Royal Court Theatre Wins Two TMA Awards

ROYAL COURT THEATRE WINS TWO TMA AWARDS

DC Moore’s play The Empire and Anya Reiss’s debut Spur of the Moment, which both premiered at the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs at the Royal Court this summer, received accolades at the TMA Awards last night (Sunday) – the awards given by the Theatrical Management Association.

The Empire by DC Moore won the award for Best Touring Production, up against Sound and Fury’s Kursk at the Young Vic and on tour and English Touring Theatre and Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse’s production of Moliere’s The Hypochondriac. Spur of the Moment by Anya Reiss was voted Best New Play, competing against Simon Stephen’s Punk Rock and Mrs Reynolds and the Ruffian by Gary Owen.

The Empire, a co-production with the Drum Theatre Plymouth, was DC Moore’s second full-length play. Set in Helmand, Afghanistan, The Empire dissects the politics of occupation, home and abroad. Playing to sold-out houses at the Royal Court in May, the production, directed by Mike Bradwell, transferred to Plymouth, before returning to the Royal Court’s satellite venue Theatre Local at the Elephant and Castle shopping centre.

Spur of the Moment was 18 year old Anya Reiss’s debut play, written when she was just 17. Described in the Daily Telegraph as the ‘most accomplished debut from a young playwright I’ve ever had the pleasure to see’, Spur of the Moment directed by Jeremy Herrin, looked at the distance between close family relations and a young girl on the brink of adolescence. The play sold out its entire run at the Royal Court before a similarly successful week at Theatre Local at Elephant and Castle shopping centre.

The prestigious TMA Theatre Awards recognise the best in theatre throughout the UK. The Theatrical Management Association is a trade association that represents over 300 member organisations involved in the creation, presentation and management of professional theatre, opera and dance in the UK. Its annual awards were established in 1990.

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(08/11/10)

Notes to Editors:

Theatre Local

Theatre Local, sponsored by Bloomberg, is a long-term project of Artistic Director Dominic Cooke, which this year presented a season of work in a disused shop at the Elephant and Castle shopping centre over a six month period, following on from a successful pilot run of Oxford Street by Levi David Addai at the shopping centre in June 2008. The project aims to take productions out of the Royal Court’s Sloane Square home, placing them in alternative spaces at the heart of a local community in order to open the work of the Royal Court up to a wider and more diverse audience.

For further information please contact Anna Evans in the Royal Court Press Office on
020 7565 5063 or e-mail annaevans@royalcourttheatre.com.