Dame Maggie sets new award record for her portrayal as Goebbels’ secretary

DAME MAGGIE Smith and Andrew Scott were among the big winners at the Evening Standard’s Theatre Awards.

Dame Maggie was awarded a fifth Natasha Richardson Award for best actress for her performance as Goebbels’ secretary in German Life, fending off competition

Afrom Hayley Atwell, Cecilia Noble, Juliet Stevenson and Anjana Vasan.

The veteran stage and screen star, 84, now holds the record for the most wins in the category, having previously won the accolade in 1962, 1970, 1984 and 1994. Fleabag star Scott took the prize for best actor for his appearance in the gender-switched version of Noel Coward’s Present Laughter. He beat Tom Hiddleston, who was shortlisted for his role in Betrayal.

The other best actor nominees were Downstate’s K Todd Freeman and Francis Guinan, and

Death Of A Salesman star Wendell Pierce.

Anne-Marie Duff was another winner at the annual awards ceremony.

Having made her musical theatre debut in Sweet Charity, the actress took the best musical performance prize, beating musical theatre stalwart Sheridan Smith to the title.

Smith was nominated for her role in Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Duff’s other competitor in the musical category was Fiddler On The Roof’s Andy Nyman.

Play of the year went to American

playwright Lynn Nottage’s Sweat, a production that explores a community left divided by deindustrialisation. Olivia Colman presented the prize for Nottage’s play.

Nottage is the first and only woman to have won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice in America.

Sir Ian McKellen accepted the editor’s award for his Ian McKellen On Stage tour.

The Evening Standard’s Theatre Awards, held at the London Coliseum, was co-hosted by Dame Anna Wintour, Damian Lewis, Helen McCrory and Cush Jumbo.