The choreographer, director and writer Kate Prince, 48, was born in Hampshire. Watching music videos on MTV inspired her to become a dancer. Since she founded her company ZooNation in 2002, she has shaped street dance into a popular theatrical form. She followed Into the Hoods (2008), the West End’s first hip-hop dance show, with Some Like It Hip Hop and The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party, which premiered at the Royal Opera House. More recently, she used the songs of Sting as the soundtrack to Message in a Bottle, about the plight of refugees. She lives near Brighton with her husband, Leo, and seven-year daughter, Ella. Mixtape, celebrating ZooNation’s 20th anniversary, is at Sadler’s Wells, London, next month.
How are you feeling about ZooNation’s big anniversary?
I feel a mixture of things. My friend Teneisha [Bonner who died of breast cancer at the age of 37 in 2019] was so much a part of why I founded ZooNation and she was front and centre of all our early shows. I find it so upsetting since she died. It’s a struggle to find my feet in the company without her and to be in the space without missing her so much. It is a wonderful thing that this show is happening, but for me and quite a few of the old timers, it’s tinged with something very sad.
