Samuel Alexander Joseph West is an English actor, theatre director and narrator. He has directed on stage and radio, and worked as an actor in theatre, film, television, and radio. He was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for his portrayal of Leonard Bast in the Merchant Ivory film adaptation of E. M. Forster's novel Howards End (1992), and was later nominated for the Genie Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role for his portrayal of the title role in Rupert's Land (1998). In 2010, he was nominated for the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of Jeffrey Skilling in Lucy Prebble's Enron. He has appeared as reciter with orchestras and performed at the Last Night of the Proms in 2002. He has narrated several documentary series, including five for the BBC about the Second World War.
Sir Michael John Gambon was an Irish-English actor. Gambon started his acting career with Laurence Olivier as one of the original members of the Royal National Theatre. Over his six-decade-long career, he received three Olivier Awards and four BAFTA TV Awards. In 1998, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for services to drama.
Armando Giovanni Iannucci is a Scottish satirist, writer, director, producer, performer and panellist. Born in Glasgow to Italian parents, Iannucci studied at the University of Glasgow followed by the University of Oxford. Starting on BBC Scotland and BBC Radio 4, his early work with Chris Morris on the radio series On the Hour transferred to television as The Day Today.
The Noël Coward Theatre, formerly known as the Albery Theatre, is a West End theatre in St. Martin's Lane in the City of Westminster, London. It opened on 12 March 1903 as the New Theatre and was built by Sir Charles Wyndham behind Wyndham's Theatre which was completed in 1899. The building was designed by the architect W. G. R. Sprague with an exterior in the classical style and an interior in the Rococo style.
Dervla Kirwan is an Irish actress. She has received a number of accolades, including two IFTA Awards for her performances in the film Ondine (2009) and the RTÉ thriller series Smother (2021–2023) respectively.
Uncle Vanya is a play by the Russian playwright Anton Chekhov. It was first published in 1897, and first produced in 1899 by the Moscow Art Theatre, directed by Konstantin Stanislavski.
Rachael Atlanta Stirling is an English stage, film and television actress. She has been nominated twice for the Laurence Olivier Award for her stage work. She played Nancy Astley in the BBC drama Tipping the Velvet, and Millie in the ITV series The Bletchley Circle. She has also guest starred in Lewis and one episode of Doctor Who, co-starring with her mother Diana Rigg.
Amanda Donohoe is an English actress. She first came to public attention at age 16 for her relationship with pop singer Adam Ant, appearing in the music videos for the Adam and the Ants singles "Antmusic" (1980) and "Stand and Deliver" (1981) during their four-year relationship. After making her film debut in Foreign Body (1986), she co-starred in Castaway with Oliver Reed and starred in two films by Ken Russell: The Lair of the White Worm (1988) and The Rainbow (1989).
Toby Edward Heslewood Jones is an English actor. He is known for his extensive character actor roles on stage and screen. From 1989 to 1991, Jones trained at L'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq. He made his stage debut in 2001 in the comedy play The Play What I Wrote, which played in the West End and on Broadway, earning him a Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. In 2020, he was nominated for his second Olivier Award, for Best Actor for his performance in a revival of Anton Chekov's Uncle Vanya.
Wyndham's Theatre is a West End theatre, one of two opened by actor/manager Charles Wyndham. Located on Charing Cross Road in the City of Westminster, it was designed c. 1898 by W. G. R. Sprague, the architect of six other London theatres between then and 1916. It was designed to seat 759 patrons on three levels; later refurbishment increased this to four seating levels. The theatre was Grade II* listed by English Heritage in September 1960.
Sir Simon Russell Beale is an English actor. He has been described by The Independent as "the greatest stage actor of his generation". He has received various accolades, including two BAFTA Awards, three Olivier Awards, and a Tony Award. For his services to drama, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2019.
Matthew Cottle is an English film, stage, radio and television actor.
Thea Sharrock is an English theatre and film director. In 2001, at age 24, she became the artistic director of London's Southwark Playhouse and the youngest artistic director in British theatre.
Sonia Friedman is a British West End and Broadway theatre producer. On 27 January 2017, Friedman was named Producer of the Year for the third year running at The Stage Awards, becoming the first person to win the award three times. In 2018, Friedman was featured in "TIME100", Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People of 2018 and was named Broadway Briefing's Show Person of the Year. In 2019, Sonia Friedman Productions was ranked The Stage 's most influential theatre producer in The Stage 100.
Gemma Elizabeth Whelan is an English actress and comedian known for portraying Yara Greyjoy in the HBO fantasy-drama series Game of Thrones and as her stand-up character Chastity Butterworth. She also plays Kate in all 4 series of the comedy Upstart Crow (2016–2018), Detective Eunice Noon on the first series of The End of the F***ing World (2017), Geraldine on the third series of Killing Eve (2020), and DCI Kerry Henderson in both series of DI Ray (2022–2024).
The Harold Pinter Theatre, known as the Comedy Theatre until 2011, is a West End theatre, and opened on Panton Street in the City of Westminster, on 15 October 1881, as the Royal Comedy Theatre. It was designed by Thomas Verity and built in just six months in painted (stucco) stone and brick. By 1884 it was known as simply the Comedy Theatre. In the mid-1950s the theatre underwent major reconstruction and re-opened in December 1955; the auditorium remains essentially that of 1881, with three tiers of horseshoe-shaped balconies.
The Personal History of David Copperfield is a 2019 comedy-drama film written and directed by Armando Iannucci, based on the 1850 novel David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. It stars Dev Patel as the title character, along with Aneurin Barnard, Peter Capaldi, Morfydd Clark, Daisy May Cooper, Rosalind Eleazar, Hugh Laurie, Tilda Swinton, Ben Whishaw and Paul Whitehouse.
Giv Paul Khatib-Chahidi, known professionally as Paul Chahidi, is an Iranian-born British Theatre World Award and Clarence Derwent Award winning and Tony and Olivier award nominated actor.
Aimee Lou Wood is an English actress. After early stage roles in Mary Stuart (2016–2017) and People, Places and Things (2017), Wood made her screen debut on the Netflix series Sex Education (2019–2023), which won her a British Academy Television Award for Best Female Comedy Performance from two nominations. She subsequently had roles in the films The Electrical Life of Louis Wain (2021) and Living (2022), and in the stage productions of Uncle Vanya (2020) and Cabaret (2023). In 2024, she starred in the BBC Three series Daddy Issues.
The 2020 Laurence Olivier Awards was held on 25 October 2020 at the London Palladium and hosted by Jason Manford, who presented all of the awards except Special Recognition.
