Olivier Award win for LIPA Sound Tech grad and visiting lecturer

Graduate Giles Thomas (Sound Technology, 2011) has won the Olivier Award for Best Sound Design for his work on Kenrex.

A true crime thriller, that features Jack Holden (winner of the Olivier Award for Best Actor) playing all 35 parts and a live soundtrack by John Patrick Elliot, Kenrex opens at Lucille Lortel Theatre, New York later this month, following a sell-out run at The Other Palace in London.

Director of the School of Creative Technologies, Design & Enterprise, Jon Thornton, taught Giles. He says: “We are thrilled that the Olivier Awards have recognised the quality of Giles’ work. During his time at LIPA, Giles was a great collaborator, and this approach has clearly served him well throughout his career, especially on such a bold and innovative production as Kenrex.

“We are incredibly proud of his achievements and equally grateful for his continued support of our students as a visiting lecturer. Through leading our Sound Design for Theatre module, he inspires the next generation by sharing his expertise as an industry-leading - and now Olivier Award-winning - practitioner.”

Giles’ nomination for an Olivier Award was announced in March while he was teaching at LIPA. We spoke to him then about the Olivier Awards, his work on Kenrex and his time at LIPA

How does it feel to be nominated? 

Kenrex is a pretty big show from a sound perspective, and there was a huge amount of work and collaboration that went into making it what it is. So having it recognised like this feels really special - not just for me, but for the whole team. I’m genuinely excited about the nomination, and also just really grateful that the scale of the work is being acknowledged. 

What about the production are you most proud of? 

It was so collaborative and what I’m most proud of is how all the elements work together. Because it’s a one man show with something like 35 characters, it relies quite heavily on sound to help push those different characterisations.  

There are parts of the show that start with Jack speaking and then pre-recorded elements take over and that has to be seamless, and it has to feel as though it’s all coming from his central performance. Using surround sound and content created by the performer we’ve created this visceral, immersive world. The amount of detail that went into creating those world’s is probably what I’m most pleased with, along with how that works collaboratively with the other elements of the production. 

What was the most important thing you learnt at LIPA? 

Of course, it was incredibly useful to get to grips with the technical side of things and to start developing a creative strategy. But ultimately, working in the creative industries is about working with people. 

What I really learned was how to collaborate and how to do it in a way that  leads to interesting work. How to challenge someone’s idea without shutting it down, and how to use other people’s ideas as a springboard. 

You can push creative boundaries so much further when you’re open and responsive to the people around you. That ability to collaborate, to build something together, is probably the most important thing I took away from my time at LIPA. 

You’ve just finished teaching the second year module, sound design for theatre. How did you find the students? 

They’ve been great - really enthusiastic and energised, and asking lots of interesting questions.  

One of the things I really like about teaching is that it’s a way of interrogating your own practice. Even just this past week there have been a couple of moments where a question’s made me stop and think, “That’s interesting… maybe I should look at how that influences my own work.” 

It feels like a two-way exchange in that sense.  

What’s next for you? 

I’m currently in rehearsals for a production of Romeo and Juliet with Empire Street Productions, directed and adapted by Robert Icke and starring Sadie Sink and Noah Jupe at the Harold Pinter Theatre. Then we’re taking Kenrex to New York at the Lucille Lortel Theatre and then I’m off to Schaubühne in Berlin to work with Complicite. 

The Olivier Award winners are announced on 12 April at The Royal Albert Hall. Evita, directed by LIPA grad and Companion Jamie Lloyd has been nominated five times, including best revival of a musical.

Find out more about our Sound Technology course

Image: Giles in LIPA's George Martin Studio, 27 February. Photography by Brian Roberts