"Shirley Valentine," a Broadway-bound comedy, and Leonard Bernstein's classic 1956 Broadway musical "Candide" took top honors in this year's Laurence Olivier awards.
The theater awards, presented Sunday, are London's most prestigious.Sir Alec Guinness received a lifetime achievement award during the nationally televised ceremony, and representatives of two winning companies from the Soviet Union - the Kirov Ballet and the Maly Theater of Leningrad - delivered acceptance speeches in Russian.
In a noticeably weak year for musicals, a limited-run revival of "Candide" won for musical of the year, with Patricia Routledge winning actress of the year in a musical.