Ontario Off Stage

by Brandon Moore, Communications Coordinator

Behind The Scenes At Ontario’s Theatres

Espanola Little Theatre's Looking

• Espanola Little Theatre is still “Looking”: With six Theatre Ontario Festival awards in hand—including the Elsie for Outstanding Production—Espanola Little Theatre's production of Looking is now touring to Gore Bay (Gore Bay Community Hall on August 16) and Parry Sound (Stockey Centre for the Performing Arts on August 18.)  These will be the fifth and sixth venues for this production.  (Do you remember the first four?)
• Kristin Shepherd was one of the playwrights featured in “Grassroots: Original Plays From Ontario Community Theatres”, published by Playwrights Canada Press. Her newest play, Hope OP, will premiere at Gateway Theatre Guild in North Bay this November

Conversations

• Rob Salerno writes a compelling reminder on Exit Upstage to think about your audience when crowdfunding.  If you're looking to learn more about crowdfunding, join us on October 7 at Great Canadian Theatre Company in Ottawa for our workshop Crowdfunding Basics: Tips for Artists and Arts Organizations with Nancy Kenny
• Adam Thurman encourages us to learn a lesson from Hollywood on Mission Paradox: Once the arts starts, the marketing (essentially) ends
• Holger Syme shared some German theatre season announcements—and how they prepare the audience for a theatrical experience, and a response to that experience, that goes beyond a commercial transaction

In Case You Missed It

• The Revival of the Siminovitch Prize in Theatre

Welcome Betsy Chaly to our Board of Directors

We are thrilled to welcome Betsy Chaly to our Board of Directors at Theatre Ontario.

Betsy is a bilingual marketing and communications professional with over fifteen years of experience in a variety of industries, including media, arts, telecom, government, and education.  Currently, she is the Vice President of Communications & Marketing at Indspire.  Prior to joining Indspire, Betsy provided consulting support to OCAD University, Tourism Northern Ontario, Waste Diversion Ontario, AIDWYC, and Don River.  Previously, she was the head of the marketing and communications departments at SOCAN, the Canada Media Fund, and CanWest MediaWorks, and she held various progressive roles at Bell.  Betsy is a member of the International Association of Business Communicators, and she serves on the board of directors of Art Starts.  She earned her MBA in International Business from the University of New Brunswick and also holds a B.A. Honours in Geography and B.Sc. in Biology.

Read more about our Board of Directors on the Theatre Ontario website

Browsing The Bulletin Board

From Theatre Ontario

• Playwright-in-Person, with Maja Ardal on August 12 at 8:30pm in Waterloo - Join us for this FREE event as Maja reads excerpts from her plays You Fancy Yourself and The Cure For Everything.
• Proposal Writing: Creative Approaches to Creative Proposals, with Denise Bolduc on September 9 at 4pm in Toronto – A workshop for individuals and theatre organizations applying for funding and sponsorships: Change the grant-writing nightmare to a positive creative experience by learning relevant tools and valuable information to improve your chances of success.  Just in time for the Canada Council Granting Deadline on September 15!
• Playwriting: Idea to First Draft, with Lindsay Price on September 14 in Toronto – A workshop for emerging playwrights: Sometimes the hardest step in the playwriting process is the first. Where do I find inspiration? How do I develop an idea? What if my idea fizzles out halfway through?
• Playwriting: How to Self-Edit and Critique, with Lindsay Price on September 15 in Toronto – A workshop for your emerging play: Plays are not written in the first draft. Plays come to life in rewrites. But re-write how? What if we don't know how to move our work forward? What if we don't know how to critique our own work? What if we aren't sure how to process feedback from others? This workshop offers tools and techniques for playwrights who have a play “under construction.”

Check out all of our upcoming courses and workshops including marketing, ask an agent, and crowdfunding basics.

