Press Release: Royal Television Society award nomination for Northern Ballet

[Jan McNulty]

Royal Television Society award nomination for Northern Ballet
 
The television adaptation of Northern Ballet’s Ugly Duckling has been nominated for a Royal Television Society programme award in the Children’s Fiction category. 
 
Ugly Duckling was Northern Ballet’s first ballet created for children and was choreographed by company dancers Dreda Blow and Sebastian Loe. The BAFTA award-winning television adaptation of Ugly Duckling was commissioned by the BBC for CBeebies and was initially broadcast over Easter weekend 2013.
 
The Royal Television Society (RTS) is Britain’s leading forum for television and media. The awards, which recognise excellence across all genres of television, will be announced at a ceremony on Tuesday 18 March at the Grosvenor House Hotel, London.
 
Funding from Leeds City Council’s Leeds Inspired fund enabled Northern Ballet to create Ugly Duckling with the aim of reaching children and families who wouldn’t normally go to the theatre or engage with ballet. Initially performed at community venues in Leeds, the ballet received further funding from Arts Council England to tour throughout the North of England.
 
To date more than 25,000 children and their families have seen a live performance of Ugly Duckling; more than 250,000 people have watched the television adaptation and more than 400,000 people have experienced the production through BBC iPlayer and the CBeebies website.
 
Northern Ballet’s Chief Executive, Mark Skipper, said: “We are thrilled that Ugly Duckling has received this recognition. Our partnership with the BBC in the creation of Ugly Duckling was a fantastic way to introduce ballet to new audiences. Its impact, reach and success has delighted us all.”
 
Northern Ballet has been commissioned to create two further ballets for children: Three Little Pigs premièred to sell-out audiences in Leeds in October and is currently touring throughout the UK; The Elves and the Shoemaker will première in 2015.
 
ENDS
 

Notes for editors
 
Northern Ballet is one of the UK’s five large ballet companies. Based in Leeds it performs throughout the UK as well as overseas. Northern Ballet’s productions mix classical dance and theatre, embracing popular culture and taking inspiration from literature, opera, or giving a unique interpretation of popular classical ballets.
 
Northern Ballet is the busiest touring ballet company in the UK and is typically on the road for around 24 weeks of the year. The Company of 40 dancers tours a combination of new works and established repertoire to cities throughout the UK and are the only large scale ballet company to do so.