New Bilingual Play Reading Club launches as part of Signal Fires

National Youth Arts Wales are launching the new MANIFFEST play reading club, led by Welsh freelance Directors in November, as part of the UK-wide Signal Fires project.

The new Play Reading Club will bring National Youth Theatre of Wales members together digitally for directed readings of new and acclaimed playwrights from Wales and beyond.

The ensemble of young performers aged 16 - 22 will gather around our virtual Aelwyd (The Welsh word for Hearth that also means a community coming together) to play and discuss stories for our stage that celebrate, explore, and give voice to the power of youth experience. 

The launch of MANIFFEST Play Reading Club will see NYTW's cast from all corners of Wales take part in an online Signal Fires evening of extract readings from this exciting canon for an invited audience of young people. 

Signal Fire (n): a fire or light set up in a prominent position as a warning, signal, or celebration. 

In October and November, fires will light up across the UK with storytellers and audiences sharing in one of the original forms of theatre. The fires will signal the vibrancy of touring theatre, and the threat our industry continues to face. 

Companies involved are: 45North, Arcade, Beyond Face, Big Telly, Boundless, Eastern Angles, English Touring Theatre, Fen in association with Out of Joint, Fuel, Graeae, Headlong, Kestrel Theatre Company, Kneehigh, Macha Productions, National Youth Theatre of Great Britain, National Youth Theatre of Wales, New Perspectives, Pentabus, Pilot, Paines Plough, SBC Theatre, Scottish International Storytelling Festival, Slung Low, Spare Tyre, The Lord Chamberlain’s Men and Yellow Earth Theatre (with more to be announced).

From spectacular bonfires to digital blazes; the nation’s leading touring theatre companies will present a series of theatrical events at locations across the UK in celebration of our fundamental need to tell stories. 

The companies will be working with hundreds of UK freelancers. Each fire will span different disciplines reflecting the breadth and diversity of the touring circuit.