Upcoming on The Bulletin Board

• Next in the Young Associates Summer Seminar series—"Managing Your Data: Making It Work For You And Your Organization" is today; "Accounting Is Not Math: Knowledge For Your GM and Board Members" is August 14
• Jumblies Theatre’s The Art Of Community starts on August 8 in Sudbury, for participants from any arts discipline, tradition or related field with an interest and/or background in community-engaged arts
• ArtReach Toronto and City of Toronto Cultural Services, in partnership with the Art Gallery of Ontario and the Grassroots Youth Collaborative invite you to participate in their 2013 Pitch Contest. If you are a young artist or a group of artists, between the ages of 18 and 29, they want to hear from you!  The application deadline is August 13

ArtReach 2012 Youth Arts Pitch Contest

Check out these items, and other postings from our members of workshops, calls for submission, funding opportunities, awards, and more—on Theatre Ontario’s Bulletin Board on our website

ONstage Openings for the week of August 6

In Southwestern Ontario
Aug. 7, Weekend Comedy at Drayton Entertainment: St. Jacobs Country Playhouse
Aug. 7, Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story at Drayton Entertainment: Dunfield Theatre Cambridge
Aug. 7, Sorry... I'm Canadian at Drayton Entertainment: Huron County Playhouse (Grand Bend)
Aug. 7, Mary Poppins at Drayton Entertainment: Huron County Playhouse (Grand Bend)
Aug. 7, Prairie Nurse at Blyth Festival – world premiere

4th Line Theatre - The Real McCoy
Andrew Moodie
Photo by Wayne Eardley

In Central Ontario
Aug. 6, On A First Name Basis at Globus Theatre (Bobcaygeon)
Aug. 7, The Real McCoy at 4th Line Theatre (Millbrook), currently in previews
Aug. 7, Johnny & June at Drayton Entertainment: King's Wharf Theatre (Penetanguishene)
Aug. 9, A Night At The Movies at Peterborough Theatre Guild
Aug. 10, Crazy For You at Theatre By The Bay (Barrie), with previews from Aug. 8

Smiths Falls Community Theatre
- Pollyanna

In Eastern Ontario
Aug. 6, The Notorious Right Robert And His Robber Bride at Festival Players of Prince Edward County (Wellington)
Aug. 6, The Drawer Boy at Ottawa Little Theatre
Aug. 8, Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at Stirling Festival Theatre
Aug. 8, Pollyanna at Smiths Falls Community Theatre
Aug. 9, The Marriage-Go-Round at Classic Theatre Festival (Perth)
Aug. 11, Bain & Bernard: Yorick Kidding Me! at St. Lawrence Shakespeare Festival (Prescott)

For more information on these shows and other theatre playing across Ontario, visit Theatre Ontario’s ONstage theatre listings on our website.

68 Applications Received for the 2014 Neil Munro Intern Directors Project at the Shaw Festival

Theatre Ontario is pleased to announce that we received 68 applications for the 2014 Neil Munro Intern Directors Project at the Shaw Festival.  Applications came in from Canadians in six provinces (Ontario, Nova Scotia, Quebec, Manitoba, Alberta, and British Columbia), the United States, and the United Kingdom.

Each season, the Shaw Festival hires two Intern Directors.  They look for promising professional directors at a point in their career where an extended residency with a company like the Shaw Festival will be of benefit to their professional development.  Applicants should have a good amount of professional experience but will not have had an opportunity to work on the scale of production that is characteristic of the Shaw Festival.

The choice of the two Intern Directors for 2014 is expected to be announced by the end of September.

Since its inception in 1988, the project has been sponsored annually by Sun Life Financial and Theatre Ontario.

Read more about the Neil Munro Intern Directors Project at the Shaw Festival on the Theatre Ontario website

Gray Powell, Wendy Thatcher, Wade Bogert-O'Brien, Sharry Flett,
Jeremy Carver-James, Kelly Wong, and Ben Sanders in Senora Carrar's Rifles
Directed by Michael Wheeler at the 2012 Neil Munro Intern Directors Project at the Shaw Festival.
Photo by Mark Callan.