Elena Roger and Douglas Hodge
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Bob Gaudio
Best Musical, Jersey Boys
“This was my first Olivier Awards, and I didn't know what to expect.It was still a little nerve-wracking right up till the very end knowing that we hadn't won some of the earlier awards. I didn't quite know what to make of it to tell you the truth. On the other hand, I'd certainly rather be up against one other show than four, so that was OK with me. It is a different feel from the Tonys—more of an industry inside thing. The fans aren't really part of this. This was the peers and the industry and, as I said on stage, after 47 years since first time we appeared here in London, to go home with an Olivier Award is beyond surreal. I'm very proud, and I know Frankie is going to be just thrilled.”
John Tiffany
Best Director, Black Watch
“I love this tactic that you can open a show in 2006 and then in 2009 you win an Olivier Award for it. It's amazing, but then the whole Black Watch journey has just been fantastic and the people involved have, you know, just been so committed and it really is a group effort in the true sense of the word. I liked group effort thing that was going on tonight. I was delighted for Michael Boyd that he won a couple of awards, and I love the idea that people are understanding that theater isn't just an actor or a director: it's a whole world. There were some mad big shows up for awards and this is a real West End ceremony, so for a show like Black Watch to be acknowledged like that is amazing. I'd never been nominated myself, and probably won't be again, and my award was right at the end so I had to stay sober, which is why I'm drinking gin and tonic now.”
Elena Roger
Best Actress in a Musical, Piaf
“I just doubted for a minute that I was going to win and I thought, ‘Oh no, maybe they're going to mention another name!’ So it was great when they said ‘Elena Roger,' and I felt happy and nervous. I didn't know what to do with my body and my words: I didn't prepare any speech so that in case I didn't win I wouldn't feel bad. But of course then I forgot to mention Jamie Lloyd and Michael Grandage and felt guilty because they are the two people who most helped me. But I managed later to find them and tell them that I loved them, and I feel happier now. I am delighted to have this award. I've got one important prize from Argentina and now this from London and I wish someday I'm going to win a Tony Award. [Laughs] Maybe.
Douglas Hodge
Best Actor in a Musical, La Cage Aux Folles
“I was nervous singing ‘I Am What I Am’ because I hadn't sung it for a month, but you have the song in your bones, it's in your muscles. I thought it would be wrong to drag up: the Oliviers are a sort of cocktail evening, a cabaret, so I thought I'll come on and sing it as myself and mean what I say, and I was glad that I did. My father died on Thursday so I wasn't going to come tonight and my mom phoned me and said, ‘If you don't go, I'll never forgive you. He would love you to go,’ so I did. It was an interesting thing. When I was offered the part if I'm honest, my dad said, ‘I don't think you should do it—what's it going to be: distasteful, sleazy?’ And then the show won him over because it's about family and love and commitment and long relationships: everything he believed in. It breaks my heart that he's not here tonight.”
Black Watch winners Gregory Burke and John Tiffany
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Gregory Burke
Best Play, Black Watch
“I thought we'd get sound—I knew we'd get sound—and I thought Steven might get choreography, but I never dreamed John Tiffany would win and that I would. I start rehearsals in three weeks for a new play called Whores for the Traverse [in Edinburgh], and it's a comedy. We have callbacks tomorrow and I'm taking this [trophy] with me and putting it on the table [laughs].”
Steven Hoggett
Best Theater Choreographer, Black Watch
“This award represents something really significant, I think, in acknowledging that movement on stage doesn't have to be about tits and teeth but that actually meaningful movement has to be absolutely constructed for a specific show and can be recognized as being something an audience can get behind and not be afraid of. Yes, it was very odd to be in a category with La Cage Aux Folles and Jersey Boys. You spend half your day thinking, ‘Maybe I'm going to win because we're the left field option,’ and then you think, ‘We're never going to win because I'm the left field option,’ so it's a kind of bipolar day I had today. You think, it will win because it's not the norm and then, it won't win because it's not the norm, so you just never know. What's nice is that this doesn't feel like a televised event, so it has its own integrity. As Alan Ayckbourn said, it only happens in the room: we were here, we saw it. This is the Black Watch cast from the Barbican, some of whom I haven't seen for nearly nine months, so it's been nice to see everybody again. We spent nearly three years on this, so it's a nice culmination, particuarly for Greg [playwright Gregory Burke]. Greg was in a really strong field, and I thought he wouldn't win, so I was really surprised. That was a lovely one tonight: Greg was the main surprise for me. That was a shock.”