A new event is set to showcase South Canterbury’s theatre talent in a one-act play competition.
In One Act of Madness, several South Canterbury teams will perform one-act plays with the opportunity to go on to compete against teams from all around New Zealand.
Organiser TJ Ramsay said the new event would be part of the annual TheatreFest.
‘‘Theatre New Zealand host the TheatreFest every year. It’s three rounds of festival.
‘‘The first round is autonomous so although we sit under the umbrella, we have set up One Act of Madness and that is that first round of festival for the South Canterbury region.’’
It was the first time they had run the event, she said.
‘‘Timaru have entered the festival before — I remember coming to regionals here in the mid ’90s. I don’t know how often they’ve entered since, but I think it’s been quite a while.
‘‘With this, we’re really hoping to bring it up and make something of it, which will be really lovely. The plan is definitely to keep building on it.’’
She said she was very happy with the interest and entries the competition had received so far.
‘‘At this stage it looks like we’ve got six entries, which is pretty cool — we’re quite happy with that for a first one.
‘‘We’ve also got [Te Kura O Tititea] Mount Aspiring College coming up to take part and the rest of us are from Timaru.
‘‘It’s a really good range of festival theatre. We’ve got some really wacky comedies, some theatre of the absurd and some dramas. It’s a really nice age range taking part, too.’’
The competition will take part over two sessions. There is no minimum time that a play can run, but there is a maximum of 50 minutes and if an act goes longer they are disqualified.
The first selection of one-act performances will take place at 3pm on Saturday, August 17 followed by a small break before the second lot at 7.30pm.
Ms Ramsay said one ticket would provide access to both sessions.
The event will be held at the Playhouse Theatre. Tickets cost $20, with $10 concession tickets for students and gold card holders.
She said although performing any piece was an option, she was proud that everything set to be performed so far was original content.
‘‘Some of them weren’t necessarily written for this festival, but they are all new New Zealand plays.
‘‘One is a devised piece and three are new, and will be [entered] for the Olga Harding playwriting award.’’
Dunedin-based Marama Grant will be adjudicating the competition.
After performing their piece, the cast and crew will take a seat in the audience and the adjudicator will take to the stage to provide thoughts and feedback on the performance.
They will then go away privately for 10 minutes and have a more in-depth discussion.
A selection of the best pieces will then be put forward to take part in the regional finals, which will be held the following weekend at the Playhouse once again, but will feature teams from all over the South Island.
Then, from that, another selection will be taken from the whole of New Zealand to go through to the showcase performance in September.
