Page 3 - 18_Bafta ACADEMY_Pierce Brosnan & Halle Berry_ok

This has been another busy year for BAFTA. We hosted seven very successful Awards ceremonies, which not only met all our financial objectives but provided a very broad platform to reward excellence across the many creative and technical dis- ciplines in our industries.
In addition, we have met our corporate targets financially, increased membership, broad- ened our Events and Education programme, renewed our suc- cessful partnership with Orange for a further three years and worked more closely and pro- ductively with our Nations and Regions than ever before.
We are pleased with our progress, a little tired, but very excited by the prospect of anoth- er year of challenges in 2003.
For the Academy, next year will be dominated by work on our building at 195 Piccadilly. We have been anticipating an essen- tial roof repair for some years now but we have finally agreed with our landlord that summer 2003 is the opportunity to commit to this major project.
As the roof repair will necessi- tate a temporary closure of the building, which will result in a sub- stantial loss of hire revenue, we have decided to commit to an upgrade and modernisation of our facilities at the same time. Plans are now well progressed for these major buildings projects and we are bracing ourselves for a busy year with architects and builders.
I cannot overstate the signifi- cance of these projects for the Academy in terms of both the opportunity it affords us to upgrade in order to offer the very best facilities as the meeting HQ for the British Film, Television and Interactive Entertainment indus- tries, but also in the financial undertaking we are making.
The combined cost of these projects is expected to be in the region of £1.5m – which provides an opportune moment to tell you more about our newly launched Capital Fundraising project ‘Raising The Roof’.
The refurbishment of 195 Piccadilly provides us with a unique opportunity to invite mem- bers of our industry to associate their names with the Academy.
After 27 years of service, the Princess Anne Theatre seats will either be replaced or upgraded as part of the refurbishment – which signals the moment to invite new endowments for the new theatre seats.
We have written to all those who in 1975 made seat endow- ments to explain our plans and of course to invite them to re- endow the new seats for the next phase of the Theatre’s life. We shall be forever grateful to that original group and preserve their names for ever within the refur- bished building.
We shall also be inviting name association endowments for our two bars and the preview theatre in 195. If any member wishes to find out more about these endowment opportunities then please call me at the Academy or e-mail me at kevinp@bafta.org.
All BAFTA members will by now have received our inaugural offer for the new BAFTA Wine Club. We are offering this new service to members in conjunction with Longford Wines who specialise in importing a compact but highly desirable wine list to its 2500 members in the UK. The wines offered through the BAFTA Wine
Club are discounted from the standard Longford Wines list so we hope they represent tremendous value to BAFTA members. We will be presenting a new offer in each addition of ACADEMY magazine during 2003, and there is a copy of the inaugural offer included as an insert with this edition – we hope you enjoy it!
If you have access to e-mail and the internet and qualify as a film voting member of the Academy, I hope you have regis- tered to vote on-line for the 2003 Film Awards. Even if you do not have access to the internet, there will be three terminals at 195 Piccadilly available for voting pur- poses during the voting period.
There are so many advantages attached to this development in our voting procedures that we expect this mode of voting to become the norm very quickly.
I am delighted to announce the official launch of the BAFTA/ Shell/NFTS Scholarship in Film Studies. The Academy originally
Kevin Price, Chief Operating Officer
And finally, the Academy suc- cessfully completed its ‘public’ thank you to its immediate-past Chairman, Simon Relph, by host- ing a function in the David Lean Room last month.
In typically modest and unselfish style, Simon gathered around him those people who
the big picture
Above l-r: Simon Bosanquet, Norma Heyman, Lord Puttnam CBE, Simon Relph, Chris Hilton and Hugh Hudson
received a generous donation from Shell in the early nineties which was used to fund scholar- ships for students at the RCA and NFTS.
The new fund is established following changes at RCA and will now be dedicated to provid- ing an annual scholarship to a student at the NFTS. We will report on the Scholarship fund from time to time here.
had contributed to the impressive development and progress of the Academy under his dedicated Chairmanship and a wonderful evening was had by all.
On behalf of all those working for and connected to the Academy, I should like to say one more thank-you to Simon for his incredible leadership to so many during his two years as Chair.
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