What is FEATS?

What is

The Festival of European Anglophone Theatrical Societies, or short FEATS, is a competitive theatre festival held in different European cities every year, usually over the Whitsun weekend. On each of four nights three one-act plays are presented in English by groups from all over the European mainland. The performances are critically watched by an invited adjudicator, who must be a member of the Guild of Drama Adjudicators (GoDA). Every night after the performances the adjudicator will publicly give his or her comments on the productions, criticise or praise stage presentation, acting and in case of original scripts, even the plays themselves. This does not only provide direct feedback for the groups, but also valuable insights (and material for intense discussions at the bar later) to the audience.

The Performances

The plays can be almost anything but too short or too long. You will see well known classics, published but rather unknown pieces or original plays, sometimes written expressly for this festival. The rules do not enforce one-acts, excerpts are allowed, as long as understandable to any member of the audience who has not seen the full play.

One of the challenges for the presenting groups not immediately apparent to the audience is that everything on stage has to be set up within a timed period of usually ten minutes before the show and has to be removed completely within usually five minutes. Failing to do so results in a deduction of points or even disqualification from the competition.

12 participating groups

The 12 participating groups are selected on a rota basis from the FEATS member groups. New member groups are encouraged and often invited to participate after bringing a performance to the Fringe.