About SBADS

South Brent Amateur Dramatics Society has had a long and busy past since it was formed in our lovely village nestling in the southern edge of Dartmoor in 1925.  We put on between two to three shows a year, with a pantomime every two years.  Our membership total comes and goes and we are actively seeking new members of all ages and embracing new methods of communicating with our members and potential audiences.  We are also looking at performing in a wider range of venues in the coming years, the better to reach untapped audiences and to try some new plays and one-act shows.

Please visit our presence on social media         and if you are interested in joining us in any capacity: actor, stage crew, director, producer, technician, artist, stage designer, stage constructor, bar staff etc. then please contact us by email; full contact details are here.

SBADS HISTORY

The SBADS archive, written by Maggie Taylor, begins in 1925 with an account of the lively musical and theatrical entertainments produced and often written by Mr Arthur Manning. This redoubtable gentleman was mainly responsible, with a little bit of help from his friends, for the village performances for the next 30 years.

SBADS fortunes have always waxed and waned. The 40s & 50s were golden years with a wide variety of drama and pantomime being performed – the society flourished, but the wheel turned with the introduction of TV and there followed 10 years of struggle and near defeat, but slowly the society resurrected itself and in the 1970s SBADS was back in full swing. It was then we started winning prizes from the South Devon Drama Federation… that we continued to win until the Federation folded in 2014.

The 1980s saw SBADS tackle new ventures and venture into revues alongside drama and the 1990s brought a very busy spell with 3 productions a year – drama, farce and pantomimes galore.  SBADS even went on tour during this decade.

Now we are in the 21st century and we are still busy with many different types of productions and the resurgence of the SBADS Youth group, giving us hope for the SBADS of the future. We are still winning awards and are learning new skills every step of the way.  We are in the process of digitising our play archives and hope to host a selection of images on the website soon.

No names are mentioned in this brief history as SBADS is all about the team and not individuals – behind every award and round of applause is a group of people, on & off stage who have worked to make the production a success.

Long may this continue…

You can find out more about our past productions, and the people involved in them, at the SBADS digital archive.