Ontario Off Stage

Conversations

• The annual tradition of wrapping up 2011 featured a lot of “best of the year lists” (including one from our own Tim Chapman); Howard Sherman, former Executive Director of the American Theatre Wing, compiled an extensive list that featured a nice amount of Canadian content, and the Toronto-plus lists from Kelly Nestruck, John Coulbourn, and NOW Magazine.
• And Aislinn Rose and Michael Wheeler at Praxis Theatre went one better, producing a Top 10 Top 10 lists.
• Speaking of Mr. Nestruck, his self-described “Twitter rant” about the singing of the national anthem before a production of American Idiot at Dancap Productions lead to a provocative column on the subject and a passionate response from Aubrey Dan.  Setting aside the predictable patriotic pissing contest, the argument I found most interesting was there was actually an artistic dissonance between singing the national anthem and the show that followed.

Migrations

• Gideon Arthurs is the new General Manager of Tarragon Theatre, effective August 2012
• Lucy Eveleigh is the new General Manager of the Summerworks Theatre Festival [link corrected - ed]

Assembled by Brandon Moore, Communications Coordinator