The Writer Speaks is a selection of interviews I’ve come across over the years on YouTube with a variety of writers including Charlie Kaufman, Christopher Durang, and Emma Thompson. There are many more of course but these are ones I’ve enjoyed and I think any writer interested in learning a bit about the creative process will enjoy these conversations as well.
For myself when I began a more serious attempt at putting something down on paper I read On Writing by Stephen King and I found there were a couple of lessons from King that worked well for me. Probably the most important one is not to share the work until you’ve finished the first draft.
In fact, once you’ve finished the first draft you put it in a drawer and leave it. Let some time pass. Then when you come back to it a month later you have fresh eyes and can read the story with a more analytical mind.
The reason you don’t share the story during the writing process is because you don’t want the story to be influenced by the opinions and thoughts of others. This works well for me but I know there are other writers who like to have input and getting feedback as they write is part of their process. I’m not saying you don’t need to share the work and get feedback I’m just saying for myself early feedback usually disrupts my writing process rather than helps it.
The key of course is to find out what works for you. There is no wrong or right. You’re not Stephen King or Margaret Atwood and what works for them may not work for you.
Anyway, I wish you well on your writing journey and I hope you find the interviews below as informative and entertaining as I have.
Selma Hortense Burke with her portrait bust of Booker T. Washington, 1930s. Smithsonian Archive of American Art. Photography by Pinchos Horn.
Selma Burke was an African American sculptor who played a major role in the Harlem Renaissance movement of the 1920s and 30s which was an intellectual and cultural revival of African American music, dance, art, fashion, literature, theatre, politics, and scholarship.
Burke used her talent to immortalize such historic figures as author and African-American civil rights leader Booker T. Washington, philanthropist, humanitarian and civil rights activist Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune, composer, songwriter, conductor and Jazz musician Duke Ellington, and Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. who advanced civil rights for people of colour in the United States through the use of nonviolent resistance and nonviolent civil disobedience.
Among her more famous works is a bas-relief bronze plaque honouring President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Four Freedoms which he outlined in his State of the Union speech to Congress in 1941 as Freedom of speech; Freedom of worship; Freedom from want; and Freedom from fear. Burke’s portrait of FDR is recognized by many as the inspiration behind the design of Roosevelt’s portrait on the American dime, which was something she never received credit for in her lifetime.
Caroline and Maria have written a rich and thought-provoking play about the life of Selma Burke that also explores the meaning of art, the Civil Rights Movement, racism, and censorship. I asked Maria and Caroline what sort of experience they hope audiences are going to have when they come to see the play.
CAROLINE RUSSELL-KING
Our goal is to entertain. Our play is not a lecture on art or a biography, it’s a flight of fancy. Selma lived nearly a century – these are ninety minutes of fun.
MARIA CROOKS
An entertaining, stimulating and very humorous one. We hope the audience will find the use of actors playing statues and other objects to be innovative and clever. We also hope that they enjoy getting to know this feisty, intelligent, gifted artist who deserves to be recognized and remembered as a one-of-a-kind artist and human being.
JAMES HUTCHISON
What was your process like working on the play together and what do you think are the key elements that make for a successful writing partnership?
CAROLINE
I think complementary strengths are important. I’m obviously not from Jamaica like Claude McKay is in the play and Maria is. Maria brings her knowledge of French as I am sadly unilingual. Maria is also a great editor. When I am creating plays in my head form and from can often look the same on the page.
MARIA
It was indeed a very stimulating, interesting process for both of us. We brainstormed together, wrote scenes individually then compared the writing and chose sections that best conveyed what we wished to express. We argued, we laughed, we fought to convince the other person of the merit of our ideas. For me, the most important elements that made for our successful partnership were the respect and trust that I have for Caroline’s extensive knowledge and experience as a playwright. She has written numerous award-winning plays, she is also a dramaturg, a critic, and a playwriting instructor. In fact, she was my playwriting instructor and has done the dramaturgy on all my plays.
JAMES
There’s a note in the script before the play begins where you say, “Selma Burke lived from 1900 to 1995 which is approximately 49,932,000 minutes – here imagined are 90 of them.” I loved that because it’s a humorous observation that illustrates the challenge of trying to tell a life story in the span of a play. So, how do you do that? How do you go about distilling the essence of a person’s life into an evening of theatre?
Selma Hortense Burke with her relief plaque of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. From the Archives of American Art Federal Art Project, Photographic Division Collection.
MARIA
We wanted to demonstrate some very salient points about Selma: how gifted an artist she was, her determination to succeed as a sculptor despite having been born Black, poor, and female in the southern US. The obstacles she faced, and the triumphs and accolades that she garnered, the people she knew, including a veritable Who’s Who of the Harlem Renaissance, presidents, and artist she studied with in Europe, the remarkable events that she witnessed, participated in and chronicled of the tempestuous era that was the 20th century. We wanted to do so dramatically but also with humour.
CAROLINE
It’s all about peaks and valleys. I always tell my playwriting students you want to see characters on their best days and their worst days not a Wednesday.
JAMES
One aspect of the play that works really well that you mentioned is that you have actors on stage being the art – the sculptures – that Selma creates. It’s an effective and theatrical way to bring the art alive and to tell Selma’s story. Tell me about how you came up with that idea and what it adds to the play.
CAROLINE
Having her work come to life is very important. In plays there are three types of conflict – person vs person, person vs environment, and person vs self. In Shakespeare’s time characters had soliloquies to express internal conflict. Today people who speak out loud to themselves are either on the phone with earbuds or mentally unwell. So, her relationship with her art is a mechanism to show internal conflict. Secondly, we so often see plays on the stage that could be screenplays or done in other media like TV – I wanted the play to be theatrical. What theatre does really well – is theatre.
MARIA
Caroline had the brilliant idea to have actors portray the artwork and other inanimate objects. This idea is not only dramatic, but as the audience will see, hilarious at times.
Christopher Clare, Norma Lewis, and Heather Pattengale in the Theatre Calgary – ATP Production of Selma Burke. Photo: Trudie Lee.
JAMES
As you got to know Selma from doing your research and writing your play what sort of person was she do you think and what do you think her hopes would be in regards to her legacy and the art she created during her lifetime?
MARIA
She wanted, I believe, to be remembered as an African American artist who created important works and who wanted to uplift her people though her art.
CAROLINE
I think she had a strong vision for her work and the confidence to pull it off – her art speaks for itself. The language of her art is deep and rich – I’m totally in love with her.
JAMES
A couple of the topics touched on in the play are artistic freedom and censorship. Artistic freedom is defined by the UN as “the freedom to imagine, create and distribute diverse cultural expressions free of government censorship, political interference or the pressures of non-state actors.” In Canada the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms protects artistic expression. And yet in many countries artists are not free to express opinions that differ from those in power and these days there’s the new phenomena of the online mob attacking artists and their work if it doesn’t agree with their particular point of view. The idea isn’t to engage in an exchange and to challenge the art. The idea seems to be to stop the artist and their work. What are your own thoughts about artistic freedom and the kinds of censorship we’re seeing in the world today and what does that mean for the world in which we live? Why is art and artistic freedom important?
CAROLINE
The play is topical because firstly the struggle to create art is always an issue in hard economic times. More importantly the play is about not only those who get to create art but who has the right to destroy it. In Victoria BC two plays have been shut down, one before opening and one mid run. This is outrageous. It used to be the right that censored artist work now it is the left.
MARIA
We both find this trend alarming and offensive. It stymes creativity and will have artists second-guessing their ideas and their work. Unfortunately, today everyone with a computer, cell phone or tablet can disseminate their ideas to a wide audience no matter how unpleasant they may be and find receptive audiences who go along just to be provoking. Unfortunately, both of us have noticed that this kind of behaviour is not limited to right-leaning people or groups, the left, it seems, wants in on it too.
Christopher Hunt and Norma Lewis in the Theatre Calgary – ATP Production of Selma Burke. Photo: Trudie Lee.
JAMES
A script is words on a page. It takes actors to bring the story to life. A director to guide it. A set designer and costume designer and sound designer to build the world of the play. Tell me a little bit about the cast and crew that’s been assembled to tell the story of Selma Burke and what they bring to the story.
MARIA
There are four actors Norma Lewis, Christopher Clare, Heather Pattengale and Christopher Hunt. All very talented Calgarians. Between them they play over 55 characters, art pieces, inanimate objects and even a plaster-of-Paris leg. The director is Delicia Turner Sonnenberg who hails from California and the stage manager is Meredith Johnson. Javier Vilalta is the movement and choreography coordinator. There are of course many other brilliant, artistic crew members who are creating magic in the background to allow this play to shine.
CAROLINE
We are so lucky to have Delicia as our director. Besides a phenomenal cast the designers are great especially Hanne Loosen who has sculped our set and Adejoké Taiwo who sculpted our costumes.
Heather Pattengale, Christopher Hunt, and Norma Lewis in the Theatre Calgary – ATP Production of Selma Burke. Photo: Trudie Lee.
JAMES
Every artist needs their champions. Someone who believes in and loves their work. So, I’m curious to know who has supported you in the making of your art?
MARIA
We have been supported by every artist at Theatre Calgary and especially the Artistic Director of Theatre Calgary Stafford Arima who has taken an artistic risk on this new piece of art.
CAROLINE
No artist is an island. In addition to what Maria said, I think it’s important to recognize the support that we get from friends and family. A play is such an abstract concept before all of the thousands of hours it takes to realize it on the stage. In the early stages it’s very fragile. Every play starts with the thought “Maybe I could write about that….” Every human has the impetus to make art whether it’s a painting, a garden, or a rebuilt motorcycle… it’s the leap into follow-through that’s difficult. I am grateful that my friends and family have supported me for decades through all of the downs, more downs and the occasional up!
JAMES
Having a production on the professional stage is certainly one of those ups and definitely something to celebrate. Who should come to see the play? Is it a play for everyone?
CAROLINE
No, art cannot possibly be for everyone, that’s part of what makes it valuable. Art which is created as mass production is not art. Everyone has their own set of unique tastes in art. This play is for adults who are curious and love to be entertained in the theatre, in the dark with other aficionados. It’s for people who like me get a thrill out of live theatre and love visual art as well.
MARIA
This play is for audiences who enjoy innovative, fascinating theatre with a big dollop of humour mixed in with theatricality.
***
Audiences can catch Selma Burke at the Martha Cohen Theatre in the Performing Arts Centre until Saturday, April 27th. An ASL-interpreted performance and an Audio Description performance is scheduled for Wednesday, April 24th at 7:30 pm and a Relaxed Environment Performance is scheduled for Thursday, April 25th at 7:30 pm. Tickets are just $39.00 and are available at the Box Office or online through Theatre Calgary or Alberta Theatre Projects.
Lauren Brotman in the Vertigo Theatre Production of The Girl on the Train. Photo Tim Nguyen.
Rachel Watson wakes up one morning from a drunken blackout with a gash across her forehead, her hands covered in blood, and no memory of the night before. Adding to the mystery is the unexplained disappearance of Megan Hipwell a woman whose life Rachel has been obsessing over and observing as she travels by train to and from work every day.
