Photos: The S&S AWARD GALA!

Writers Alex Young & Kate Marlais won this year's S&S Award for their musical Here, at last night's glittering Gala at the St James Theatre.

The S&S Award Gala is an annual celebration of new musical theatre. The evening, hosted by S&S Award Patron Nigel Harman, consisted of a showcase presentation of the 2013 winning show Forest Boy by Scott Gilmore and Claire McKenzie, and the second half was extracts from the three finalist shows: After Lydia by Christine Denniston and Gwyneth Herbert, after Terence Rattigan; Here by Alex Young and Kate Marlais and The Last Word by Brett Sullivan.

This year The S&S Award went international, attracting a record number of entries from around the world. The Award, which is a Mercury Musical Developments initiative, also formed a partnership with Curve, under the artistic directorship of Nikolai Foster. Mr Foster was joined by Nica Burns of Nimax Theatres and Kent Nicholson of Playwrights Horizons in New York on the final judging panel. As part of their prize, winners Alex Young & Kate Marlais will now go on to have a development workshop week at Curve on their winning musical.

This year the Gala attracted many industry professionals including; Haydn Gwynne, Edward Seckerson, Claude-Michel Schonberg, Rob McWhir and 'WestEndProducer', and the award was presented to the winners by the multi-award winning actress Janie Dee.

The stellar West End company included: Nathan Amzi (Dinner With Saddam, London Road Movie), Daniel Buckley (Book Of Mormon, Stiles & Drewe's 3 Little Pigs), Greg Castiglioni (Titanic, Phantom Of The Opera), Rebecca Caine (Les Miserables original cast, Phantom Of The Opera London and Toronto), Haley Flaherty (Rocky Horror Show Live, Matilda), Louis Maskell (West Side Story, My Fair Lady), Michael Matus (Phantom Of The Opera, Women On The Verge), Matthew Rixon (Casa Valentina, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang), Charlotte Wakefield (two-time Olivier award nominee for Spring Awakening and The Sound Of Music) and Matthew Wycliffe (Jersey Boys, Buddy Holly).

The Gala was directed once again by Simon Greiff with musical direction by Inga Davis Rutter. It was produced by SimG Productions, a champion of new British musical theatre writing, in association with Mercury Musical Developments.