National Theatre’s annual festival returns to Royal & Derngate, welcoming 440 young people in celebration of theatre

The National Theatre is set to hold its annual youth festival at its flagship partner, the Royal & Derngate, beginning on Tuesday April 11.

The Connections Festival has been held at the Royal & Derngate for over ten years and is “a celebration of young people, theatre, and the importance of access to the arts.”

Jonathan Stewart, creative learning associate at the Royal & Derngate said the festival is about connecting young people together from Northampton and surrounding areas.

“They get to meet other like-minded people and support each other’s performances,” said Jonathan.

“One of the highlights which the young people absolutely enjoy is we do pizza at lunchtime

“That’s always a winner for the young people.

The festival also allows young performers to connect with a text that has been created for them, Jonathan says.

This year, the Royal & Derngate’s in-house acting group, the Young Company, will be performing ‘Circle Dreams Around (The Terrible, Terrible Past)’ by Simon Longman.

Andy Routledge, a local theatre director has been working with the Young Company to direct Circle Dreams Around (The Terrible, Terrible Past).

The play explores surrealism and is about somebody that’s stuck inside a dream and they’re unable to wake up.

“The play keeps circling around and round on itself. And within and within this dream, lots of quite weird things happen

“One of the big themes is this idea of young people being forced to do jobs they want to do so it's made up of a series of speakers

“Throughout this, it's exploring the idea of the challenges to be a young person today.

“It's written with a very kind of quite deadpan, naturalistic style.

“So you've got the juxtaposition between these really quite extreme, and in some places, quite gruesome images.

“But that's juxtaposed with this really authentic, honest, grounded vernacular of what it means to be a young person today”, Andy said.

Throughout the week, the commissioned plays are performed by different acting companies so there will be multiple showings of the same productions.

“There’s a real agency for the director of the company

“Everyone’s got hugely different ideas, which is what is hugely exciting about the festival,” Andy said.

Jonathan adds the same productions are often shown in different locations.

He said: “It’s really interesting to see how the space changes the performance, how the director has, perhaps taken a different route, had a different vision with that particular play.”

Unlike many other theatre groups, the Royal & Derngate does not have an audition process, so if people wish to get involved they can.

“I think it's so difficult for young people at the moment on this side of the pandemic and all the pressures that they're put under.

“The opportunity to work on something that actually isn't marked is a chance for expression and to be creative, and to have a huge amount of fun,” said Andy.

To find out more information on how to get involved with performing arts at the Royal & Derngate, click here. You can also book into performances during the Connections Festival week here.