Not content to let the police and Detective Inspector Gaskill handle things Rachel begins her own investigation into the mystery while she desperately tries to remember that night and figure out what happened. Add to the mix Megan’s husband Scott Hipwell and Megan’s therapist Kamal Abdic and then throw in Rachel’s own ex husband Tom Watson and his new wife Anna Watson and there are plenty of secrets to be revealed and several suspects to uncover in this exciting and tension-filled thriller.
Jack Grinhaus Artistic Director Vertigo Theatre Photo by Dahlia Katz
I sat down with Jack Grinhaus the Artistic Director of Vertigo Theatre and the director of The Girl on the Train to talk with him about the show, the importance of trust in the rehearsal hall, and what Vertigo Theatre has planned for their 2024/25 Theatre Season.
JAMES HUTCHISON
So, Jack, Vertigo Theatre is producing The Girl on the Train adapted for the stage by Rachel Wagstaff and Duncan Abel based on the best-selling novel by Paula Hawkins and the Dreamworks film which came out in 2016. How did this particular play land a spot in your season?
JACK GRINHAUS
It was a great book that I read and adored a number of years back and the play is written very much in the thriller mode – which I really enjoyed. I love the idea of a strong female lead. I love that there’s a truth about women in the world and how they are perceived. I thought the issues around alcoholism and memory were really intriguing subject matter to deal with. And the play is also highly entertaining and challenging because you’re trying to tell this story that’s flipping through different times and spaces. So, to me, it felt like a story audiences would get behind but it’s also the kind of work I’m interested in which is very much that fast-paced thriller that I think Vertigo’s been moving towards.
JAMES
You talked about the novel and the challenge always is how do you tell the story in a different medium. How does the play convey the story but still manage to capture the essence of the novel?
JACK
The novel takes the view of all three women. So, you have chapters from Anna, Megan, and Rachel and each chapter kind of overlaps. So, you’re seeing all three women through their own interpretation of their experiences whereas the play focuses on Rachel’s story and Megan and Anna’s stories are told through the eyes and the memory of the other people telling their version of events.
So, when Megan is confessing to having an affair to her husband Scott, she’s cruel and vicious and mean about it because of how he remembers it. He remembers it in that way and in this way, Megan becomes more of an enigma. There isn’t one version of Megan. We see four to five different versions of Megan. We see her how her therapist Kamal sees her. How Scott sees her. How Tom sees her. And how Rachel sees her as sort of this fantasy character.
Adaptations are really about finding a way to distill the book’s ethos into the play and finding a way so that the important tenants of the book and the story and characters are retained in a way that makes sure the book’s main thrust is still present and existing but in a format that is contracted and shrunk.
JAMES
The film boasts an outstanding cast including one of my favourite actors Emily Blunt who was up for an Oscar this year for her role in Oppenheimer. Your own cast that you’ve assembled for this production is outstanding with many Vertigo favourites bringing the story to life. You’ve got Lauren Brotman playing Rachel Watson, Filsan Dualeh playing Megan Hipwell, Tyrell Crews as Tom Watson, Stafford Perry as Scott Hipwell, Jamie Konchak as Detective Inspector Gaskill, Mike Tan as Kamal Abdic, and Anna Cummer as Anna Watson. Tell me a little bit about this cast and what qualities each actor brings to their roles.
JACK
Lauren who plays Rachel is my wife and we’ve worked together for a number of years and Lauren has an extraordinary facilitation with emotion. She’s able to capture emotion in multiple ways. She can go from screaming to laughing to crying in the span of a second or two. And she’s able to make the character of Rachel much more affable because the Rachel character if not done well can come across as this irritating self-absorbed narcissist who’s getting involved in something she shouldn’t get into. But because Lauren is capable of giving us a much more authentic and nuanced experience, she brings complexity and truth to Rachel.
When it comes to someone like Ty and Stafford, they’re both well-known in the community and they’re both strong male counterparts to Rachel. And in this story, they have the opportunity to support Rachel but they also both provide a bit of danger. Ty has played the bad guy a lot and he’s the sweetest guy so he can play a sweet guy but then flip that switch.
And Stafford is someone who feels almost like a little boy in a man’s body. And Scott is like that. He’s just this guy who gets thrown into this situation and he says, “You know five minutes ago I was just a guy with a mortgage and a wife and suddenly now I’m a circus attraction.” And he’s not good at that.
Anna Cummer who plays Anna in the play is so wonderfully idiosyncratic in the way that she prepares as a human and as an actor and as an artist. She’s a seasoned actor – a strong actor – who can give us that neurosis, jealousy, and fear that the Anna character has.
Jamie and Mike are just excellent rocks. You know whenever you cast a company of actors you need a couple of rocks in the company who hold down the fort because we have Rachel and Anna and Scott all emotionally up here so the key to an ensemble is to have two people that are emotionally down here.
And then Filsan brings this beautiful youth and enigma. She’s the youngest person in the company. The one with the newer experience in theatre comparative to the other actors who have maybe ten or fifteen years on her. So that innocence is kind of Meghan in a way, right?
So, they each have qualities that are really within the characterization and a lot of that came up in the audition process and right away we went, “Ah, you embody this character in this way as a person naturally.” And then as a group I needed really strong actors because of the nuanced performances necessary for it to be a believable piece of theatre.
JAMES
You mentioned that your wife Lauren is in the show and that you’ve worked with your wife over the years and I’m curious to know how do you enjoy that professional relationship and how do you maintain a successful personal relationship?
JACK
I don’t know how it is for other people, but we’ve just always been very similar on how the art is done. We can battle in the rehearsal hall, and I know that she’s going to try and do the best out of what she can get from the character, and she knows that I’m only going to try and get the best out of her. But at the end of the workday, we go home and leave it alone. And if someone starts talking about the work at home the other will say let’s wait for the rehearsal. And because I think we see art in the same way the end game is always the same and, in that way, it means we’ll never actually fight because we know we’re both trying to reach the same goal.
Filsan Dualeh and Stafford Perry in the Vertigo Theatre Production of The Girl on the Train. Photo Tim Nguyen.
JAMES
From what you’re saying I’m taking that trust is a huge part of your relationship with your wife but let’s expand that out to talk about how important is trust in the rehearsal room and putting on a production.
JACK
It’s critical. I always say as a director I need to win the room in the first five minutes of the first rehearsal. Because if I don’t win the trust of that team – if they don’t believe that I can lead the ship – then I’m going to lose them and once you lose the room it’s very hard to get it back.
And so, I like to come in very well prepared and also come in with a great sensitivity to the understanding of the actor process and let them know that I’m strong and I’m here to support their journey. I’m happy to have discussions about things and if I’m curt or I cut you off it’s only because part of my job is about time management, and I have to keep things moving.
So, I’m very clear upfront about the rules of the game. People know I’m the leader of the team, but it doesn’t mean that your voice is not needed wanted or justified and if there’s time to have conversations we will. So, I’m really clear on my vision and the idea I have for the show so that they can buy in. And the key to building trust in that room is about supporting each other and giving them a place where they feel they can work safely.
JAMES
So, let’s say I have a friend this weekend who says I don’t know what to do and I say there’s Vertigo Theatre’s production The Girl on the Train. What should I tell them? Why should they go see it? What’s the hook?
JACK
I think it’s a gripping, exhilarating, crime thriller experience and we all love that storyline. And because you’re following this journey through the eyes of the unreliable narrator there are red herrings and that’s a bit of a puzzle and it’s also highly theatrical in its presentation. The writing and the acting are naturalistic, but the set and the projections are much more expressionistic and metaphoric, so I think it feels very epic in scope. So, if you want a really great experience, you can come out and have a drink and have a conversation with some of your friends and see something that is not only theatrical it’s cinematic in style and it’s a great thriller with great acting.
Lauren Brotman and Jamie Konchak in the Vertigo Theatre Production of The Girl on the Train. Photo Tim Nguyen.
JAMES
Since you mentioned cinematic a couple of weeks ago the Oscars came out and I’ve seen a few awesome films that were nominated this year like American Fiction which just blew me away and The Holdovers which I loved. And on the weekend, I saw Past Lives and that devastated me. Which totally surprised me. But for me out of the films I’ve seen so far, I think the one I like best is The Holdovers. Did you have a favourite out of the films that you’ve seen and were nominated this year?
JACK
I loved Oppenheimer. I really did. I found myself really drawn to it. I mean I love Christopher Nolan the director and I love the work that he does. The performances weren’t necessarily very deep emotional experiences but I’m a big history buff and I love the storytelling and the way it was shot and even though it was a longer film it didn’t feel like it. It didn’t drag at any point for me. I was in it the whole time. I just wish I’d seen it in the movie theatre and not at home because it feels so epic and I would have loved to have been in the cinema for that one.
JAMES
I saw an interview with Jeffrey Wright who was in American Fiction, and he said when he’s making the work he doesn’t think about awards but afterwards awards bring recognition to the work and if they’re going to hand out awards anyway why not hand them out to him. And that made me laugh. So, I’m curious about your thoughts. We have the Betty’s coming up which are our local theatre awards. What are your thoughts about placing artists in competition with each other and that whole idea of awarding work?
JACK
There are many layers to that question. With film and TV when you win an award it can actually bolster awareness about the film and the work helping it to grow but usually a play is completed by the time it gets an award so I’ve always felt that awards are really valuable for young artists who are coming up and it can give them some stature. It’s kind of like good reviews. Those things can bolster grant writing potential and maybe even opportunities for work and so I’ve always thought awards are really great for young people.
I’m also curious about the idea that does a work of art only become great if it’s publicly lauded or can a work of art still be great even without that? You think of some of the greatest artists in history people hated for years and years and years and then suddenly twenty, thirty, fifty, a hundred years later their works are being lauded.
I think it’s valuable in it’s a way for communities to get together and to at least acknowledge each other and that’s great but we could also just have a big party at the end of the year – a big theatre party and have a nice dinner together and just celebrate each other in a way without necessarily having to say you’re the best of the best you know.
When Connie Chung was interviewing Marlon Brando she said, “You know you’re considered the greatest actor of all time.” And Brando said, “Why do we always have to deal with absolutes? Why does it always have to be somebody is the best? Somebody is the worst. Can’t you just attune yourself to a thing and be one of the people who does that.”
JAMES
So, last year you gave me a little sneak peak about next season, and I was wondering what do you have planned for the 2024/25 theatre season at Vertigo?
JACK
Well, it’s about turning the page and I always build seasons that are feeling the zeitgeist of the day in a way and trying to understand where we are. And I think even though people would argue the pandemic isn’t over we are certainly past the most fearful stage of it where we just didn’t know anything, and we were all just guessing. And I think we’re in a place now where we have a better understanding that helps us reflect on ourselves and look at that time and think about who we are today.
So, for me – turning the page – are stories about people who are doing exactly that. They’re reflecting on the past and figuring out what are we going to do now in the future. And so, all of the plays live in that ethos a bit. And we also want to provide opportunities for audiences to have a great time next year. It’s still a hard time in the real world so why not enjoy the entertainment that we can provide. And we’ve got four premieres this coming year. So, lots of new plays.
