The Stage

Walters, Jones and Harris nominated for this year’s RTS Awards

Published Monday 1 March 2010 at 13:44 by Matthew Hemley

Julie Walters is to compete with Suranne Jones and Naomie Harris for the title of best actress at this year’s Royal Television Society Programme Awards.

The awards, which celebrate all genres of programming, will take place at the Grosvenor Hotel on March 16.

Walters has been nominated for her performance in A Short Stay in Switzerland on BBC1, while Harris is up for BBC1’s Small Island and Jones is nominated for Unforgiven on ITV.

Best actor nominees are Stephen Graham, who is up for his performance in BBC1’s The Street, Tom Hardy, who is nominated for Sky One’s The Take, and David Oyelowo, for Small Island.

MI High, Roy and The Sarah Jane Adventures will compete in the best children’s drama category, while Cast Offs, Misfits and The Street will battle it out for the title of best drama series.

The programmes competing for the best single drama award are A Short Stay in Switzerland, Endgame and Five Minutes of Heaven, while EastEnders, The Bill and Casualty have all been nominated for best soap/ continuing drama.

Meanwhile, BBC1’s Occupation will compete with Channel 4’s Red Riding and ITV’s Unforgiven to be crowned best drama serial, and Peter Bowker who wrote Occupation, Guy Hibbert, who penned Five Minutes of Heaven, and Howard Overman, the writer of Misfits, are all up for best drama writer.

Elsewhere, Peter Capaldi, Miranda Hart and Ruth Jones will go head to head in the best comedy performance category, and Britain’s Got Talent, Newswipe with Charlie Brooker and The X Factor are all contending for the best entertainment programme award.

The programmes nominated in the best scripted comedy section are Miranda, The Inbetweeners and The Thick of It.