Natasha Richardson in A Streetcar Named Desire
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Standard Awards Longlist, Richardson Honoured

For the third year running, London’s Evening Standard newspaper has published the longlist of contenders in its annual Evening Standard Theatre Awards, which this year includes big names such as Lenny Henry, Kevin Spacey, Mark Rylance, Juliet Stevenson, David Tennant, Sam Mendes, Rupert Goold, Ian McKellen and Rachel Weisz.

The Best Actress category has been renamed this year in honour of actress Natasha Richardson, who died in March following a skiing accident. Announcing the longlists, Evening Standard executive director Evgeny Lebedev paid tribute to Richardson, calling her "one of the great stage talents of our age", adding that the renaming of the award will "honour her achievements and her memory".

The Awards, now in their 55th year, will be chosen by a panel of critics including the Standard’s own Henry Hitchings, the Observer’s Susannah Clapp, the International Herald Tribune’s Matt Wolf, the Mail On Sunday’s Georgina Brown and the Daily Telegraph’s Charles Spencer. The longlists, which prior to 2007 were kept private, will be whittled down to shortlists next week.

The first prize-giving of the 'awards season' - ahead of the Critics’ Circle, the Laurence Olivier and Whatsonstage.com Awards (which opens public voting on nominations today) - the Evening Standard Awards are announced at a ceremony at the Royal Opera House on 23 November 2009.

The full longlist of contenders in this year’s 55th annual Evening Standard Theatre Awards, which covers openings up until the end of October 2009, are (in no particular order):

BEST PLAY

THE NATASHA RICHARDSON AWARD FOR BEST ACTRESS

- by Theo Bosanquet

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