We start the season with The Woman in Black which is a ghost story and just closed in the UK after nearly thirty-five years and over 13,000 performances since 1989. And we were the first phone call to say can we have it because they kept it on moratorium for a number of years – not allowing anyone to produce it. And it’s about Arthur Kipps looking back on his past to try and understand what happened to his family. So, starting off with something like that around Halloween is lots of fun.
Then there’s the Canadian premiere of Murder on the Links which is a new version of a Christie Poirot – which everybody loves with six actors playing thirty roles. That’s exciting. It’s nostalgic with the way we love those chestnuts that time of year. It’s the holiday season. People want nostalgia. They want to look back a little bit and see those things and it’s a great story right.
We have the Canadian premiere of Deadly Murder. Deadly Murder is a dark deep psychological thriller. Very uncomfortable. Very cat and mouse. It’s that thing where you lock two or three people in a room and you see what happens. And it’s the old Hitchcock thing. It’s not scary to find out there’s a bomb in the room. It’s scary to find out there’s a bomb in the room that’s going off in five minutes and now what?
Then we have the world premiere of a new play called A Killing at La Cucina which is about a food critic who dies at a restaurant called Fate where one in a thousand people are fed poison and they go there because of that. And we’re introducing this new super detective who might very well be the next Poirot named Lucia Dante who investigates this fast-paced and intense mystery along with her AI colleague Isabella.
And we close the season with the Canadian premiere of The DaVinci Code which you know is nearing a hundred million copies in sale. It’s been about twenty-odd years since the book came out and I don’t think there’s a person who hasn’t at least heard of it. And I think that audiences are looking for things that they can recognize, and I think DaVinci Code is definitely one that is an exciting piece that is adapted by the same people who did The Girl on a Train, so it’s got that fast pace and that excitement in a treasure hunt adventure that goes all across Europe.
How are we going to do that?
We’re not going to have Europe all over the stage but that’s the beauty of theatre we’re going to use the set design and maybe the projections and the sound and the way that the lighting is set to create those environments where the audience goes – Yes you are in a Piazza in Milan. I see it. I see it all. Right. You’re in the Louvre. I totally take it we’re in Paris. So, I think those challenges – you know a big ten-person or eleven-person cast and a big show to crown the season – are the kinds of things Vertigo is excited about moving into.
On September 16th, 2023, friends, family, and members of the Alberta arts community gathered in Medicine Hat to celebrate this year’s recipients of The Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Distinguished Artist Awards. This year’s recipients include playwright and theatre artist Mieko Ouchi, film and theatre performer Michelle Thrush, and film animators Wendy Tilby & Amanda Forbis.
Chair of the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Awards Arlene Strom said, “Albertans can be proud of the contributions of these Distinguished Artists who have pushed the boundaries of art to reflect indigenous identity and expression, present a more inclusive and diverse view of Alberta’s history, and highlight the art of film animation in Alberta and worldwide. Each has contributed immeasurably to the development of the province’s artists, arts communities and expanding art disciplines.”
L to R: Wendy Tilby, Amanda Forbis, Her Honour Salma Lakhani, Mieko Ouchi, Michelle Thrush, Photo Credit Randy Feere
Her Honour, the Honourable Salma Lakhani, Lieutenant Governor of Alberta said, “The women receiving the Distinguished Artist Award this year have offered important contributions to the arts in Canada. We have all been granted the opportunity, through their work, to learn and grow in our understanding of the human condition. Artists such as these are essential to the lifeblood of our communities, and we are truly fortunate to have them as cultural leaders in their respective disciplines, in our province and our country as a whole.”
I contacted Michelle Thrush as well as Wendy Tilby and Amanda Forbis to talk with them about their work and creative process. You can read those interviews by following the links above. I also spoke with Mieko Ouchi who is a theatre and film director, screenwriter, dramaturg, playwright and a passionate champion for new play development. She is also a fierce advocate for accessibility, inclusivity, diversity and equity across all ranges of artistic output. In our conversation we talked about her approach to storytelling, how she works as a dramaturge to help other artists bring their work to the stage, and what it means to be recognized for her work by receiving The Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Award.
JAMES HUTCHISON
You have a big body of work now and I wonder when you look back at that has your approach to telling stories grown and changed over the years?
MIEKO OUCHI
I think as an artist you do grow and change as you write more, and you create more, but I also feel like there’s a heart that always remains the same. And maybe this was best illustrated quite a few years ago when Red Deer College commissioned me to write a play for a group of students. I pitched a couple of new ideas and then I said, “There’s this play that I started writing in grade eleven about the DaDa Art movement and I did some workshops with some professional theatres, but it was never finished, and I’d love to go back and finish that play as an adult.” And that was the project they chose.
And I went back and read this draft of the play that I’d written when I was seventeen and the wild thing is there were lots of things obviously, I had to change and fix but there was a way of writing – of turning a phrase – an approach to text – that remains to this day – and I recognized my voice in that script.
And right now the thing I feel like I’m growing in most is learning to build empathy for all my characters, and I think my goal is continually to make them more than 2D characters and to make them very complex people that actors will have to really dig into and figure out and audiences will too. Because to me those are the most interesting characters for myself as an audience member.
The Citadel Theatre’s production of The Silver Arrow (2018) written by Mieko Ouchi and featuring Natasha Mumba, April Banigan and Lara Arabian. Photo by David Cooper
JAMES
I think those types of characters are the most relatable because they are the most human because we are so complex and grey. And how often have we done something and then said to ourselves, “That’s so unlike me. Why did I do that?”
MIEKO
That’s right. We recognize that people don’t fit neatly into boxes – that they do things impulsively. They do things against their better judgment or in spite of themselves all the time. And I think theatre is such a beautiful place to explore those impulses.
JAMES
As a playwright you bring new works to life, but you also work as a dramaturge and director assisting other artists to bring their work to the stage. What are some of the important elements you feel are needed to help workshop and develop a new play?
MIEKO
I really see my job in those roles as being like a doula or a midwife. So, you’re in the room. You’re highly connected to the event – to the people – but you’re also a little bit separate and you’re there to help, encourage, and support the person who is giving birth to the new play.
So, I feel like I’m there as an encourager. I’m there as someone with a lot of experience to say, “Here are some things I’ve noticed in the past when we’ve made these kinds of theatrical decisions.” You know someone who knows a little bit more about technical theatre and how theatre is put together and can help playwrights who might not have a background in that. I’m really kind of a sounding board and another set of eyes to say, “I really noticed this. Did you notice that?” Or “This really landed on me this way today.” Just some information for the playwright to take in.
Playwright/performer Mieko Ouchi in a reading of Hiro Kanagawa’s ‘Forgiveness’ at the 2019 Banff Playwrights Lab. Photo by Jessica Wittman.
I always think it’s not up to me to fix the play. I hate the word fixing plays because the play’s not broken. We’re just continually digging out new layers and things that we want to explore. And it’s not for me to write the play. I’m there to help the playwright find the best form of the play that they can find and that they can write.
And also, in that sense of a doula I want the experience to be a positive one. So, I think I’m also there to make sure the process is a safe and comfortable and a pleasurable experience to go through because it can be stressful. Just like birth. You’re there to make it be the best and most happy place it can be.
JAMES
You mentioned creating a safe space and I understand that but sometimes we’re dealing with plays that are asking difficult and complex questions and so we have to be open to uncomfortable discussions and exploring possibilities. How do you create a room that is open to discussion and yet is respectful and safe?
MIEKO
I think transparency is really helpful. Just being very transparent about those things and talking about them in advance and to say, “You know we’re coming up on this scene that’s really challenging and there’s a lot of content in there that might challenge us in personal ways.” So, you just give people a heads up and say, “If this brings up feelings and thoughts that are unexpected or that take over in a way that you weren’t hoping they would – just come and let me know and we can take a break.” Everyone has a heads up and there’s an open conversation.
And I think there are other artists now that we can invite into the room. There are fight choreographers. There are intimacy co-ordinators. And there are other people we can bring in who have the tools to help us. So, I think that’s been a really great evolution and it has made those things less like – let’s wing it and hope for the best to having a bit more structure and having conversations around it. I find when people have that space then things stay nice and calm, and we figure it out step by step, and everybody feels more comfortable.
JAMES
You’ve talked about your play The Red Priest and you’ve called it a very transformational experience. And I understand that it came into being because of Catalyst Theatre and they had commissioned some writers – you among them – to write short six-minute pieces. And you wrote something called Eight Ways to Say Goodbye. And afterwards you started working on expanding it because it had a great response.
And then Ron Jenkins made you playwright in residence – even though you’d never actually written a finished play – because he believed in you. And you ended up finishing the play, and it was nominated for a Governor General Award, and it won the Carol Bolt Award for Drama from The Playwrights Guild of Canada, and if you’re going to write a first play that’s a pretty auspicious beginning. So how did writing that play, winning that recognition, and having people believe in you transform your view of yourself as an artist?
Ashley Wright and Jamie Konchak in the ATP 2014 Production of The Red Priest (Eight Ways to Say Goodbye) by Mieko Ouchi. Photo Leah Hennel Calgary Herald
MIEKO
Well, I think one of the key things is I was so extraordinarily lucky to have Ron recognize me so early as a writer and to encourage me before I had that belief in myself. He believed in me before I believed in me. And there was something about the passion that he brought by saying, “I know you can do this. You have a voice. You just have to be brave enough to let it out,” that got me over the finish line.
He encouraged me to take a risk because it was a very personal story. From the outside you won’t know that. But I’d just gone through a really really heartbreaking relationship breakup in my life and that is very much imbued in the play even though the play’s not in any way autobiographical. A lot of the emotional feelings of what happened are in that play. He encouraged me to let that be there. And I think the lesson that I learned from that play with the recognition that it received was that the moments that people all brought to me afterwards – like audience members would say, “Oh, this moment is the moment that meant the most to me,” were all things that were true. They were emotionally true. There was a core of it that had happened to me, and I was revealing something very very honest. And I think to learn that lesson that early as a writer was an incredible gift because it taught me that when I was truthful people connected.
JAMES
How much do you think drama then is exploring our emotional response to the world?
MIEKO
I think it’s everything. I think that’s exactly what it is. Theatre just gives us this incredible chance to explore feelings that you might not have fully explored in real life where we don’t have a chance to say that to our parent or to our partner or to our child, but on stage we can kind of enact that.
Augusto Boal said, “Theatre is a rehearsal for change.” And I believe that too. It’s a chance to try out things that haven’t happened yet or to say, “What would happen if I put this scenario into a play?” So, for me, it’s been an incredible chance to explore not necessarily autobiographical things but emotionally things that I’ve been through or are thinking about.
JAMES
And then people who have experienced that same emotion even though the context might be different can relate to it.
MIEKO
Yeah.
JAMES
I’ve heard other artists talk about the more specific you make it the more universal it becomes.
MIEKO
One hundred percent. I’ve felt that totally. I really did feel that. And it was very exciting because at the same time that I was having this experience I was also working as a filmmaker and making documentaries. Initially, they were about my family and very biographical and even autobiographical types of projects. And so, I think I was in a world where I was trying to find truth. Whatever, that meant to me and to bring that forward. And that recognition really said, “You’re on the right track. Be brave. You’re onto something. Just keep going.”
