The Gwent Festival.....Winners again, but not Godfather Death this time....Twas the Biscuits (and the Spoon) what won it!!

Today, I woke up with a very strange feeling, which I have not experienced before over the years that I have been competing in Theatre festivals.  BLT have won plenty of things over the years and we have also had our fair share of losing too.  Both have their own, separate emotional responses.  Today I am experiencing both!

To explain.  Godfather Death performed last night and did really well in the adjudications, with only one minor costuming point raised.  The night before, Biscuits - the other play entered by BLT and featuring Vic Mills in the leading role had an amazing night, with a completely faultless adjudication and the audience loving it.  I am the director of this show....I am chuffed for the cast, crew and for me!  When it came to the awards, BLT walked away with virtually everything that we were eligible for - Vic Mills won best actor, Gwen Livingstone the Adjudicator's award, I won best director and we picked up the Gwent Festival title too for Biscuits.  To have been playing one of the lead characters in GD and that to have lost - even though it was losing to ourselves, is a weird feeling.  I am both elated and slightly deflated.  I know that the same would be said if the decision had gone the other way.   I do know that these feelings are very temporary and totally illogical - we won!!  Team BLT won and it was in a play that I directed!   Having said all that - there was only 1 mark between our two plays, so perhaps we will both get to the final in a few weeks time?  Let's hope so.

Strange feeling for me or not, it takes nothing away from the amazing efforts of my fellow actors, crew, technical directors, foh teams and everyone associated with these two, very different productions. They have worked extremely hard - and sometimes our patrons and followers (and perhaps some of our competitors) don't realise the effort it takes to rehearse both these shows and be involved in running the theatre and take part in the full length play too.  Amazing stamina and fortitude by everyone involved - I salute you all.

 We entered competition in 2004 with GD and since then have competed in every Wales Final.  I have been fortunate enough to be involved in every one of those productions - in some shape or other.  Since 2004 we have had 11 plays in Wales Finals, with 6 plays in the past 3 years.  If we were to get both into this year's final, that would be an amazing achievement.  We shall see - the results of the top 6 plays in Wales will be announced at the Torch Theatre in Milford Haven, next week - Saturday 5th May....so we will know all then. I shall be attending with with both a BLT and a DAW hat on.  Busy times for BLT with a Canada trip and potential Wales final and then there is Dad's Army!

Well done again to everyone at BLT.  Please keep your fingers crossed for us, next weekend!

Cheers

Neil