Facts and Figures

The Laurence Olivier Awards are Britain's most prestigious stage honours. But who has won the most awards? Here is the answer to this question and many more...

And the biggest winners are:

SEVEN

• Judi Dench (actor)
• William Dudley (designer)

SIX

• Ian McKellen (actor)
• Alan Bennett (actor/writer)
• Richard Eyre (director)
• Stephen Sondheim (composer)

FIVE

• Matthew Bourne (choreographer/director)
• Declan Donnellan (director)
• Mark Henderson (lighting designer)
• Mark Thompson (designer)

FOUR

• Michael Bryant (actor)
• Michael Gambon (actor)
• Michael Frayn (writer)
• Tim Goodchild (designer)
• Clare Higgins (actor)
• Alex Jennings (actor)
• Sam Mendes (director)
• John Napier (designer)
• Trevor Nunn (director)
• Philip Quast (actor)
• Willy Russell (writer)
• Simon Russell Beale (actor)
• Frances de la Tour (actor)
• Andrew Lloyd Webber (composer)

The Venue

The venue most associated with the Awards is Grosvenor House Hotel, which has housed the after-show reception nine times and hosted the whole event on four further occasions. As well as at the Grosvenor, the presentations have been held at:

• Victoria Palace (2 times)
• Lyceum (3)
• National Theatre Olivier (2)
• Albery (now Noel Coward)
• Shaftesbury
• London Palladium
• Dominion (5)
• Royalty (2)
• Theatre Royal Drury Lane (2)
• Café Royal (5)
• Piccadilly (1)
• The Park Lane Hilton (3)

Most decorated productions

SIX

• Nicholas Nickleby (1980)

FIVE

• Guys and Dolls (1982)
• Sunday In The Park With George (2007)

FOUR

• All My Sons (2001)
• Billy Elliot - The Musical (2006)
• Hedda Gabler (2006)
• Oklahoma! (1999)
• Stanley (1997)
• She Loves Me (1995)
• Sweeney Todd (1994)
• Machinal (1994)
• An Inspector Calls (1993)
• Carousel (1993)

The early years

In the early years, the Awards were sometimes referred to as the 'Urnies' because the winners were presented with a specially commissioned blue Wedgwood urn. The Awards were established in 1976 as The Society of West End Theatre Awards, becoming the Laurence Olivier Awards in 1984. Consequently they are now often called the 'Larries'.

The first ever awards ceremony was held at the Café Royal on a Sunday evening in December 1976 and broadcast on the BBC as part of Nationwide. The first self-contained programme was broadcast on BBC1 in 1981, continuing until 1992 when it switched to BBC2. In 2004 the Beeb decided it no longer wanted to televise the awards. In 2007 edited television broadcasts from the event were hosted exclusively on this very website, enabling theatre fans to see inside the event for the first time in three years.

If you're hoping to pick up a couple of Olivier Awards yourself, you'd better have strong arms! Each solid bronze statuette weights 1.6kg. It depicts the young Olivier as Henry V at The Old Vic in 1937 and was commissioned by The Society of London Theatre from the sculptor Harry Franchetti.

Famous presentations

Famous names who have presented an Award range from Diana, Princess of Wales to Eddie Izzard, and from Kevin Spacey to Sir Tom Stoppard and in 2007, Laurence Olivier's son, Richard.

The award for the 'Most Bizarre Acceptance Speech' goes to a member of Compagnie Montalvo-Hervieu who gargled her entire speech for the Best New Dance Production in 2001. She is run a close second by Brazilian choreographer Deborah Colker, who accepted her award with what appeared to be a spontaneous, unintelligible, piece of performance art involving a pharaoh and a penguin.

Winners

Laurence Olivier's wife, Joan Plowright, won an Award before he did. She picked up the Best Actress Award for Filumena in 1978. Olivier was given a Special Award a year later.

Hit comedy The Play What I Wrote included a joke that Sir Ian McKellen was supposed to be the show's special guest star but he has got too drunk in the theatre bar to appear on stage. The performers were surprised one night when an apparently drunk Sir Ian really did amble onto the stage. He was actually there to present the 2002 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Comedy.

And the loser is ...

People who may feel inclined to stay at home even though they have been nominated for an award include David Suchet, who has been nominated no less than six times but has never won an Olivier Award.

Total number of awards given 670.

In 2005 and 2006 the Award Ceremony was hosted by the esteemed Richard Wilson, while in 2007 he co-presented with Sue Johnston. The previous seven ceremonies were hosted by Clive Anderson while previous hosts have included Angela Lansbury, Barry Norman, Peter Barkworth, Anthony Hopkins, Sue Lawley, Diana Rigg, Edward Fox, Tim Rice, Gary Wilmot, Jane Asher, Tom Conti, Denis Quilley and Angela Rippon.

Keeping it in the family

Winners who have kept it in the family include Sam Wanamaker, who won a special award for his work on the rebuilding of Shakespeare's Globe, and his daughter Zoe, who has won awards for her performances in Electra and Once in a Lifetime. Brother and sister Daniel and Anna Massey won acting awards in 1981 and 1982.

Ian Holm, an acclaimed Royal Shakespeare Company actor in his youth, spent almost 20 years away from the stage following an attack of extreme stage fright. He returned to working in theatre in the mid-1990s and won the Best Actor Award in 1998 for King Lear.

The Awards are run by The Society of London Theatre but are adjudicated by panels that are equally made up of members of the theatregoing public and experts chosen for their knowledge and professional experience.