The Citadel Theatre’s production of The Silver Arrow (2018) written by Mieko Ouchi. Photo by David Cooper
JAMES
You mentioned you went back to a play you wrote when you were seventeen and it seems to me all the writers I know have a drawer full of unfinished work. Sometimes we hit a wall and other projects become priorities and I’m curious about those unfinished projects. Do they go quietly into the drawer? Do they protest? Do they whisper to you? Do they remain dormant? When do you open that drawer and take them out and look at them again and work on them?
MIEKO
Those dormant plays – they’re just kind of asleep right now. They’re having a long nap – at the moment. Yeah, I have a couple. And I think they have to find their right time where I feel mentally ready to go back and explore them.
Meilie Ng as Lily in the 2011 ATP Production of Nisei Blue by Miecho Ouchi.
I have a project that premiered at ATP called Nisei Blue which was a noir detective story. And I felt like I didn’t quite get to the heart of it by the end of that production. It was a very fraught time because my father had just passed away before we started rehearsals. And my mind wasn’t fully hitting on all cylinders, and I wasn’t able to get to the heart of it because of everything going on in my life. So, now I’ve actually started a process of adapting that play into a novel and I feel like I am very slowly archaeologically getting there through a different medium. Sometimes it’s about digging into a play at a different time theatrically or maybe it’s approaching it through a different entry point.
JAMES
So now you’re exploring writing a novel — how is that? Fun? Exciting? What have you learned? Where are you at with that?
MIEKO
Oh, my gosh. So, when I started it was terrifying but also it was weirdly exciting because I thought, “I don’t know anything about this. So, who cares? Throw all the rules out the window. I don’t feel beholden to any rules or any lessons because I haven’t had any yet other than being an avid reader and knowing what I like to read. I don’t know any of the things that we’re supposed to know as a novelist. So, I’m just going to start writing the story from my heart — the way I kind of wrote The Red Priest” And there’s just something exciting to be at the very beginning of a learning process. To be at the bottom of this giant mountain looking up at the peaks and the great writers.
And I’m really intrigued by the interior voice. That’s something this novel has let me dig into with this character that I was never able to share with the audience in a stage production. I think my main character in Nisei Blue is a character with a really rich interior world and so writing a novel has really opened up the story for me because I’m able to share what’s running through his mind. And that’s been exciting. That’s been a totally fresh take on it. And it feels right. It feels like a good way to tell the story.
The Citadel Theatre’s production of Pride and Prejudice (2023), directed by Mieko Ouchi and featuring Morgan Yamada, Nadien Chu, Ben Elliott, Beth Graham and Gianna Vacirca. Photo by Nanc Price.
JAMES
This year there’s been a lot of chat about artificial intelligence, and I believe we’re on the edge of a really big disruption in science, business, and technology. And I don’t know what that looks like, and I don’t know if anyone really does but as an artist I was curious about your thoughts about AI and what sort of impact you think – positive or negative – it might have on the arts and the work you create.
MIEKO
Well, I think as a writer there’s a part of it where my heart just sinks at the thought of it. Because I believe in that human journey of struggling to find the path through writing and to find the path to expression. And to allow a computer-generated draft to be hacked out kind of hurts my soul a little bit as a writer, to be honest. But I suppose there might be some places where it is useful. There’s just something to me about the struggle to figure out the path of the story or the play that’s essential to its final shape and its humanity. And I know that some of the things that I’ve seen that have been AI generated that have been in the voice of Chekov or Shakespeare are kind of like gobbledegook.
As writers, we sometimes have this filler dialogue when we’re struggling and you have one person say, “Hello.” And the other person says, “Hi. Why are you looking at me that way?” And they say, “I don’t know. Why are you looking at me that way?” And nothing’s actually happening. We’re just going back and forth. It’s like we’re getting the rusty water out through the pipes until the clear water comes through and you get to the heart of a scene. And I sometimes feel that AI writing is a bit like that rusty water. It’s filler. It doesn’t really have that human drive and that soul that we need for writing to be compelling.
JAMES
There you go. Art is the exploration of the human soul.
MIEKO
That’s great. I love that.
Medal Presentation L to R: Arlene Strom, Chair Lg Arts Awards Foundation Board, Distinguished Artist Mieko Ouchi, Her Honour Salma Lakhani, Photo Credit Randy Feere
JAMES
So, my last question is about you receiving the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Award and I was wondering what the actual evening was like for you where everyone gathered to honour the recipients and what does it mean to you as an artist to be recognized for your work and receive a Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Award?
MIEKO
Well, it was such a surprise to find out I was receiving the award. It was really just a kind of a heart-stopping moment to hear Kathy Classen on the other end of the phone when she called and told me. I couldn’t quite believe it. And going to Medicine Hat was a wonderful experience.
All of the recipients were able to bring friends and family members along and it really felt like a family kind of weekend. And they rolled out the red carpet for us. They put on this beautiful art festival at the centre with kids doing art. We had our event and then we had a street party with a concert headed up by none other than Hawksley Workman who I worked with on a production of my play The Silver Arrow. He wrote the music for it at the Citadel. They didn’t know that when they set it up but to have Hawksley there was like the cherry on top of the cake.
That night felt like such a beautiful recognition of Alberta and all the people who have supported these distinguished artists to help them get to where they are. So many people talked about the mentors they had along the way. The people who supported them. Fellow artists. Community members. Teachers. Family members. So, it really did feel like a celebration of all that it is to be an Alberta artist and to be someone that has chosen to come here and work or to remain here and work and there’s just something so beautiful about having that connection to Alberta.
L to R: Clint Lawrence, Mieko Ouchi, Michelle Thrush, Amanda Forbis, Wendy Tilby, Photo Credit Randy Feere
And everybody spoke about that and I think back to my earliest days being a student at Artstrek and having my first tiny little play workshopped at ATP and having Ronnie Burkett as my set designer and Kathy Eberle my high school drama teacher helping me submit my play for that program. And you know Marilyn Potts has been a supporter since way back and then you know Bob White and Dianne Goodman – and all the folks at ATP – John Murrell and so many other folks in this province.
And then all the folks when I came to Edmonton who supported me. You know Stephen Heatley gave me my first summer job at Theatre Network as a summer student. Ron Jenkins supporting me as a first-time playwright and as a playwright in residence. And then all the way up to now working here at the Citadel with Daryl Cloran as his Associate Artistic Director and his support of me and my writing but also my directing on A-House stages.
He gave me my first A-House directing job and he gave me my first commission for an A-House play with Silver Arrow. You really need those folks encouraging you and, in your corner, making opportunities for you to help you find your path.
And so now I get to have that reversed a little bit and in my job at the Citadel I get to support emerging artists and help them get their first assistant directing job or be a part of the playwright’s lab and help them work on their new plays, and I’m really enjoying being able to pass it along and being an opportunity maker for other artists.
On September 16th, 2023, friends, family, and members of the Alberta arts community gathered in Medicine Hat to celebrate this year’s recipients of The Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Distinguished Artist Awards. This year’s recipients include playwright and theatre artist Mieko Ouchi, film and theatre performer Michelle Thrush and film animators Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby.
Chair of the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Awards Arlene Strom said, “Albertans can be proud of the contributions of these Distinguished Artists who have pushed the boundaries of art to reflect indigenous identity and expression, present a more inclusive and diverse view of Alberta’s history, and highlight the art of film animation in Alberta and worldwide. Each has contributed immeasurably to the development of the province’s artists, arts communities and expanding art disciplines.”
L to R: Clint Lawrence, Mieko Ouchi, Michelle Thrush, Amanda Forbis, Wendy Tilby, Photo Credit Randy Feere
Her Honour, the Honourable Salma Lakhani, Lieutenant Governor of Alberta said, “The women receiving the Distinguished Artist Award this year have offered important contributions to the arts in Canada. We have all been granted the opportunity, through their work, to learn and grow in our understanding of the human condition. Artists such as these are essential to the lifeblood of our communities, and we are truly fortunate to have them as cultural leaders in their respective disciplines, in our province and our country as a whole.”
I contacted Michelle Thrush and Mieko Ouchi to talk with them about their work and creative process. You can read those interviews by following the links above. I also spoke with Wendy Tilby and Amanda Forbis who are celebrated Oscar nominated and award-winning contributors to the art of film animation. Their unique visual style has captured the hearts and imaginations of audiences worldwide in ground-breaking short films that explore themes of human connection, environmentalism, and the fragility of life. In our conversation we talked about how their work has evolved over the years, the relationship between the artist and the audience, and what it means to be recognized for their work by receiving The Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Award.
JAMES HUTCHISON
After thirty-plus years you have created a body of work including the three films you’ve produced together and those are:
When the Day Breaks nominated for an Oscar in 1999 and is a story about a pig living in a large city who witnesses the accidental death of a stranger.
Wild Life which was nominated for an Oscar in 2012 and tells the story about a young remittance man sent from England to Alberta to try ranching in 1909 and who is not in any way prepared for the harsh conditions of prairie life he encounters.
And The Flying Sailor which was up for an Oscar this year and is inspired by the true story of Charles Mayers a sailor who was blown two kilometres through the air and landed naked but alive after the Halifax explosion on December 6, 1917.
So, I’m wondering how have the types of stories and themes you’re interested in evolved over the years. What kind of stories did you tell when you began your careers and what type of stories are you telling now, and do you see any sort of path from that early work to the work you’re doing now?
WENDY TILBY
Well, it’s funny, having completed our third film together we’re only now realizing that they’re really all the same. They have similar themes. Preoccupations. When we’re coming up with an idea we’re not thinking, “Oh, yes – let’s do something along the same lines of the previous one.” In fact, we actually specifically don’t do that. But we have noted, and other people point out, that there is a kind of a common thread that I suppose could be described as connectedness. That’s one theme that keeps emerging. And we do seem to touch on death a lot. We’re not obsessed with death, but death is an element of each of the three films and it seems to be a way to talk about life, or aspects of life. If you look at When the Day Breaks, Wildlife, and The Flying Sailor that idea has just become a little more distilled over the years.
When the Day Breaks Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby
AMANDA FORBIS
I think death is a part of every one of them. In The Day Breaks it was primarily about the unseen and often unappreciated ways in which we’re connected to others. In Wild Life it was more about what happens when that connection is severed. And in The Flying Sailor he seems to me to be going solo. He may be reviewing his life and reviewing his connections but he’s on his own and I’m reminded of the line, “You’re born alone, you live alone, and you die alone.” It’s a very bleak statement but we hope that The Sailor isn’t as bleak as that.
WENDY
The explosion and the near-death experience of the sailor is a way for us to explore, in a nutshell, who he was – which is what often happens in near-death experiences. There is a review of life that many people have written about and so we wanted to get at that question – what is life? Is it our physical selves? We’re made up of bones and cells and vessels, but really what our lives are is a collection of experiences and connections and relationships and memories, all encapsulated in this bag of flesh.
The Flying Sailor Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby
JAMES
You’re talking about connections and earlier today I was thinking about how social media has changed the way we connect to the world just as an individual experience. Have you been pondering social media and these connections between people and has that interested you in any way as something you want to explore in your work?
