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Theater|John Lithgow’s ‘Giant’ Is Among the Big Winners at the Olivier Awards
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/06/theater/olivier-awards-winners-giant-lithgow.html
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The play, about Roald Dahl’s antisemitism, took home three awards at Britain’s equivalent of the Tonys. So did a “Fiddler on the Roof” revival and a folk rock “Benjamin Button.”
April 6, 2025, 4:30 p.m. ET
“Giant,” a play about Roald Dahl’s antisemitism starring John Lithgow as the truculent children’s author, was one of the big winners at this year’s Olivier Awards, Britain’s equivalent of the Tonys.
The play, which was staged at the Royal Court last year and is transferring to the West End on April 26, took home three awards at Sunday’s ceremony at the Royal Albert Hall in London: best actor, for Lithgow; best supporting actor for Elliot Levey as a publisher trying to get Dahl to apologize for his statements about Jews; and the coveted best new play award.
For that final prize, “Giant” bested four other titles, including “The Years,” an acclaimed staging of a Frenchwoman’s life (featuring a back-street abortion and late-in-life affair) that is running at the Harold Pinter Theater until April 19.
The success for “Giant” was perhaps unsurprising given how much critics praised its opening run. Clive Davis, in The Times of London, said the “subtle, intelligent and stylishly crafted” drama, written by Mark Rosenblatt and directed by Nicholas Hytner, “deserves to transfer to a bigger stage.” (Lithgow has said in interviews that he wants to take the play to Broadway.)
Houman Barekat in a review for The New York Times said that Lithgow was “superb as the beleaguered but unrepentant writer, blending affable, avuncular esprit with scowling, cranky prickliness and nonchalant cruelty.
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