LONDON — On Thursday, Anna Wintour’s power to convene stars from across popular culture was on full display at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane in the West End, where the Condé Nast title staged Vogue World London, a glossy six-act stage show overseen by Stephen Daldry, the British director behind “Billy Elliot” and “The Crown,” and Vogue’s creative editorial director Mark Guiducci.
The evening, hosted by Wintour and outgoing British Vogue editor Edward Enninful, was a celebration of British performing arts with runway-esque fashion segments slipped between slick performances, including a Shakespeare-infused number featuring Stormzy and Sophie Okonedo.
A comedy sketch by Damien Lewis, Cush Jumbo, James Corden, Sienna Miller and James McAvoy drew chuckles ahead of a grand finale featuring Annie Lennox singing “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)” and supermodels Naomi Campbell, Christy Turlington, Cindy Crawford and Linda Evangelista.
The event was the second iteration of Vogue World, following a star-studded catwalk-performance in New York last September, and again seemed to position fashion — and the Vogue brand — as a kind of connective tissue between the worlds of music, film, theatre and more.
As with the New York event, the public could buy limited tickets to Vogue World London. Members of the exclusive Vogue 100 club were also invited, along with creative luminaries close to Wintour, from John Galliano to Baz Luhrmann, and the likes of Jared Leto and Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie.
