"One person whose thunder would absolutely not be stolen was Helen McCrory."

Actor Damian Lewis has paid tribute to his late wife Helen McCrory at a special evening honouring her memory. The actress, who was perhaps best know for her role as Polly on Peaky Blinders, passed away last year. She was 52-years-old. Last night saw approximately 900 people attend a dedicated poetry evening in honour of Helen in the National Theatre in London. There, a recording of her reading poetry was played. Damian addressed guests and spoke about his wife's love for the theatre. According to The Sun, he told the audience: "This evening is dedicated to her and it's perfect, because Helen loved the National Theatre. "One person whose thunder would absolutely not be stolen was Helen McCrory." He then read the final verse of the poem Everything Is Going To Be Alright by Irish poet Derek Mahon. The evening was based on Allie Esiri’s latest anthology, A Poet For Every Day Of The Year, and saw many other friends and colleagues of Helen's take to the stage to read poems. Addressing the audience, Esiri herself said: "We dedicated the evening to Helen, and Damian said a few words, but we just wanted to get on and do the show. "It's what she would have told us to do – 'OK, enough already, get on with the show!' "She loved poetry and I think she would have been pleased to be kind of here with us. It felt right.

"Damian and Helen really helped to get poetry out to people. When you are stuck at home with Covid but can't quite take on a novel, a lot of people have been turning to poetry.

'Tonight we chose poems that will hopefully have chimed with people who have been going through a lot over the last two years."

Other poems read on the evening included Spike Milligan's You Must Never Bath In An Irish Stew and Carol Ann Duffy's Mrs Icarus.