Coronavirus: National Student Drama Festival will take place online

The National Student Drama Festival has relaunched as a virtual festival, following the closure of theatres due to the coronavirus outbreak.

The festival was originally due to take place at Leicester Curve from April 4-10, until organisers announced its cancellation on March 16. It will now be presented online, with all work made available to audiences for free.

NSDF director James Phillips confirmed that much of the festival’s original content will be incorporated into the new online event, which he hopes will reach even larger audiences.

This year’s festival will feature talks by theatremakers and playwrights including Emma Rice, Mark Ravenhill, Laura Wade and April De Angelis. Leeds-based theatre company Slung Low, an NSDF partner, has offered the festival the money it would have donated as a prize for one of the festival awards, the Holbeck Cup, named after the company’s venue.

Founded in 1956, the NSDF is an annual festival of theatre made by young people aged between 16 and 25 from across the UK.

The new festival, which will still run from April 4-10, will include online workshops, masterclasses, and mentoring sessions for young artists, as well as online content from the festival magazine Noises Off.

NSDF: showcasing student creations for sixty years