Derek Jacobi wins Critics’ Circle award for 'exceptional' contribution to the arts

Derek Jacobi has become the latest recipient of the Critics’ Circle’s prestigious Rosebowl award for his "exceptional" contribution to the arts. 

The annual Rosebowl Award for Distinguished Service to Art has, since its inception in 1988, celebrated figures who have created a lifetime of outstanding work across drama, film, books, visual arts and dance. 

In receiving this year’s award, Jacobi joins the likes of Judi Dench, Stephen Sondheim, Matthew Bourne and Emma Thompson, who scooped the prize in 2021.  

Jacobi, 86, was presented with the award on November 7 by the outgoing chair of the Critics’ Circle’s drama section Kate Maltby, alongside her incoming replacement Rosemary Waugh. 

His acceptance speech highlighted vital supportive reviews in his early career, as well as wryly thanking the late Irving Wardle for his scathing review of Cyrano de Bergerac, which Jacobi said deterred him from ever reading a review again.

Jacobi received the Olivier award for best actor for his turn in Cyrano de Bergerac in 1983, scooping the same award for Twelfth Night in 2009.

One of the first actors to appear in Laurence Olivier’s fledgling National Theatre company in the 1960s, Jacobi last appeared on stage in 2016 as Mercutio in a West End production of Romeo and Juliet, directed by Kenneth Branagh, and has since announced his retirement from theatre.