Anjana Vasan is first Singaporean to win at Britain’s Olivier awards
LONDON – London-based Singapore actress Anjana Vasan has won the Olivier for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for playing Stella Kowalski in the revival of American playwright Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire.
The Oliviers are the Oscars of London theatre and the 36-year-old is the first Singaporean to win the prestigious award.
The ceremony was held at the Royal Albert Hall in London on Sunday and Vasan was up against some veterans, including South African actress Pamela Nomvete as Calpurnia in American playwright Aaron Sorkin’s adaptation of To Kill A Mockingbird, and Scottish actress Sharon Small in C.P. Taylor’s 1981 Nazi drama Good.
Vasan looked shocked when her name was announced. The first words out of her mouth when she got up to the podium were: “It takes a while to come up here in these heels. I apologise.”
She thanked her director Rebecca Frecknall “for trusting me with Stella” and her co-stars Paul Mescal, who won the Olivier for Best Actor in a Lead Role as Stanley Kowalski, and Patsy Ferran, who lost the Best Actress trophy to Jodie Comer.
Vasan also thanked her parents, “amma” and “appa”, before saying: “I’m going to find a corner and have a lie-down and a cry.”
The actress has been winning recognition for her work, and earned a Bafta (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) nomination for playing doctoral student-turned-punk singer Amina in We Are Lady Parts (2021 to present), a British comedy about an all-female Muslim band.
She was also in the final season of the hit series Killing Eve (2018 to 2022), where she played an assassin in training.
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