Maimuna Memon on the quiet after winning an Olivier

This time last year Maimuna Memon was on a career high after winning an Olivier for her performance in the musical Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, based on a section of War and Peace. Then it went quiet. “I didn’t expect to skyrocket but I did think, ‘OK, what’s next?’” she says.

“And it was a rather quiet year, which was tough.” The pause proved useful in stripping the ego away; she went to Galway to be with her mother and watched musicians playing for the love of it, “not for how they will be reviewed, or to win any awards, or any of that.” Memon is no newcomer — she won praise for Mary Magdalene in Tim Sheader’s Jesus Christ Superstar, sang her own work in the National Theatre’s adaptation of The Grapes of Wrath, and was first Olivier-nominated for Standing at the Sky’s Edge — yet the industry is hard right now.

“It’s brutal right now.

maimuna memon, olivier award, great comet, natasha, pierre, galway, mary magdalene, jesus christ, national theatre, theatre industry