Latitude 2007: Richard Curtis Interview

24 October 07

Watch award-winning screenwriter and Academy Fellow Richard Curtis recall highlights from his sparkling career at the Latitude Festival in 2007.

Hidden in a woodland glade on the east coast of England, the Latitude Festival is a welcome addition to an ever expanding festival circuit. Local press had already billed it as East Latitude 07 Richard Curtis Anglia's answer to Glastonbury, albeit the artistic encounters presented felt like the Edinburgh Fringe in miniature.

Featuring an unparalleled mix of music, film, comedy, cabaret and theatre, the Academy was invited to open the festival and headline the Music and Film Arena. We were delighted to accept and brought Sony into the proceedings as sponsors.

A major highlight was the appearance of Academy Fellow, Richard Curtis. On a balmy summer evening he took the stage with Tracey Macleod prior to an outdoor screening of his film The Girl In The Café starring Bill Nighy and Kelly MacDonald. Eloquent and irreverent, Curtis held the 400-strong audience captive with tales of his screenwriting career and charity fundraising.

Latitude Festival Lights Richard Curtis has received international acclaim for his screenwriting and production credits on some of Britain’s best-loved television and film comedies such as Blackadder, Four Weddings and a Funeral, Bridget Jones’s Diary, and Love Actually. He is also known for establishing the national charity Comic Relief and the international campaign Make Poverty History.

A legend of British film and television, Curtis received the Fellowship, the Academy’s highest accolade, at the British Academy Television Awards in 2007.

A Tribute to Richard Curtis When He Received the Academy Fellowship in 2007:

Supported by The Farm Group.

Other Academy events at Latitude in 2007 included:

Film critic Mark Kermode presenting Hitchcock’s silent thriller The Lodger (1926) accompanied by a live orchestra.

A screening of Julien Temple’s documentary, Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten.

Award-winning filmmaking duo Shane Meadows and Mark Herbert joining Radio One’s James King to answer a barrage of audience questions about their recent collaboration, This Is England.