Fantastic news from across the Channel! Mimi’s Shebeen, the poetic dance performance by Alesandra Seutin, has been nominated for an Olivier Award in the category “Best New Dance Production”. A great honour: the Olivier Awards are widely regarded as the highest distinction for theatre and dance in the United Kingdom — and, by extension, in the world.

Alesandra Seutin created Mimi’s Shebeen in 2023 at KVS. The production then toured the Netherlands before landing in London at Sadler’s Wells last autumn, where it caught the attention of the Olivier Awards jury. The jury has now rewarded the creation with a nomination for “Best New Dance Production”, alongside other nominees such as Sharon Eyal for Into the Hairy, Random Taranto by María Del Mar Suárez La Chachi, and She’s Auspicious by Mythili Prakash.

In Mimi’s Shebeen, Alesandra takes the audience, through dance, text, song and music, into the depths of a deconstructed shebeen (a bar where, under the apartheid regime, activists secretly gathered to drink and talk, often run by women). Inspired by the exiled South African singer Miriam Makeba, Seutin draws on her legacy as a political activist to tell stories of exile, migration and humanity.

The performance bears all the hallmarks of Seutin’s distinctive hybrid dance-theatre style, featuring a talented cast including the remarkable Tutu Puoane, Nandi Bhebhe, Kopano Maroga, Nosiphiwo Samente, Hendrickx Ntela, Shorlady Preciado, Kenza Deba, Elaisa van der Kust and Rose Sall Sao, with music by Angelo Moustapha & Zouratié Koné and text by Lebo Mashile & Lisette Ma Neza.

The Olivier Awards ceremony will take place on 12 April 2026 at the Royal Albert Hall in London. We are already eagerly looking forward to that evening and keeping our fingers crossed for Alesandra. Anyone curious about the choreographer’s work would do well to attend our season launch, as Seutin’s newest creation will premiere at KVS in autumn 2026. And on 29 April, we will tell you all about it.