Ontario Off Stage

by Brandon Moore, Community Theatre and Communications Manager

In Memoriam

We lost two members of our Theatre Ontario family this past week.

Helen Zdriluk – a former Board member and pioneering advocate in educational theatre with the Council for Ontario Drama and Dance Educators and the Sears Ontario Drama Festival.

Jon Kaplan – a long-time supporter and a member of our Maggie Bassett Award jury. Jon was recognized in numerous tributes from colleagues and the Toronto theatre community:

• Susan G. Cole in NOW Magazine
• Glenn Sumi in NOW Magazine
• Playwright Michael Healey interviewed by Matt Galloway on CBC Toronto’s Metro Morning
• Lynn Slotkin on The Slotkin Letter
• Kate Robertson at NOW also compiled many of the community tributes.

Conversation Starters

• ICYMI: Donna-Michelle St. Bernard – our playwriting instructor at our Summer Theatre Intensive and last year’s “Playwright-in-Person” at Festival in North Bay – was the keynote speaker at Post-Marginal, and the video of her speech is now available.

Behind the Scenes at Ontario’s Theatres

Matt Pilipiak as Simon/e in Carousel Player's production
Boys, Girls, and Other Mythological Creatures
Photo by Lauren Garbutt

• Carousel Players has been facing cancellations of their production Boys, Girls, and Other Mythological Creatures at Niagara Catholic District School Board elementary schools, as Artistic Director Jessica Carmichael shared in an open letter.
• J. Kelly Nestruck of the Globe and Mail reported on the story, reaching out to several people within NCDSB without response.
• Playwrights Guild of Canada has opened a new book store: The Canadian Play Outlet, in the suite we share at 401 Richmond. Come visit the Canadian Play Outlet, and you can get promotional prices on three of our publications: The Agent’s Book, Ontario Playwrights: Eight Short Plays, and Grassroots: Original Plays from Ontario Community Theatres.

TO Toasts

• ... to the finalists for the Toronto Arts Foundation Signature Awards—including The AMY Project (finalist for the Arts for Youth Award), Jacoba Knaapen of the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts, Sandra Laronde of Red Sky Performance, and Mark Hammond of the Sony Centre (finalists for the Margo Bindhardt and Rita Davies Award for creative cultural leadership.)

In Case You Missed It

• Rachel Kennedy invites you to make plans to PLAY this summer with Ontario Summer Theatre.
• Browsing Our Bulletin Board featuring opportunities across the province including grant writing info session, launching your career workshop, voice over workshop, Festival, Summer Theatre Intensive, and more.
• ONstage Openings this week in St. Jacobs, Goderich, Waterloo, Fergus, Toronto, Midland, Beaverton, Ottawa, previews in Stratford and Niagara-on-the-Lake.

Ontario Off Stage

by Brandon Moore, Community Theatre and Communications Manager

Conversation Starters

Peter Fernandes and Dion Johnstone in Soulpepper Theatre's
production of Father Comes Home from the Wars.
Photo by Cylla von Tiedemann

• “Arts education is so much more than securing the ‘audiences of tomorrow’” – part of a smart intermission post by Rob Kempson, Associate Artistic Director of Thousands Islands Playhouse, about the value of arts education.
• Also from intermission: Peter Fernandes wrote about his experience rehearsing for Father Comes Home from the Wars at Soulpepper, and how “being surrounded by diverse theatre creators gave me the freedom to speak as myself, unburdened by the pressures to represent my race.”

Behind the Scenes at Ontario’s Theatres

• Drayton Entertainment has announced that Nathan Carroll will be playing the role of Terry Fox in their world premiere production of Marathon of Hope: The Musical. It’s interesting to read about the diversity of Nathan’s acting career, which took him from community theatres like Simcoe Little Theatre and youth theatre training programs like Theatre Aquarius’ Performing Arts Program to post-secondary conservatory training at George Brown Theatre School to professional performances with diverse theatres like Blyth Festival (Ontario Summer Theatre), Young People’s Theatre (TYA), Mirvish Productions (commercial), and Red One Theatre Collective (indie.)
• Meet Generator’s Artist Producer Training cohort and Annual Resident Companies for 2016/17.
• The Shaw Festival has announced their 2017 productions, the first season under new Artistic Director Tim Carroll.

Migrations

• Thom Currie—an adjudicator and directing instructor in our Talent Bank—is the new Artistic Director of Magnus Theatre in Thunder Bay.

You can also receive news from Theatre Ontario every month by email. Our archives are online and the August issue is now available.

Ontario Off Stage

by Brandon Moore, Communications Coordinator

Culture Days
Culture Days invites everyone to explore, discover and participate in arts and culture in every community across the country.  Culture Days runs September 27 to 29.  Some of our members activities that we’ve heard about include:

• An interactive play reading at Aluna Theatre in Toronto
• A poetry festival at Children’s Peace Theatre in Toronto
• An open house at Domino Theatre in Kingston
• A backstage tour at The Grand Theatre in London
• An acting workshop for 6-12 year olds at Great Canadian Theatre Company and OYP Theatre School in Ottawa
• A “backstage pass” at Mississauga Players
• Physical theatre workshops with Andy Massingham at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa
• An open house at Oshawa Little Theatre
• A backstage tour at Ottawa Little Theatre
• An art gallery at the Rose Theatre in Brampton
• An evening of Plays in Cafes at Shadowpath Theatre in Vaughan
• A backstage tour and a Sunday coffee concert at the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake
• Shakespeare text classes at the Stratford Festival

(We'll update this list if we hear about more opportunities)

Unearthed at Theatre Passe Muraille

Behind The Scenes At Ontario’s Theatres

• Unearthed at Theatre Passe Muraille: What they found when they decided to spruce up their lobby
• Past members of Scarborough Music Theatre: They are looking for some past show programs to scan for their archives
• Stu Cox, flying director for Soulpepper’s production of Angels In America, was profiled in Torontoist’s I Want Your Job

Conversations

• A campaign is underway to ensure drama and dance education is part of Ontario teacher education programs: find out more on the Advocate for Drama and Dance wiki
• The arts are not in trouble—it’s the institutions that are failing: Devon Smith proposes three possible solutions arising from an Arts Dinner-vention Party
• What could theatres accomplish with Big Data?  Gwydion Suilebhan explores the question on HowlRound
• Does the arts need an Anti-Defamation League?

From The Wire

• The Playwrights Guild of Canada’s Tom Hendry Awards will be held on October 28 in Toronto

Migrations

• Patrick Gauthier is the new Festival Director of the Ottawa Fringe Festival
• John McHenry is the new Director of Marketing & Development at the Blyth Festival (PDF)

TO Toasts

• To Vinetta Strombergs, our former Professional Theatre Coordinator; her Toronto Fringe hit production of Musical Of Musicals: The Musical! will be part of the Mirvish season this December

You can also receive news from Theatre Ontario every month by email.  Our archives are online and the September issue is now available.