Orange 60 Seconds of Fame - watch the winnng film

Jonathan Ross looked stumped at the Baftas on Sunday night as he faced a crowd featuring stars including Daniel Day-Lewis, Kiera Knightley and Sir Anthony Hopkins. All the big names had assembled for their moment of glory, but where was the winner of the ‘60 Seconds of Fame Award’, a prize reserved for short films no longer than a minute?

He assumed that the winner, Cheryl Marshall, would be there to take in the adulation, but there was no sign of her. “Ridley Scott is here,” he said. “The Coen brothers are here. But she has stood us up.”

Organisers at the British Academy of Film and Television Arts believed that Ms Marshall, a 34-year-old teacher from Nottingham, had another pressing engagement she could not put off, but the real reason emerged yesterday: she is a bit shy.

Her film, United Polar Showtime Dancers, beat more than 200 entries for the prize, which has no cash reward but guarantees exposure at the highest levels of the film industry.

She told The Times yesterday that she simply feels uncomfortable at film parties. “It wasn’t a conscious thing,” she said. “I don’t have anything against the Academy. I’ve gone to a lot of events to do with film and I don’t really enjoy them that much.”

She abandoned a career as an actress, while being trained at the Nottingham College of Performing Arts, when she discovered that she was uncomfortable going on stage. “I write. That’s what I do. When you first see a film on a big screen at a festival, sometimes they want you to do an introduction. I always say, ‘Oh no, not me.’ I don’t like the attention.”

The winning film charts the downfall of a dancer who dresses as Father Christmas and enters an international dance competition, only to suffer memory loss at a critical moment.

Ms Marshall hoped that Christian Hayes, who plays the dancer, or Katy Milner, who co-produced the film, would be allowed to accept the film on her behalf, but Bafta were “not interested”.

Mr Hayes, 29, who also co-produced the film said that he was disappointed that Bafta only allowed the award to go to one person.

“Unlike the director’s category, where you can have two names like Joel and Ethan Coen, they would only take one name,” he said. The trio attempted to get around the rule by creating a hybrid name for themselves — Chamina Mills — but the academy insisted on using Ms Marshall’s name alone.

Mr Hayes said: “It looked like we didn’t want the award. I understand it’s amusing — it got a big laugh — but it’s not a mystery. Cheryl is just not comfortable in front of the cameras. Unfortunately in this day and age that is an unusual quality.”

A Bafta source said that it seemed bizarre that anyone would enter a competition to be honoured by Bafta but not turn up for the ceremony, but conceded that Ms Marshall’s decision not to seek fame was “very noble”.

Ms Marshall said that she hoped the award would act as a springboard for her career. “Hopefully it will mean we get to make more films and get more support. There are a lot of people making films outside of London who don’t get support that people in London get.”

United Polar Showtime Dancers cost nothing to make, she said. The Father Christmas suit was borrowed and the pom-poms he waves were left behind by Ms Milner’s niece.

She added that she was delighted by the award, but declined to pose for a photograph for The Times. “I just don’t feel comfortable in those kind of settings,” she said.

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