CURVE ANNOUNCES 2016/17 ANNUAL RESULTS

Curve has announced the results from its 2016/2017 Annual Review, with the new figures showing continued growth in audience engagement and turnover, cementing its reputation as one of the UK’s leading producing theatres.

Increasing audience reach both nationally and internationally by 156% and turnover by £1.5m on 2015/16, Curve has seen significant growth across many areas of the business, continuing to build on last year’s successes.

The key achievements during the period included:

• Increased turnover to £11.7m
• Almost 1 million people engaged with Curve by either visiting the theatre or seeing a show on tour
• Curve on Tour went from strength to strength with shows visiting 53 different cities and performing over 80 tour weeks
• Theatre attendance and participation in learning events and workshops reached 75,000
• On line sales and digital engagement continued to improve with 74% of customers booking online and over 100,000 people watching a piece creative content
• 2016/17 was Curve’s most successful Christmas to date with over 66,000 people seeing either Grease or Roald Dahl’s The Twits
• Curve’s Artist Development programme engaged almost 300 artists from across the UK

Curve Chief Executive Chris Stafford said today

“2016/17 has been another excellent year for Curve – our most successful since we opened almost nine years ago. Not only have we increased turnover for the second consecutive year, nearly a million people – almost double last year – have engaged with our work either in one of our theatre spaces or through one of our touring productions.

“Curve on Tour has been a major step change in our business and I am delighted we have been able to fly the flag for Leicester and our theatre on the road nationally and internationally with 5 co-productions touring last year including our West End debut with Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Away from work on our stages, our learning and talent development programmes went from strength-to-strength, with 75,000 young people attending a performance, workshop or project and almost 300 artists engaging with our work. None of this would have been possible without the terrific team at Curve, our loyal audiences and the support of our members, sponsors and Leicester City Council and Arts Council England.”

Ian Squires, Chair of Leicester Theatre Trust commented

“To echo Chris’s comment, it really has been a great year, the most successful since Curve opened nearly nine years ago. In the past 12 months Curve has gone from strength to strength, attracting even more spectacular productions to Leicester and creating new and exciting work of our own under the direction of Nikolai Foster. Curve’s reach and influence continues to grow, with more and more people wanting to work with us and coming to see our work, and I am truly excited to see what this next year brings and for even more people to experience the magic of Curve.”