A PEMBROKESHIRE drama student has made it into the finals of a global online acting competition that was set up in response to Covid-19.

The Monologue Games were founded in March this year by an Australian playwright and monologue coach, who said he could foresee ‘the devastation of the creative industries’ and wanted to give actors a chance to keep honing their craft in front of an audience.

It attracted more than 3,000 entrants worldwide.

Ruby Wilson, 16, from Narberth is a finalist in her youth category, alongside finalists from Australia, South Africa, Pakistan, Syria and Brazil. Her competition will take place on Saturday, October 24.

Ruby's monologue is about the anger felt after a difficult break-up.

She said: “I’m really excited. I hadn’t expected to get this far, especially when I saw the quality of the other entries. It’s a great honour to feel that I’m representing Wales. I wrote the monologue and performed it so seeing it get this far feels magical.”

The Pembrokeshire College drama student started acting at the age of seven with the Torch Youth Theatre in Milford Haven.

For the last five years, she has trained with The Young Actors Studio, which is part of the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama.

Of the 3,000 competitors to sign up for the event, just under 200 reached the regional livestream finals.

Fewer than 70 have progressed to the global finals, which consists of six categories broken down by age group, experience level and duration.

Monologue Games founder Pete Malicki said: "The World Monologue Games is a new event. I founded it in March 2020, in response to Covid and the impact that very quickly and very evidently had on the arts and entertainment industries with live venue and film set closures.

"I designed the event to be as accessible as possible - free entries, judging criteria based on performance and not technology (i.e. camera or microphone quality), open categories allowing anyone to compete no matter their circumstances.

"The excitement is palpable. I’ve been flooded with emails from actors telling me this has been the highlight of their year."

Ruby's group of finalists can be seen on https://youtu.be/uKUKhQRYf98, with the competing monologues available from around 11.30pm on Saturday. People then have up to two days to view them a vote for their favourites.

Read more about the event or watch the event here: www.monologues.com.au/WMG.