All about the Festival
The National Drama Festival – this year with Nick Hern Books as its Principal Partner – brings together the cream of British amateur theatre. Groups from across the British Isles and beyond (which include Gibraltar, Geneva, Scotland, Germany, The Netherlands, the Channel Islands, Republic of Ireland, Isle of Man and England) are chosen to compete as a result of their success in the current festival circuit.
They will all have already won awards and have been deemed by the adjudicators to be this year’s ‘Cream of amateur theatre’. It is one of the prestige annual events in this country’s amateur theatre calendar.
It’s also an opportunity to learn new skills through Feedback Forums and Studio Spotlight sessions. To encourage groups who’ve entered festivals and perhaps haven’t done as well as they wanted, we make some National Drama Festival tickets available to our NDFA-affiliated festivals to give away.
It takes place every July.
Best decision we made”
It is fast becoming one of the highlights of the UK drama calendar."
Who can enter?
One-act and full-length plays that have performed exceptionally well in theatre festivals held within the British Isles throughout the festival season will be invited by the NDFA to apply to participate in the National Drama Festival.
To be eligible to apply, the invited plays need to have gained over 80 marks in an adjudicated festival in the current festival season.
The festival either needs to be a FULL MEMBER of the NDFA (an ‘NDFA-affiliated festival’), or the group performing the play needs to be an ASSOCIATE MEMBER of the NDFA.
How does the NDFA select the plays that get through?
Once all the applications have been received, the Adjudicators’ results are looked at by the NDFA, and discussions with the festivals and adjudicators take place, to narrow the shortlist down to around 14 plays. These plays are then accepted into the National Drama Festival and allocated a slot.
How is the festival adjudicated?
One adjudicator oversees the whole programme and marks each entry using the same criteria, working to a standard mark sheet produced by the Guild of Drama Adjudicators (GoDA).
After the final session, the adjudicator sums up the Festival, announces the winners, and the awards are presented.
For 2026, our Adjudicator is Jan Palmer Sayer
There are a maximum of 100 marks available in the following categories:
Stage Presentation (15)
Direction (35)
Acting (40)
Dramatic Achievement (10)
Feedback Forums
Participating groups and audience members get together each morning Feedback Forums to discuss the plays they saw the day before in detail. It’s a free-flowing but monitored discussion, and explores exactly what works and what doesn’t, by using real-life examples from the plays we’ll all have just seen.
Studio Spotlights
Throughout the festival you can also come along to short Studio Spotlight sessions with each one focusing on a specific subject giving you the chance to listen, add your view, ask questions and generally get what you need.