AMANDA
It certainly interests us on a personal level and on how you navigate it because it changes all the ground rules. I’ll just speak for myself. I sometimes say extremely rude things about other drivers from the safety of my own car, and what social media does is it provides us all with our own cars and everybody feels free to say horrible things to other people.
WENDY
Yes, the trolls come out.
AMANDA
But on the other hand, it is a fantastic connection tool. Even at my darkest moments on Facebook I still like seeing my cousin Barbara on her recumbent cycling trips in Oregon. And so just like every single human endeavour it’s a huge mixed bag. But as to whether that will filter its way into our work remains to be seen.
WENDY
Obviously, we contemplate it in a way that everybody does. We marvel at it and how we are able to connect with people virtually. In our film When the Day Breaks – which was made in the late 90s – connectedness is illustrated by way of the plumbing and wires, the telephone and subway – the vessels that literally connect us in cities. That all looks very quaint now.
When the Day Breaks Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby
AMANDA
I never thought of that but it’s true. It looks totally quaint.
WENDY
How much has changed in a couple of decades is remarkable.
JAMES
I think about the telephone a lot because I remember the family phone. And so the family phone was in the kitchen, and people would call the family. So, I would end up talking to my aunts and my parent’s friends, and when my friends would call my parents would end up talking to my friends. It was more of a community and you touched base with many different people involved with the family because it was a family phone. And that has gone away. Now we have our individual phones and I’ve lost all those unexpected connections to people that just don’t happen anymore.
WENDY
We even had a party line for a while.
AMANDA
Yeah, a party line. That’s a connection you don’t want. It is weird how we’re simultaneously much more disconnected to people and much more connected to them.
The Flying Sailor Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby
JAMES
My next question was about how people access your work now. We have YouTube we have Vimeo we have all these ways for me to access stuff through the internet on my desktop on my home TV. Not that long ago about the only way to see your work was if they ran it before a movie or you sought out the NFB library. Do you think that connection has changed the relationship between the filmmaker, the product, and the audience?
AMANDA
Well, yes. Short NFB films used to seem more precious. Now content feels really disposable. How much do they upload on YouTube every day — it’s astonishing. When we started out you could work in the short-animated film area and if you made a good film it would have a shelf life of at least forty years, and it would be in the pantheon of NFB films, and I’m not even sure that pantheon really exists anymore. So that’s one way in which it’s changed.
And people used to ask, “How do we see your work?” And we’d say, “You can go to the library or you can go to the NFB library or if you’re really lucky you might be able to see it at a theatre or on TV.” And so, it’s really lovely to be able to just direct people straight to your work. And also to have our film, The Flying Sailor, on The New Yorker site brought us a massive audience we hadn’t had before.
So, there are tremendous advantages like that, but then there’s the horrible prospect of people watching the film on their phone. I don’t think there’s any filmmaker that likes to see that happen. A couple of times we’ve had people say. “Oh yeah, I watched it on my phone.” And they don’t say much about it – and then if they happen to see it in a big theatre they’re much more profoundly affected. It’s a totally different experience.
The Flying Sailor Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby
WENDY
And we really struggled with that, particularly with The Flying Sailor, because the sound was mixed in a new technology called Atmos, which is a souped-up Dolby with a lot of speakers. We’re not really fans of a lot of the gimmicks with sound but in this case when you experienced the film in a theatre with Atmos in just the right circumstances, it was fantastic. You felt the sound of the explosion viscerally and not in a gimmicky way. We’ve had to accept that very few people are going to see it that way.
JAMES
So, in theatre ten-minute plays are very popular. And I think ten minutes as a platform lets you break some conventions and look at stories in different ways and I’m wondering in what ways do you think the short film format allows you to explore things differently – to look at different subjects – and topics and to examine story.
WENDY
I think the length is appealing to us as animators because of the way we work. We’re like a little cottage industry. We like to do everything ourselves and there’s a handcrafted quality to what we do. The more people you get involved the more diluted that process is and it’s hard to find ten people to paint the way we paint or to draw the way we draw. And if more people are involved it becomes an assembly line. Animation, no matter how you do it, is onerous – it’s tedious – and it’s going to require a lot of hands the longer it gets. So, feature length animation always looks a little watered down in terms of the technique.
AMANDA
Well not always. It depends on who’s doing it.
WENDY
Well, they’re less idiosyncratic because it’s an assembly line. And also the budgets are such that to get the money needed to make a feature it has to be a money-maker. And what we do at the Film Board is not reliant on it making money. We’re making films as art and there’s no expectation it’s going to turn a profit. And so as a filmmaker and as an artist that’s a…
AMANDA
…gift…
WENDY
… and greatly appealing. So, nobody’s going to be after us about it being popular in that sense. And we like the concision. It’s like a poem or a short story. Everything we put in there is in there is there for a reason because it’s so much work. We wouldn’t put it in there if it wasn’t furthering our story. We’re striving to convey character in as few strokes as possible and that’s challenging and that’s interesting to us.
Wild Life Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby
AMANDA
You come up with an idea for a shot and it has to convey a number of things. You’re trying to pack as much into every shot as you can and then you tweak it so it goes in a slightly different direction and it says more. And then you throw it out. Then you put it back in again. It’s a bit of a puzzle. A creative puzzle. And it’s a lot of fun and that’s something that I don’t think the long form does in the same way.
And as you say it frees you up from conventional dramatic structure. You don’t necessarily have to have a dramatic arc and a climax three-quarters of the way through and then have the character be changed and be a new person at the end of the story. You don’t have to follow those conventional structures because you’re not holding the audience that long, so we’re big fans of the short structure.
WENDY
Short animation is also is also a very rich form of expression. If you go to an animation festival and you see an evening of animation with one film after another it’s almost too much. It’s like too many candies at once because each one is so rich.
Wild Life Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby
JAMES
I’m curious about your thoughts right now in regard to artificial intelligence. We’re just on the cusp of something changing and I’m not looking for any definite answers. But in the six months, it’s just been in the conversation. There are good things and bad things about it just like you mentioned before with social media. What are some of your general thoughts about AI and how do you feel it’s going to influence your work and the future of creation?
WENDY
A friend of ours, Jay Ingram, just published a book called The Future of Us. He was writing about AI just as ChatGPT was coming out – along with other major developments – and he kept having to update it. It was frustrating because even by the publication date the landscape was still changing. And so, it’s one of those things that’s almost impossible to talk about because the ground is shifting beneath our feet.
In our field people are nervous about it. And I think it’s actually more nerve-wracking when you think about it in the context of news and people imitating other people’s likeness or voice. And we work in advertising too and that’s a whole other ball game. I think in advertising it’s going to put a lot of people out of work, particularly in storyboarding or visualizing.
It’s actually a helpful tool because you can ask it to visualize a scene in three dimensions which is helpful for storyboarding and blocking the action. Whether it will replace what we’re doing remains to be seen, but what we’re doing is so specifically aimed at something that’s not AI that I hope that distinction will continue to be appreciated. But I don’t know. It is a little bit frightening and intriguing at the same time.
AMANDA
I think one of the things that bothers me is that since 1830 or whatever we’ve been looking at the extinction of craft. People who craft. Craftsmen. And what Wendy was saying is the people who storyboard and who do previsualization – these people who are deeply committed to that part of filmmaking – they’re out of a job. And that’s regrettable because humans are built to craft, and craftspeople always bring a depth to what they’re doing that cannot be imitated – in the same way that a handmade box is a completely different thing than a box that’s slammed together in a factory.
And then if you consider that we don’t even really understand how AI learns at this point and how it’s producing what it does we can’t really know where it’s going to end or if it’s going to end. And that’s pretty alarming.
So, the thing I have to lean on as an artist and I’m talking about the realm of really great art – that I’m not going to lay claim to – but a really great piece of art takes you somewhere that you didn’t see coming, or makes a point to you that you understand but it comes from way back in the depths of your brain and you recognize the truth of it. I would like to believe that’s beyond AI.
So, I trotted that thought out to our friend Jay and Jay said, “Oh, bullshit.” (laughs) He said, “It’ll get there.” And then I thought, “Well he’s not an artist. I don’t know if he necessarily feels that in the same way as I do.”
WENDY
Well, it brings up so many bigger questions about consciousness and what it is to be human and the big question of whether or not machines will ever get there. We’ve played a little bit with Midjourney and it’s a program where you can tell it to give you an image of a man running down a hallway…
AMANDA
…in the style of Picasso…
WENDY
…carrying a briefcase and see what comes up. And it’s very good at ultra-realism and it’s astonishing really what it does but it’s quite boring. A lot of people would be seduced by it and enraptured by the images that it gives you. We didn’t really like them but we were impressed by it that’s for sure.
L to R: Arlene Strom, Chair Lg Arts Awards Foundation Board, Distinguished Artists Amanda Forbis, Wendy Tilby, Her Honour Salma Lakhani, Photo Credit Randy Feere
JAMES
You’re one of this year’s recipients of the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Awards and so what was that evening like – you know – where everyone gathered to honour the recipients? What sort of weekend was it like and what does it mean to be recognized for your work by receiving that award?
AMANDA
The evening itself was – what’s the right word – it was elegant. It was really a wonderful event, and everybody involved with it did such a great job, and Salma Lakhani was fantastic. I don’t know how to get past saying all these effusive things, but it was a beautiful evening, and it was actually a genuine honour to be there. The whole weekend was really fun.
WENDY
And two dear friends of ours were also there. Part of the award is you are able to honour one other artist. We actually sneaked in with two because there are two of us after all. And they were there and that made it especially fun. It was more fun than the Oscars.
AMANDA
It was more meaningful than the Oscars.
WENDY
And much less stress.
AMANDA
And I don’t think we’ve necessarily been on Alberta’s radar (if I can even say a strange thing like that) so to get that honour at a provincial level and to be declared someone of note in the Alberta Arts scene felt pretty great. Of course, at the Oscars, you talk to lots of people who have interesting things to say about your work and care very deeply about animation, but really that kind of all gets swept aside for the grand pageant and the promotion. But to be nominated for the LG award by somebody in the Arts community and then have it juried by the Arts community is very meaningful. It’s much more meaningful than measuring success by whether or not our film was on a billboard on Sunset Boulevard.
On September 16th, 2023, friends, family, and members of the Alberta arts community gathered in Medicine Hat to celebrate this year’s recipients of The Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Distinguished Artist Awards. This year’s recipients include playwright and theatre artist Mieko Ouchi, film and theatre performer Michelle Thrush and film animators Wendy Tilby & Amanda Forbis.
Chair of the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Awards Arlene Strom said, “Albertans can be proud of the contributions of these Distinguished Artists who have pushed the boundaries of art to reflect Indigenous identity and expression, present a more inclusive and diverse view of Alberta’s history, and highlight the art of film animation in Alberta and worldwide. Each has contributed immeasurably to the development of the province’s artists, arts communities and expanding art disciplines.”
L to R, Arlene Strom, Chair LG Arts Awards Foundation Board, Wendy Tilby, Amanda Forbes, Her Honour Salma Lakhani, Mieko Ouchi, Michelle Thrush, Photo credit Randy Feere
Her Honour, the Honourable Salma Lakhani, Lieutenant Governor of Alberta said, “The women receiving the Distinguished Artist Award this year have offered important contributions to the arts in Canada. We have all been granted the opportunity, through their work, to learn and grow in our understanding of the human condition. Artists such as these are essential to the lifeblood of our communities, and we are truly fortunate to have them as cultural leaders in their respective disciplines, in our province and our country as a whole.”
