By Francis Quamina Farrier
Everyone who has an interest in Theatre, and the National Drama Festival of recent vintage, is hoping that the many problems which surfaced during the 2016 festival, will be sorted out well in advance of the 2017 National Drama Festival.

It is known that Drama Festivals of the pre-independence and immediate post-independence era, never experienced such turmoil, as was the case last year, with all sorts of charges and counter-charges flying all over the place.

The new vintage of National Drama Festivals commenced in 2012. They had the added element of very attractive monetary prizes, for the winners, unlike the Drama Festivals of yore. Back in those early festivals, an attractive trophy was the singular prize. National Drama Festivals were held in British Guiana since the early 1950s. There were also the Sugar Estates Drama Festivals as well, which were sponsored by the two flourishing Sugar Companies of the day, Bookers and Sandbach Parker.

Following the dramatic resignation of the 2016 National Drama Festival Chief Judge, Al Creighton, after serious allegations of wrong-doing were leveled at him by some of the players, there has already been a meeting held by the Minister of Culture, Nicolette Henry, with the judges, discussing the way forward. The judges themselves will also meet later this month, to further discuss the many areas which need to be addressed. It is possible that Creighton may consider ligation against his accusers who used Face Book to besmirch his character.

Some of the areas to be discussed at the up-coming meeting by the judges, is how many productions any one individual will be permitted to be involved with. Another area for discussion and decision, is the contents of plays, since that was an area which brought much criticism my a large segment of the audiences. Some members of the audiences expressed the view that there was just too much unbridled violence in many of the plays; especially Domestic Violence, in which women were the victims of very aggressive men all played out on the stage. Some scenes displayed lots of gun-play, murder and suicides; the raw under-belly of the society, with no reference to the better and glorious aspects of the Guyana society; and that proved to be very offensive to the deserting theatre goers who attended.

Let’s now take a brief backward glance to some of the earliest theatre in this country, since some of the younger players tend to be of the view that theatre commenced with the 2012 National Drama Festival. To begin, one wonders how many of the younger theatre practitioners know that there was lots of theatre activity at the Assembly Rooms in Georgetown, from the 1890s and for many years after, until that building was destroyed by fire in 1945. That beautifully designed wooden building, was located where the Bank of Guyana now stands, and was the venue for many of the international classical plays.

There were also theatre Companies such as the Georgetown Dramatic Club which was housed at a small building where the Critchlow Labour College is located. Actors and actress, directors and stage staff of that colonial era, were all very serious about making their contributions to drama without receiving any financial rewards. They loved what they were doing and brought pleasure to theatre-goers by producing plays which generally displayed stories which entertained and informed, void of vulgarity. Generally, there was always a positive message for the audience.

It must be said that some of the plays which were staged at the 2016 National Drama Festival, were of the better category, which kept the high standards known at the Theatre Guild Playhouse and the National Cultural Centre over the decades. The vintage “Miriamy” by Frank Pilgrim and the new play “The Healing” by the group from the St. Cuthbert’s Mission on the upper Mahaica river, being prime examples. As the Village Chairman, Mr Chambers, in the Frank Pilgrim play “Miriamy”, says, “We discuss and discard”, so, too, the organizers of the 2017 National Drama Festival will have to discuss and discard all the negative elements which be-dogged the 2016 festival. And as one of the judges of last year’s festival has been saying, “Long Live the National Drama Festival”.