Tonight:
9°c
Underage star is forced to collect £100,000 talent prize on pavement
Shekhar Bhatia02.04.09
A GIRL of 15 who won £100,000 in a talent contest was barred from picking up her prize because she was too young to enter the nightclub venue.
Lucie Evans, who had travelled to London from Warrington with her parents, had been due to collect the prize from girl group The Saturdays.
But she was left outside the Proud Gallery in Camden as her parents, Lorraine and Rob, tried in vain to negotiate with security officials. She was comforted by Britain's Got Talent winner George Samson, who was also prevented from entering as he too is 15.
Nine other finalists took part in the live stage of the competition after more than 250,000 people voted them into the top 10 of the internet contest 1Click2Fame.
The result was declared late last night with a host telling the audience: "Lucie is the winner, but unfortunately she could not be here to collect her prize."
Instead of performing live, a video of her singing the No1 Gnarls Barkley song Crazy was shown. The audience was not told the new star was outside. She said: "At first I was upset when they said I could not come in, but now I really don't care. I am so excited.
"It is fantastic to win this and now I know what George felt like when he danced on TV and also won £100,000. I was looking forward to meeting The Saturdays on stage, but they came outside and gave me the cheque, which was nice of them."
Mother Lorraine, a teaching assistant, said: "Nobody told us Lucie and George would be stopped at the door, otherwise we might not have bothered coming all this way. But I don't really care now. I am just so pleased for Lucie."
The competition involved performers putting their videos online for three months into one of five categories, ranging from comedy to variety.
Lucie will receive £20,000 of her prize immediately and another £80,000 will help develop a recording career. A security official at The Proud Gallery said: "Camden's licensing laws stopped us from allowing Lucie and George in."
Reader views (5)
The event was a private party, the drinks were not on sale, all the three under age kids in question were supervised on site by their parents, and had been in the club most of the day rehearsing anyway !!! And the whole event until this point was run in an orderly manner. Discretion could have quite easily been applied for the short time it would have taken to complete the ceremony,
instead the kids including the winner and their entourage had to stand outside in the freezing cold for nearly 2 hours, proud Gallery . . . yuk never again !!
- Erika Lee, Leeds
Don't blame the licensing laws but the organisers of the even of either their disregard or, more likely, ignorance of them. Knowing that the possible winner could be "under age" they should have chosen a more appropriate venue.
- Jan Bors, london U.K.
The organisers should have foreseen this. Since they didn't, surely someone in authority should have been able to exercise their discretion to allow this girl in?! Rules are made for a reason, and the reason is not to prevent talented teenagers from collecting prizes they have won at an event being held specifically for that purpose.
- Adam, London, UK
It's a shame Camden's prohibitive licensing laws don't stretch to the dozens of inebriated vagrants that wander the streets around Camden Town tube station at all times of day and night with a drink in their hand.
- Keith, Kings Cross, London, UK
I believe the Licensing Laws prevents under age drinking, not admittance?
- Frank, Home Counties, England.
