Ray Davies was already A Well Respected Man in the music industry, but he’ll now be equally high-regarded in the theatre community after taking home the Autograph Sound Award for Outstanding Achievement in Music Award at this year’s Olivier Awards with MasterCard.
The Kinks frontman, whose music provided the very essence of hit musical Sunny Afternoon, fought off stiff competition from fellow musical legends Fatboy Slim and David Byrne (Here Lies Love), Bon Jovi’s David Bryan, Memphis The Musical’s Joe DiPietro, Nick Finlow, Tim Sutton and the Memphis Band, and the entire Beautiful – The Carole King Musical orchestra.
Backstage at the ceremony Davies described the feeling of winning his first ever Olivier Award as “Like a really good drug” and went on to tell us how after half a century he has achieved what one of his teachers predicted. “The last course I did before joining the band was a theatre course in design. I told my tutor ‘I’m leaving college to join a band’ and he said ‘You’ll come back to the theatre one day’. I waited 50 years.”
Featuring well-known hits including You Really Got Me, Waterloo Sunset and Lola, Sunny Afternoon charts the euphoric highs and agonising lows of Davies’ legendary band as they go about creating and performing the music that influenced generations.
Starring John Dagleish as the lead singer and songwriter, the acclaimed show started life at the Hampstead Theatre in April 2014, when it was described by The Telegraph’s Charles Spencer as “An irresistibly enjoyable and touching night out”.
Since then it has transferred to the West End’s Harold Pinter Theatre, where it will continue to belt out the iconic band’s greatest hits until at least 24 October.