I contacted Mieko Ouchi as well as Wendy Tilby and Amanda Forbis to talk with them about their work and creative process. You can read those interviews by following the links above. I also spoke with Nehiyaw performing artist Michelle Thrush a multiple award-winning actor whose acting credits include Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, North of 60, Blackstone, Prey, and Bones of Crows. She is also a director, producer, community builder, and one of the founding members and current Artistic Director of the ground-breaking Making Treaty 7 Cultural Society. In our conversation we talked about her career, about her one-woman show Inner Elder, and what it means to be recognized for her work by receiving The Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Award.
JAMES HUTCHISON
Michelle, when you look back over the course of your career and the body of your work as an artist in what ways has it been an intentional journey and in what ways has it been more a road of discovery?
MICHELLE THRUSH
That’s an interesting question because back when I was a kid there were not Indigenous people on television or anywhere really. We weren’t a part of the shows I watched like Little House on the Prairie when I was a kid or if we were it was Italians playing us. It was something that wasn’t in our psyche and so in my little brown girl brain I never thought that I could be an actress or work in the arts.
But I grew up loving pretending and loving imagination and I was always trying to get my friends together and direct shows and put on plays. And then when I was sixteen or seventeen, I met a man named Gordon Tootoosis who along with Tantoo Cardinal, Gary Farmer, Grahame Greene, Augee Schellenberg, Margo Kane, and of course Chief Dan George were all doing little bit roles here and there on film and that was the beginning for Indigenous people. I’d see them and think whoa there’s a real native person and they’d have a line in a movie like Running Brave where Robbie Benson who is Jewish played the actual star of Running Brave who was a Lakota.
And Gordon who was just a beautiful indigenous actor really encouraged me to follow my dreams and he said, “Michelle it’s important that we tell our stories from a place of honesty.” My big goal in life at that time was to be a social worker. And I ended up throwing that aside and just going, “Okay, I’m going to move to Vancouver from Calgary at nineteen and I’m going to try and get an agent and I’m just going to hope and pray that auditions come up.”
So, I did all that. Moved to Vancouver. And it took a few years of working in restaurants before I started to get a few little auditions. And I often say in 1992 Dances With Wolves came out and that’s when things began to open up for us as actors, and I ended up getting into a TV series called North of Sixty, and that was the beginning. And things just kind of fell into place after that.
It’s interesting you mentioned you were looking at being a social worker and I wonder if there are connections between that career and acting. Because social work and sociology look at relationships between people and between people and society and I think an actor has to sensitive towards those kinds of things.
MICHELLE
I think the connection for me was I grew up with two chronic alcoholic parents. And I didn’t realize the trauma that my family had been through because as a kid – and it’s really hard for me to talk about this – but as a child I had so much shame when it came to being an Indigenous person because I related it to the pain and the trauma of my parents and of my grandparents and of my aunts and uncles and everybody else in my family who was alcoholic. And as a child that imagination part for me was about creating these other scenarios that didn’t include violence and all that stuff that comes along with trauma which is a big part of my one-woman show Inner Elder.
Michelle Thrush in her One-Woman Show Inner Elder, Photo Ben Laird
So, when I was a kid, I knew it wasn’t proper that my parents didn’t know how to be parents. I knew it wasn’t proper that they would drink for days and us kids would fend for ourselves. In my brain, I thought if I become a social worker I can create change in this world for children. I can do something that’s going to make sure other Indigenous children don’t have to go through what I went through.
And then I realized through meeting Gordon and getting involved in acting that the power we have as artists can change the world and we wouldn’t have to deal with all the red tape it would take to be a social worker. It was like fast-tracking the ability to create a shift in people’s thinking.
Back then, of course, we didn’t have Truth and Reconciliation. We didn’t realize our families were suffering from this huge history. I just thought that my parents were messed up and I felt a lot of shame because I swore to God that every white kid at my school went home, and their moms would hand them cookies as they walked through the front door, and they had these perfect homes and alcohol didn’t touch white people. That’s how I thought when I was a kid. I thought it was something that was part of who we were as Indigenous people. But then you know obviously I learned that alcoholism touches everybody.
So, that connection between acting and social work was a very strong connection because there was the ability to really affect people’s lives using the arts as opposed to going in and trying to work with the family of Indigenous children. And almost all my work still leans in that direction, you know, trying to create healing. And I always say, “We aren’t in it for Shakespeare. We don’t do what we do to recite Shakespeare. We do what we do to create healing and to contribute to the goodness of our communities and our children.”
Eric Schweig, Darla Contois and Michelle Thrush in the Canadian Drama Television Series Little Bird
JAMES
You mentioned healing and change and you’re one of the founding members and the current Artistic Director of Making Treaty 7 Cultural Society and on your website, it says – “Making Treaty 7 is dedicated to Indigenous artistic expression and the transfer of Indigenous knowledge through story.” So, what are some of the things you feel you’ve accomplished so far and what are some of the plans, goals, and hopes for the future?
MICHELLE
Making Treaty 7 has had this really long history and I’ll just explain a bit of the history about how we began. Michael Greene who was one of the founding members of One Yellow Rabbit and is a beautiful Icon in theatre here in Calgary was a good friend of mine for many years and a huge supporter of the work I did in theatre with Indigenous story. And he was always trying to figure out ways to bring more Indigenous presence into the High Performance Rodeo and whatever else was going on in Calgary.
So, back in 2012 he became the curator of something called Calgary 2012 which was when Calgary became the artistic capital of Canada for a year. He ran that and we put together a committee of about ten of us – Indigenous and non-Indigenous – so we could have an Indigenous presence and we ended up forming a template for what we wanted to do. Part of that was exploring the land and the history here in Southern Alberta and how the land connects us to story. And not a lot of people including us – I’m Cree – my family is from Maple Creek Saskatchewan Treaty 4 but I grew up here in Treaty 7 and I have family who are married into the Blackfoot Confederacy, but we didn’t know much about the treaty.
The Making Treaty 7 production of O’kosi with Garret C. Smith, Mary Rose Cohen, Michelle Thrush, Janine Owlchild, and Dustin Frank. PHOTO: Hidden Story Productions.
So, I didn’t know anything about the treaty and the Blackfoot artists that we brought in didn’t know a lot about the treaty which was signed in September 1877 in Siksika. So, it was a huge learning journey for us, and Micheal ended up writing these big grants and bringing together over a hundred elders from Southern Alberta. And we asked what do you know about Treaty 7? And a lot of their parents and their grandparents were at the Treaty signing and so they opened up this huge vessel for us. And as artists we spent the whole weekend just listening to all these elders talk about the Treaty and the true intention of Treaty 7. And they talked about what life was like leading up to the signing, what life was like on those ten days, and what life was like after the Treaty was signed. What were the repercussions? What happened with the Indian Act. All these things.
And they just filled us up with all this incredible knowledge and we went out to Banff Centre for two weeks. And Micheal asked myself and Blake Brooker to be the directors of the show and I was an actor and a writer on it as well. And we came up with the very first Making Treaty 7 and we had to perform it for the Elders first and get their permission which we did. And it became this huge spectacle of incredible entertainment which brought in all the voices that call Southern Alberta home but was an Indigenously led process.
And since then we’ve been expanding on that and as the Artistic Director my goal is to wake up the stories that belong here. That are a part of this land. And to decolonize theatre and create a safe space for Indigenous people to tell stories of the land and I’m very proud because Making Treaty 7 is doing some really beautiful work.
Bernard Starlight and Quelemia Sparrow in The Making Treaty 7 production of Tara Began’s The Ministry of Grace. Photo Alanna Bluebird
JAMES
You mentioned your own show. You touched on it and I wanted to ask you a little bit about that. It’s called Inner Elder. I saw it when you did it at Lunchbox Theatre and really enjoyed it and thought it was an amazing piece of theatre. And in it you transform into an Elder in the play and it’s moving. It’s funny. What was the genesis of the story and what are some of the highlights of performing that piece?
MICHELLE
So, more than thirty years ago this character started coming through me and she was an old woman and she loved comedy. Her name is Kookum Martha and she was very much a clown in a lot of ways. And so I started to do comedy and she started to be known as an MC of various Indigenous conferences and concerts in Canada. And I hosted the Inspire Awards on CBC a few years back and we did some things with Kookum on there. And in 2018 Ann Connors was the curator of the High Performance Rodeo and she had seen my Kookum character and Anne’s like, “Why don’t you create a big show and we’ll fund you and we’ll present you for the Rodeo.”
Michelle Thrush as Kookum Martha in Inner Elder at the High Performance Rodeo Photo Elyse Bouvier
And so, I was like how can I do a show in a way that honours the clown of Kookum as well as telling my own story in a way that doesn’t make me a victim. That allows me to sort of flip the script on what it means to grow up in an alcoholic environment and then winning the Gemini for playing a chronic alcoholic on Blackstone which is a show I starred on for many years. And I created a show about learning how to take what’s given to us in life and then turning it into something that works for us.
And when I get into the zone with Kookum she can get wild on stage and I’m like, “Oh my God, did I just hear her say that?” And I tell people when they hire me to do my comedy with Kookum I am not responsible for any marriages that break up because she goes after the white guys all the time. She picks on them and they fall in love with her. It’s a fun character. And I’m a true believer that as artists we channel our energy through us and it’s not about us – it’s about being vulnerable enough to bring that energy through us.
JAMES
That’s part of the magic of theatre I suppose that moment that you’re so fully in the story and the performance that it’s almost not really you.
MICHELLE
Yeah, it’s magic. And it happens in film too. I swear to God on that episode of Blackstone I did where I won the Gemini I stood there on my mark before I heard action and I prayed and called in my grandmothers, and they took over my body and I felt like I was allowing them to work me through that scene. And low and behold I won a Gemini and a whole bunch of other awards but it’s that trust to be able to really zone in taking the focus off of yourself and putting it on the story and then just allowing that energy to come through you. It’s about being vulnerable to the moment of creation.
Tantoo Cardinal as Wilma Stoney and Michelle Thrush as Gail Stoney in Blackstone
JAMES
You know one of the things art can do is help us understand our place in the universe but I’m sort of curious as an artist do you think art provides actual answers or do you think art operates more to provoke us to come up with answers and ask questions.
MICHELLE
I think both. I often say as Indigenous artists that we’re frontline workers. We shine light into places that are dark. And the work that we do is not just about a love story or whatever. The work we do whether it’s in film or in theatre is tough and it sometimes creates huge amounts of triggers for people because what we focus on is bringing to light things that people don’t want to talk about.
And the work that I’ve done through the years and all of us as Indigenous Artists have done through the years is really truly groundbreaking work I think because that’s how you bring healing. I often say if you have a wound and you just continue to cover it all the time with Band-Aids it will never heal. You have to be able to bring the light to allow that wound to heal and I feel that’s what we do as artists – we bring light.
