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In March 2008, 20 of our young apprentices and youth theatre members passed their youth arts awards, after months of hard work.

14 people achieved a bronze level, and one gained a silver award, but an incredible five young apprentices achieved a gold level youth arts award.

‘This is a remarkable achievement’, says acta Artistic Director Neil Beddow, ‘These young people face many challenges in their everyday life, it’s incredible what they’ve done. We are extraordinarily proud of them all, and of our staff who supported them’

The Youth Arts Award Moderator, Lara Martyn endorsed this view, saying,

“The candidates have clearly evidenced in some depth the ‘Gold’ process and should feel very proud of their achievements”

This is another Arts Awards first for acta, who last year were able to appoint Beccy Young as Arts Awards Support Officer, thanks to funding from Connexions PAYP scheme. This appointment has been unique in the country.

“This success wouldn’t have been possible without the support of Beccy Young”, says Neil Beddow, “I think we have proved how important it is to have someone to support young people through this process, and although funding has now run out for the post, we hope to find someone to help us to continue this in the future”.

“It’s particularly exciting that the Culture Minister, Andy Burnham, has this week announced a scheme to support Creative Apprentices. We’ve certainly found that our apprenticeship scheme has been of huge value both to us and to our young people, and we are keen to build on our success”

A massive well done to them all, and also to Beccy Young and the rest of the acta team, who have all done a fantastic job to support them through.

‘The No-ones’ was the last acta Advance show, which toured Bristol communities in 2007 and delighted audiences, of whom a staggering 85% were not regular theatre goers. The group toured regionally in January-March 2008, and took the show to the International Festival of Community Arts in Rotterdam. 

We have been developing this new strand of work, which focuses on creating high-quality original plays for touring to audiences in neighbourhoods on the edge of Bristol, over the last three years. Both the first show in 2005, For Love Nor Money, and The No-Ones in 2007/8, have enjoyed unprecedented success, drawing enthusiastic audiences all around Bristol and receiving international acclaim.

This project is aimed at the following areas:

• High-skills development for a smaller number of participants
• Creating new and relevant theatre for a specific audience
• Developing a huge, untapped audience for theatre in excluded and diverse communities.

The project is further looking to develop a partnership with Bristol Old Vic, to include the creation of new shows and possible future community theatre festivals.