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National Drama Festival - The Birds Are Back

29 July 2026

The National Drama Festival starts tomorrow!

On Thursday 30 July, the National Drama Festival begins. For the second year in a row, Brightlight Theatre have been selected to perform. As a large contingent of the group descend onto Bromsgrove, our Artistic Director, Jamie, is going to be blogging his reflections on each day. Here’s his first entry, the night before the festival begins.

I’m not nervous. I’m absolutely not nervous.

(I’m nervous.)

Tomorrow night, Brightlight Theatre opens the National Drama Festival. First on. Opening night. The birds fly first. I’ve been trying to play it cool about this fact for approximately six weeks. It has not worked.

The journey to get here has been quite something. The Aviary made its festival debut at Maidenhead in April, winning Best Comedy, and then Henley in May, picking up four awards including overall winners. Then Welwyn the following week - runners up, three more awards, and a feeling that maybe our show was something special. And now here we are - back at the NDF for the second year running, which still doesn’t feel entirely real.

But setting aside whatever happens with The Aviary tomorrow the programme for the festival looks spectacular. 13 groups chosen from across the UK and Europe. All winners and selected to be the best of amateur theatre. I can’t wait to see them all, but here are a selection of the productions I’m most looking forward to seeing.

TACT are here. If you were at last year’s NDF you’ll remember what TACT did with MODEST - winning the festival overall. I am still not entirely over how sensational their production was. This year they’re back with The Weight of Small Things by Tilly Lane - which has won the AETF Final AND the British Final. I hear they have puppets and anyone who saw our entry last year, Songkeeper, will tell you how much I love puppetry.

The Gibraltar Academy of Music and Performing Arts are performing Tatty Hennessy’s superb monologue play, A Hundred Words for Snow. I saw a production of this many years ago and it’s a lovely piece of writing. It looks like they’ve adapted it for a ensemble performance, so I can’t wait to see how that will work.

Nantwich Players, runners up last year, are back with Mike Bartlett’s Bull. It’s a great play, with some powerful characters. Nantwich had really choreographed every movement in last year’s Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons. I wonder if they’ll continue with that tight choreography. That could be spectacular paired with Bartlett’s script.

There’s Stoppard from Switzerland (The Semi-Circle Basel with Another Moon Called Earth), Horowitz from Banbury (A Handbag - and yes, THAT Handbag), original scripts from Liverpool (Red Onion with Tigers) and on Sunday, a full-length play from Harlequin Players before the awards ceremony. And so much more.

Then there’s the rest of it - the stuff squeezed in between the productions - feedback forums every morning, stage combat with Dan Gough (looking forward to the chance to punch Liam, even if it’s only pretend), a session with West End director Bob Tomson on how to recognise and deliver effective theatre, and a deep dive into this year’s Derek Jacobi Award winning script with its author, Ste Mc.

Phew! I remember how exhausting it was last year - arriving at the theatre at 9am and not leaving again until 10pm. But it’s worth it in inspiration alone.

This is what I love about the NDF. It’s not just a competition. It’s a weekend where you throw yourself in completely and come home a slightly better theatre-maker than you were when you arrived. Last year I left with enough inspiration to fuel twelve months of writing. The Aviary exists, in part, because of what I absorbed at this festival.

So tomorrow night, when Brightlight take that stage and the birds start to sing, whatever happens, we’re already winning.

If you’re around the Bromsgrove area and want to see brilliant theatre - come along! You won’t regret it.

Right. I need to go and find my lucky socks. (And yes, I really do have lucky socks. And no, I’m not sure what I’m going to do about the fact I’ll almost certainly be wearing shorts and so look ridiculous!)

Come back tomorrow for my update on how we got on, plus the rest of the first festival day! Watch this space. 🕊️

Jamie