Even more incredible to think that it was her professional debut, though! The whole cast (3 of 4 were OFFIE nominated) did excellent work under excellent direction by Oscar Toeman. (Read my four star review of THE SUGAR SYNDROME here)
Good too to see hard-working producer Katy Lipson be rewarded for her shows RAGS and THE LAST FIVE YEARS, at Park Theatre and Southwark Playhouse respectively.
The challenging play SCROUNGER was a joint winner for Best Play, written and performed by Athena Stevens. The show’s supporting actor Leigh Quinn also won for her performance in the play. (Read my three and a half star review of SCROUNGER here).
As I mentioned before, the only major disappointment is that Temi Wilkey, author of the brilliant THE HIGH TABLE, was not eligible to win Most Promising New Playwright, a title which she eminently deserves, owing to there not being enough competition in the category. In my books, Wilkey won. Read my four star review of THE HIGH TABLE here.
The free to view ceremony can still be watched online until the end of March 2021 by visiting the Scenesaver website and searching for “Offies“.
Congratulations to all nominees and winners!
