FIAT — Festival of International Alternative Theatre

FIAT — the Festival of International Alternative Theatre — is Montenegro's longest-running theatre festival, founded in the 1980s and still the defining stage event of Podgorica's autumn. Every September it gathers alternative and experimental productions from across Europe and the wider region, and in 2025 it marked its fortieth edition with ten days of programming from 5 to 14 September. The 41st edition returns from 4 to 13 September 2026.

September suits it well. Podgorica, Montenegro's capital, sits on a plain where rivers meet, and by early autumn the fierce summer heat has softened into warm evenings made for going out. Cafe life spills across the squares, the wooded slopes of Gorica park begin to turn, and the city eases into the season that this festival has made its own.

The anniversary edition packed 31 programmes into the city: seven productions competed for the festival's awards, while the French choreographer and director Josef Nadj opened the festival with "Full Moon" on the stage of the Montenegrin National Theatre. Performances spread across the KIC Budo Tomović cultural centre — its Great Hall, the Dodest stage and the terrace — as well as the CNP and the Kuslev House.

What sets FIAT apart is everything around the shows. Film screenings, music and literary side programmes fill the days, and every night the KIC terrace turns into the festival's living room with live music, where audiences, critics and performers mingle long after the curtain falls. For a visitor, this rhythm is the real attraction: an afternoon screening or reading, an evening performance, then unhurried conversation under the open sky. You do not need to follow the regional theatre scene closely to enjoy it, either — experimental work tends to speak across languages, and the terrace atmosphere carries newcomers along.

Ticketing is mixed — some performances charge entry while many accompanying events are open to all. The festival is annual, and the 2026 edition runs from 4 to 13 September at KIC Budo Tomović and the Montenegrin National Theatre in Podgorica. The full schedule is published each year at fiat-montenegro.org.