The Stage

Latitude wins Stage Award for Special Achievement in Regional Theatre

Published Monday 27 October 2008 at 13:00 by Lalayn Baluch

Latitude Festival has won this year’s Stage Award for Special Achievement in Regional Theatre, for its efforts in taking the performing arts to new audiences.

The announcement was made at the 2008 Theatrical Management Association Awards, which were held last night at the Hampstead Theatre.

Presenting the prize on behalf of The Stage, actress Isla Blair said: “What makes this event’s achievement particularly special is its ability to attract a broad range of age groups - in rather impressive numbers - to come and see performances ranging from hard-hitting plays, to dancing on a lake, to an RSC zombie thriller.

“At a time when people are complaining about the falling theatre offering at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, this is a festival which boasts the best in the UK’s theatre and manages to make it appealing to all age groups, from young children to teenagers to young adults and, well, old adults.”

Latitude is a multi-art form event, which was established three years ago and is held in a collection of fields in Suffolk. Its Theatre Tent has hosted performances by the Royal Shakespeare Company, the National Theatre, the Royal Court, Sadler’s Wells, the Bush, Paines Plough, the Factory and the Lyric Hammersmith.

The festival’s arts curator Tania Harrison commented: “We have brought people who are not theatre aficionados, but theatre virgins, to a whole new experience. So many people go to the festival to see a band and maybe their only experience of theatre is some Shakespeare at school.

“So to bring quality theatre to them from the Royal Court, the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Bush, exciting contemporary writers, it is tremendous. It is exciting for me to be able to introduce that and see how exciting it is in a field, and think, ‘Oh my God, I’m so glad they are loving it’.”

The Stage special award recognises people or organisations working in the performing arts, in the regions, who are taking steps beyond or above the ordinary on a local or national scale. This year, Latitude beat off competition from the Arcola Theatre, Hall for Cornwall, producer Richard Jordan, the RSC and producer Edward Snape, to take the award.