It's the time of year when thoughts turn to acceptance speeches. On being presented with the Evening Standard's best actor prize this week, Rufus Sewell said: "This award is very special because it is quite easy to get recognised for being a newcomer, but to still be in the game all these years later is fantastic." A touch ungracious, perhaps, given that the Standard's outstanding newcomer, Andrew Garfield, was presumably in the room. And anyway, bah! Getting recognised is hardly a doddle for young stage actors.
Nominations for the Olivier, Critics' Circle and Whatsonstage.com awards are all announced early in 2007 and, as Simon Russell Beale surely knows, awards breed awards: year in year out, big names hoover up most of the glory. But what really got my heart thumping this year was the remarkable number of impressive turns from gifted young performers, half of whom I'd never seen before.
I've already written about Toby Danzig and Mariah Gale, and my list of actors to watch out for just keeps growing... Andrea Riseborough underplayed shrewdly in Burn and Chatroom at the National Theatre. Andrew Garfield, who also shone at the National, shone again in a staging of Beautiful Thing.
If Andrew Scott doesn't get some kind of prize for his roles in Christopher Shinn's Dying City, strong men will have to winch my jaw back into position.
Katherine Parkinson gave a beautifully abashed performance in Laura Wade's Other Hands, a seductive forecast of her Nina in the Royal Court's upcoming production of The Seagull. Daniel Mays dazzled in The Winterling. Ony Uhiara was breathtaking in a small and virtually silent role in Motortown. And I can't wait to see what Kellie Bright, Naomi Bentley, David Judge, Morven Christie, Samuel Barnett, Hattie Morahan, Lorna Brown, Chris New and Danny Worters do next.
Why is this such a fertile moment for young turks? I suspect the talent is always around but that it's been given more breathing space than usual, partly because this has been a year of bracingly good plays for and about teenagers.
Burn, Chatroom and Citizenship at the National, When You Cure Me and Christmas is Miles Away at the Bush, and a revival of Beautiful Thing all provided great showcases. So forget, for a minute, the recognised talents everyone admires out of habit: which actors do you think deserve more limelight?
