David Wood’s stage adaptation of Goodnight Mister Tom has won the Olivier Award for Best Entertainment and Family.
Set during the Second World War, the classic tale of an evacuee, a curmudgeonly old man and how their relationship grows and changes captured the hearts of family audiences when it ran at the Phoenix theatre last winter, and was described by The Independent as “Enchanting” and Metro as “Grippingly staged… a flawless performance”.
Its triumph – a win for Wood, who was nominated for The Tiger Who Came To Tea last year but lost out to Derren Brown: Svengali – came at the expense of two original adaptations of classic fairytales, Cinderella: A Fairytale (St James theatre) and Hansel And Gretel (National Theatre), and Tall Stories’ adaptation of Room On The Broom (Lyric theatre).
Talking to us after collecting the award, Wood described the production as “very much a labour of love”. After missing out on an award in the same category last year, the writer said: “It feels wonderful… second time lucky! It’s very exciting. I’m particularly pleased with this one, because I’ve wanted the rights to do this for 20, 25 years, and it’s taken all this time and finally we got it together thanks to Angus [Jackson, the director].”