Bones of Crows, Day 2
Ayasew Ooskana Pictures
JAMES
And I think you need multiple stories right? You need many stories. Like you mentioned initially Indigenous actors were getting little bit parts and now we’re seeing shows like Bones of Crows. That’s an epic story. I watched that and I thought it really is an outline for a five-season series. Because it’s massive. Each episode could be ten episodes. But having that story now expands what you can tell in the future, I think.
MICHELLE
Exactly because again, it brought light to something that previously wasn’t lit up. Like that whole history most Canadians don’t understand any of it. Our own people are just beginning to understand what happened in reality and when you do bring light you bring life and then you’re right it just spreads out and it creates more conversations and it gives people permission to be able to discuss those things that were taboo twenty years ago. It’s about expanding consciousness really you know as artists.
I was proud of Bones of Crows. Marie Clements is a dear, dear, friend of mine from years ago. I’ve worked on many of her things and it took her five years to get Bones of Crows to camera. It took a huge team to convince CBC and to get all the funding and it’s a fully Indigenously created, directed, written, acted, performance.
JAMES
So, Artificial Intelligence has exploded onto the scene this year and it’s going to be disruptive in science and art and everything and I am just sitting here going well – this is good – this is bad – so I’ve been asking a few artists and a few friends what are their thoughts about AI. What sort of an impact do you think it’s going to have?
MICHELLE
I don’t know. I feel like I’ve got my head in the sand and I’m trying to avoid talking about AI because it really bugs me. I have so many friends that are all pro AI and how it’s going to change everything and I’m just like, “No, I just want real humans. I have a hard enough time checking out at Safeway with computers” I’m so old school in that way and so I’m sort of in denial about AI and I don’t have a lot to say about it.
JAMES
It’s hard to know what the impacts are going to be.
MICHELLE
It is. Even the SAG strike had a lot to do with AI. And who knows man. They can do a video now of you and change what you’re saying and that scares me.
JAMES
It’s getting difficult to be able to distinguish between the fake and the real. And that can be scary. So, I guess we’ll have to talk about this in five years?
MICHELLE
Exactly.
2023 Distinguished Artist Michelle Thrush with family and friends, Photo credit Randy Feere
JAMES
So, you’re one of the recipients this year of the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Awards and I was wondering what was that evening like for you where everyone gathered to honour the recipients. What sort of evening was it and what does it mean to you to be recognized for the award?
MICHELLE
It was a fun weekend. It was a whole weekend it wasn’t just one evening. The funnest part of it was they did it in Medicine Hat this year and my family comes from Maple Creek which is just forty-five minutes down the number one highway on the Saskatchewan side. So, when I found out I was receiving this amazing award and that it was in Medicine Hat I called everybody – “Everybody’s got to come to this.” So, the highlight of receiving that award was having two or three rows of my family – Indigenous faces out there with all these government officials. And it’s not often that we feel comfortable or welcomed into these types of spaces, right?
JAMES
Right.
MICHELLE
Even just in theatre alone and that’s a big part of my whole agenda is trying to find ways to make sure that Indigenous people feel comfortable in the theatre. It’s the same thing for these types of awards. My cousin got the Chief to come and they did a ceremony with me when I went up on the stage. It’s a beautiful ceremony where they come up to you on both sides and they just wrap you in this blanket. And they did that with a star quilt which is a beautiful handmade style of blanket. And to me that was such a beautiful gesture of honour. I’m glad obviously I got the Lieutenant Governor Award and the gold pin and all that wonderful stuff but to have my family there and to be recognized in that way was also an honour.
L to R: Lori Davis, Michelle Thrush, Chief Rossa Wahobin, Nakaneet First Nation, Chief Rossa Wahobin presented Michelle with a Star Quilt in recognition of her achievements, Photo credit Randy Feere
JAMES
How does it feel to be offering that mentorship now to others because Indigenous artists and young people today can look to you and see somebody who has a successful career?
MICHELLE
I try to stay away from this whole role model thing with Indigenous people. I don’t believe in putting anybody on a pedestal no matter who they are. I think we are all amazing contributors to each others light. But I do understand because when Blackstone came out my whole life shifted. I felt like a lot of my privacy was shifted with my own people because going to Pow Wows and stuff people are always coming up and they’re like, “Oh, my gosh, your character on that show was my mom or my auntie or my grandmother and then they would tell me this whole story of you know alcoholism in their family and how my character gave them permission to be able to discuss that.” And so again as an artist, it’s shining that light onto previous taboo topics and giving people permission to speak about it without shame and to share that load.
JAMES
How do you stay resilient then? Because that sounds like sometimes a heavy burden.
MICHELLE
I don’t know if it’s a burden at all. I think it’s just really a part of our development in this world. There are so many amazing beautiful things happening for Indigenous people right now. Like Reservation Dogs is on and we’ve got people in the NHL. And I remember I was on George Stroumboulopoulos back in the day – The Strombo Show – and I remember mentioning Wab Kinew who was rising up in the political scene and saying you know this is a young man who inspires me and now he’s Premier of Manitoba. And it’s just expanding continuously, and I get hope from seeing our young people. There are so many young people right now that are so resilient, and they are pushing boundaries that I never thought about when I was a teenager or when I was in my early twenties. I see these young people resurrecting language and being proud of who they are and that’s what keeps me going really is just knowing that we’ve got so many incredible young people.
Cambrian Players Present ‘A Christmas Carol’. Directed by Thomas McDonald and starring Gabe Ferrazzo as Ebenezer Scrooge.
The spirit of Christmas is alive and well in Thunder Bay Ontario as the Cambrian Players present my adaptation of A Christmas Carol directed by Thomas McDonald and starring Gabe Ferrazzo as Ebenezer Scrooge. The production runs from November 29th to December 2nd and December 6th to 9th, with a special Matinee Performance and Tea on Sunday, December 3rd at 2 p.m. and a live-streamed performance on December 8th. There’s also a “pay what you may performance” on Thursday, November 30th. Tickets start at just $22.63 and are available online by following this link: The Cambrian Players present A Christmas Carol: Every man has the power to do good.
I contacted Thomas McDonald to talk with him about the Cambrian Players, his love of theatre, and this year’s production of A Christmas Carol.
JAMES HUTCHISON
So, who are the Cambrian Players and what’s their history? Tell me a little bit about the company and its vision and plans for the future.
THOMAS MCDONALD
Cambrian Players is Thunder Bay’s longest-running community theatre group and has been completely volunteer-run since 1949. It’s truly Theatre For the Love of It! Over the past seventy-plus years, Cambrian Players has presented over 200 mainstage plays, numerous Improv shows, and has recently added a Green Room semi-staged play reading series to its offerings. This season we’re producing on our mainstage, your version of A Christmas Carol ~ Every Man Has The Power To Do Good, as well as Charles Way’s adaptation of The Snow Queen, and Anthony Shaffer’s Sleuth.
Cambrian Players is an inclusive volunteer-led, non-profit community theatre organization fostering an appreciation of theatre by producing diverse amateur theatrical productions of the highest quality. We provide training in all aspects of theatrical production both on and offstage; recreational and volunteer opportunities; and affordable entertainment for our members and the community.
Cambrian Players strives to be accessible and a leader in community theatre. Cambrian Players purchased their first home in 2017, a historic building – formerly the Polish Hall on Spring Street. While the building is an incredible new home, it requires retrofitting to be accessible for all our wonderful patrons and volunteers. In advance of our 75th year, we are raising funds to renovate the theatre through a new capital campaign we call Spotlight On Inclusivity, which we hope will make our space physically accessible for all of our patrons.
JAMES
What is it you personally love about theatre? Why do it? What does it provide? What have been some of the magical moments for you as either a director or an actor or as an audience member?
THOMAS
I have been in love with theatre since I was a kid. The first professional show I ever saw was the touring company of Anne of Green Gables from Charlottetown – I know, how Canadian, eh? – and my heart was gone. The idea of escaping to a different world struck me, and I was hooked, and frankly, I still am. As my hubby will tell you, I do a lot of theatre with Cambrian, the College Performing Arts Club, Applauze Productions, and in the past the 10×10 Short Play Festival and during Covid-19 with Come Play With Me Digital Theatre and that love of theatre has never waned.
I work with a lot of amateur performers and people who are new to theatre both on and offstage and I love seeing them come alive and fall in love with the process and ultimately the product. There’s something about seeing their eyes light up and their confidence grow when they get a laugh, or meaningful silence or hear applause just for them the very first time. It provides a home and a chosen family for a lot of folks who, like me, were misfit kids.
As far as magical moments go, I love being surprised in the theatre, seeing a performance that is unexpected, or listening to an actor and realizing you are so caught up in their words that you’re holding your breath. Or feeling tears come to your eyes as you relate to what is happening, or it touches your spirit in a way that you weren’t expecting. However, I still hold on to seeing Anne of Green Gables that first time, and as they sang Ice Cream looking over and seeing my Grandma smile back at me, and knowing we were experiencing that joy together.
Cambrian Players Present ‘A Christmas Carol’. Directed by Thomas McDonald and starring Gabe Ferrazzo as Ebenezer Scrooge.
JAMES
This year you’re producing A Christmas Carol. So, why do you think we keep telling this story? The story of Scrooge. The story of the spirits? Why does it still resonate today?
THOMAS
The story turns 180 this year and still it speaks just as loudly. It’s a redemption story, and who doesn’t love a redemption story? The way you’ve given us Scrooge in this adaptation is very human. He is committed to the life he has chosen, in his mind for all the right reasons. He is “a good man of business”; but not in fact a “good man”. The chances the spirits give him – are to a point – like the choices we make every day. The ways we can do good, but are too busy, too self-involved, too single-minded to see them as what they are – opportunities to better the world we live in. Our Scrooge, Gabe Ferrazzo, says that of all the roles he’s played – Prospero, Shylock, Julius Caesar and more – no role has affected him more personally than Scrooge. A man reflecting on the years behind him, knowing there are fewer years ahead.
Not only the way you have written Scrooge but also the way you’ve written Marley and Scrooge together has given us Marley with more to be redeemed from. The way he isolates Scrooge from all he loves and rewards him for following in his footsteps. The father figures in this version of the story speak to people, Scrooge’s clear struggle with his own father, then being mentored by Fezziwig, then having his head turned by Marley, and then ultimately Scrooge’s relationship with his nephew Fred, and Scrooge’s desire to toughen him for the world are poignant. It’s universal. It’s human. It’s a story for all of us.
JAMES
Every theatre company brings their own vision to telling the story. Tell me a little bit about the vision for this year’s production and the cast you’ve assembled to bring the story to the stage and what magical elements can people look forward to experiencing when they come to see the show.
THOMAS
We are so very blessed to have assembled this talented multi-generational cast. Twenty-five actors play thirty-nine roles – which is a lot for our very small theatre! – ranging in age from 11 to 70+, and ranging in experience have come together to bring your story to life and also provide mentoring and learning opportunities which Cambrian Players sees as the heart of what we do. With so large a cast, we have had to be creative and use all the available space making it a semi-immersive production. We have turned our stage into a world frozen in time, anchored by a huge clock face and a flurry of letters and ledger pages frozen in time.
