NATIONAL PLAY FESTIVAL

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27442, 31 August 1954, Page 14

NATIONAL PLAY FESTIVAL

DECISION BY DRAMA COUNCIL SIX SOCIETIES TO BE INVITED (New Zealand Press Association) 1 WELLINGTON, August 30. 1 A one-week national festival of ; three-act plays will be held at Wei- , lington in August next year by the New Zealand Drama Council. It will 1 be the first time that the large amateur drama societies have been brought ■ together in such a festival, and if ; it is successful it will become an , annual fixture, with Christchurch or 1 Invercargill possibly the venue for the second one. J The Drama Council, at its quarterly ' meeting at Wellington, appointed Mr . Russell Reid, of Wellington, as manager of the first festival It was decided that six societies : should be invited to present a play ; on each night of the week. Invitations to the first festival will : be sent initially to the Wellington and Canterbury Repertory Societies and 1 also to societies in Auckland, Hawke’s Bay, Manawatu, and Nelson. The Drama Council’s executive committee will probably choose the types of play it wants the various societies to perform, and it will suggest a number of titles for the societies’ consideration. Details of travelling, rentals, and finance generally are to be settled later. The council does not intend that the festival should be competitive. Opportunity will be . taken to make the festival Week a theatre week generally, and suggestions are being considered for day-time activities.