Budding young talent will fill the stalls of the Gaiety Theatre on Friday 1 July as participants in Scotland’s National Festival of Youth Theatre (NFYT) descend on Ayr to mark the start of a wonderful camping weekend of workshops and performances. 

As the largest gathering of youth theatres in the UK, NFYT enables young people to celebrate their shared passion for theatre, offering them the opportunity to develop as artists, audience members, and creative thinkers. With an emphasis on inclusion, education and collaboration, the festival teaches valuable life skills, and provides extraordinary new experiences to youth theatre groups from across Scotland.  

After six successful years in Glenrothes, NFYT first pitched their tents in Ayr back in 2017, enjoying two successful biennial festivals in the town before being interrupted by the pandemic, and organisers Youth Theatre Arts Scotland are delighted to bring the event back to Ayr for 2022.  

As part of the festival, many participating youth theatres will be packing up a show as well as their tents and suncream, and bringing it by road and rail to the stage at the Gaiety Theatre. You can catch exciting new work by Dundee Rep Young Company, Ayr Gaiety Young Company and Youth Theatre, Glasgow Acting Academy, Firefly Arts and more as part of this explosive weekend of young theatre talent.  

You can read more about each NFYT performance from 1-3 July at ytas.org.uk/whats-on/performances, and tickets are available to the public on a Pay-What-You-Decide basis from the Gaiety Theatre Box Office on 01292 288235 or at ayrgaiety.co.uk. 

And if you’re not going to be near Ayr this weekend, don’t worry. We’ve selected three shows to stream, so you can watch from the comfort of your own home. These are Glasgow Acting Academy’s We Hear You, When This Is Over by Firefly Arts, and the Gaiety’s own contribution to the Positive Stories for Negative Times series called Thanks For Nothing.