The idea of Scrooge as a stuck clock came into our minds as we plotted the show and began considering the way Scrooge moves through his world, in straight lines focused on his goals, and it’s not until the spirits intervene that we get circular movement as the clock – or Scrooge’s heart – begins ticking again. We have approached the spirits in an interesting way, but you’ll have to come and see the show or tune in for our virtual production to see it for yourself. There is a real humanity to the show which has been the core of our approach, with period-appropriate costumes, nuanced performances and finding the humour and pathos in the play, we hope to do your play justice and make it something magical for everyone.
Prior to each performance a musical community member will be busking in support of our Spotlight on Inclusivity Campaign and our matinee tea will support the same. We will be doing a relaxed performance in partnership with our friends from Autism Ontario, to present the show in a way that will be safe and welcoming for their members to attend and experience the magic of A Christmas Carol first hand!
JAMES
So, Tom, every year the King gives his Christmas message, and the Prime Minister gives his, the Pope chimes in as well. Politicians, artists, and religious leaders all have their own Christmas messages. What is your Christmas message to your friends and family and the world this holiday season?
THOMAS
I hope that you all find light, love, and strength this holiday season. I hope that you are with those who love you, whether blood or chosen family. I hope that you have an outlet for creativity in your life. I hope that you feel community, and can give back to it. I hope that your heart is light, and you can make peace with that with which you struggle. I hope that you are safe and sheltered, warm and full, cared for and have those to care for. Merry Christmas from Thunder Bay, and from Cambrian Players!
***
A Christmas Carol directed by Thomas McDonald and starring Gabe Ferrazzo as Ebenezer Scrooge runs from November 29th to December 2nd and December 6th to 9th, with a special Matinee Performance and Tea on Sunday, December 3rd at 2pm and a live-streamed performance on December 8th. There’s also a “pay what you may performance” on Thursday, November 30th. Tickets start at just $22.63 and are available online by following this link: The Cambrian Players present A Christmas Carol: Every man has the power to do good.
Cambrian Players Present ‘A Christmas Carol – Every Man has the Power to do Good’ By Charles Dickens Adapted for the stage by James Hutchison Directed by Thomas McDonald.
Our cast features 25 talented local performers both new and familiar to our audiences: Gabe Ferrazzo as Ebenezer Scrooge with Adam Wayne Lyew-Sang, Alex Jecchinis, Andrea Jacobsen, Ariana McLean, Ben Albert, Caden Lear, Chris Jason, Emily Upper, Janis Swanson, Jarin Brown, Jerry Silen, Joelle Krupa, Joshua Mulzer, Joy Haessler, Kenzie Dillon, Matthew Henry, Matthew Jollineau, Pauline Krupa, Penelope Upper-Smith, Richard Pepper, Ruth Currie, Shawna Marshall, Taylor Onski, Wyatt Krupa
Joe Perry in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
The Vertigo Theatre production of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde promises love – betrayal – and murder – and it delivers all three in a highly theatrical production all brought to life by a terrific cast under the artful direction of Javier Vilalta.
Joe Perry takes on the role of the tortured genius in a physically demanding and nightmare-filled performance. Daniel Fong is the voice of reason as Dr. Jekyll’s friend Hastings Lanyon. Grant Tilly plays Gabriel Utterson whose investigations eventually reveal the true relationship between Hyde and Jekyll. And Allison Lynch plays Eleanor Lanyon a smart complex woman who finds herself being drawn towards darkness and obsession.
This is a story of mystery and horror and the lighting, costumes, live music performed by the actors, the towering brick walls, and intermittent fog all add to the growing sense of dread and doom. Nick Lane’s script is faithful to the original story while providing some new and exciting elements. The play works best when there are big bold moments as we follow Jekyll – a man whose desire to provide the world with scientific knowledge – is thwarted by the monstrous pleasure-driven animalistic side of his own humanity.
I contacted Joe Perry to talk with him about the production and the process of bringing this classic tale to the Vertigo stage.
JAMES HUTCHISON
What does Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde say about the light and the darkness that dwells in all of us?
JOE PERRY
It’s really looking at that duality and what happens when desperation and unintended consequences put you in a situation where you have to reconcile your own morals. Dr. Jekyll starts out doing his research looking to leave his mark on humanity but there is this unintended consequence. He feels released physically. Because as Dr. Jekyll he’s trapped in this physically ill body and when he becomes Hyde he’s free. But that freedom has consequences. And now he has to make a choice. Does he move towards that freedom that he gets with Hyde, or does he continue his work with the integrity that he originally intended?
And I also think part of the exploration is that we all have thoughts that are not something we’re proud of or something that we would say out loud, but the repression of that – of its very existence – is not going to make them go away. It’s just going to bottle them up and then they’ll explode out in an animalistic way. I think possibly that’s a bit of what people are afraid of in themselves. And being Hyde gives him this freedom and this release but at a cost to everyone around him and at the cost of his own sanity and at the cost of people’s lives and safety. And yet he can’t not do it because that freedom is so tantalizing.
Daniel Fong, Grant Tilly, and Allison Lynch in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
JAMES
Besides yourself, this production features three other well-known actors to Calgary audiences. There’s Daniel Fong, Allison Lynch, and Grant Tilly. They’re all playing multiple characters in this version of the story. What was the rehearsal process like? What sort of discussions amongst yourselves did you have about Jekyll and Hyde as you brought the story to life?
JOE
Well, our director Javier really challenged us, and we had some conversations about those moral questions that the play was bringing up. And it was a really free and interesting room to be in. I’ve never been in a rehearsal hall like this because Javier works so visually. He has these beautiful stage pictures in his head that he’s putting together. And he sees all these design elements and the four of us are kind of like in this playground made of that but we’re not necessarily seeing all of the elements as he’s seeing them. So, we were able to play and extend in a way that you don’t get to do in a lot of plays.
And I think you see that in a lot of the characters. I think Grant, Allison, and Daniel have transformations as actors on stage as profound as the Jekyll and Hyde transformations. And their characters are just so wonderfully crafted by each of them that it’s really an honour to share the stage with them. They’re people that I have worked with before or I have watched on stage and I have nothing but the utmost respect for them. So, I am just sitting here in full gratitude every day to be able to share the stage with them.
Joe Perry and Daniel Fong in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
Grant Tilly and Joe Perry in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
Grant Tilly, Allison Lynch, Joe Perry and Daniel Fong The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
Daniel Fong and Joe Perry in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
Joe Perry in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
Allison Lynch and Joe Perry in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
Joe Perry and Daniel Fong in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
JAMES
You mentioned that Javier uses a lot of physicality. And the play contains theatrical moments – moments that stick with you – and it’s exciting to see a production embrace that. How did some of those key moments evolve?
JOE
There’s a fight in the play that Javier had seen in his head and we kind of choreographed that together. He knew when he wanted it to go in slow motion and when he wanted it to be an extended, brutal, very theatrical sort of fight sequence. So that was sort of starting from the design first and then putting the movements into what he wanted to do.
But then with something like the first transformation from Jekyll to Hyde, he gave me a framework of where the lights would be and then he let me sort of free flow into it and he’d say, “More. You can go more.”
My favourite bit as an actor and something that I haven’t had the opportunity to do since theatre school is the final shattering of Hyde where it gets really expressionistic in the physicality. That was another bit where Javier told me to, “Just surrender to the physicality. This is not a moment of realism. This is a moment of extension. This is a shattering of the psyche and just surrender to it.”
And being able to do that as an actor is cathartic because you get to extend beyond what you would see in a naturalistic play, or what you would be able to experience in a naturalistic play. So that catharsis was really fun. And Javi had real specific ideas of what these characters would look like and then when he put them over into our hands he was really open to seeing where we were going with them and there was a real give and take and support.
JAMES
How is it to be back on stage and in particular the Vertigo Stage?
JOE
Honestly, it’s just an absolute joy. I was lucky enough to do The Extractionist by Michaela Jeffery here last year. That was the first play I’d done in four years. I mean, it’s my lifeblood. I missed it. I’ve missed it through the pandemic. Stepping away from the stage for that long was never the intention. And the Vertigo audiences are generous and committed. And it’s just a pleasure being able to play these characters on stage. I can’t even really begin to express my gratitude.
JAMES
Jekyll and Hyde are pretty iconic characters in the Western Cannon. They’re pretty well known and played by all sorts of actors in all sorts of adaptions including Spencer Tracey and Lon Chaney during the silent movie era.
JOE
That was one of the first ones I watched.
JAMES
What did you think?
JOE
It was great. Interesting and totally different themes.
JAMES
Yeah, totally. And that’s the neat thing. Do you think maybe part of what makes something a classic is its ability to be flexible in its interpretation?
JOE
Yes. The short answer is yes. The long answer is that this narrative is in almost everything that we watch. It’s Fight Club. It’s The Hulk. Jekyll and Hyde is in almost every movie. It’s in almost every play. Everybody knows Jekyll and Hyde on the macro scale. They know – take a potion and become someone else. It’s The Nutty Professor. And you can explore so many different themes. Nick Lane’s adaptation explores some very specific experiences in his life. Javier’s interpretation of Nick’s adaptation is Javier exploring his own things. And then my acting of Jekyll and Hyde is exploring my own thing. It’s just such a wonderful and rich conduit to explore the human condition because essentially, it’s about the duality of man, which I think is a pretty age-old question in philosophy and art.
Allison Lynch in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Photo Fifth Wall Media
JAMES
There’s a female character Eleanor Lanyon who is new to the story in this adaptation and she seems to have a dual nature in many ways too.
JOE
Yeah, she’s a rich and complex character as well. And the way that Allison portrays Eleanor is super rich and complex. She’s dealing with more than just the potion and the science. She’s dealing with the constraints of a marriage that isn’t fulfilling. She’s dealing with the constraints of the time in society. And this is totally just my own look at that character. But I think she is really struggling with so many different constraints that the men in the play aren’t. We’re doing things for our hubris and honour. She’s doing things for her freedom and her autonomy.
JAMES
So, you got to play Jekyll and Hyde and there are other iconic characters like Hamlet, Poirot, and Sherlock Holmes in the Western canon. Are there other characters – well-known or not – that hold a particular fascination for you that you would like to play?
JOE
I mean, Hamlet is an easy answer. But if we’re going with Shakespeare Prince Hal has had a special part in my heart for a long time. Just an interesting character to me. And I’ve always wanted to do Sam Shepard’s True West with my brother Stafford. But to be honest my passion lies in playing new characters. I love new work. I love working on new plays. I love incepting new characters.
JAMES
What is it that fascinates you about the creation of new work?
JOE
It’s alive. Reprising old work is alive too. You can always look at something through a new lens. But having the ability to take new interesting voices from our communities that are speaking about current contexts and being able to explore that in a way where it’s not going up against an existing benchmark that’s already there or trying to contextualize something from another time into this time I find really exciting. I think there are so many unique interesting Canadian – Calgarian – Albertan voices. And every time I see these new works at any festival or on the larger stages I find it thrilling. Workshopping or acting in a new play in any sort of capacity or a new movie is my passion for sure.
JAMES
That’s where your heart lies, does it?
JOE
Part of it. But it’s always fun to go and see iconic characters. Everybody knows Jekyll and Hyde or Hamlet and the question is how can I authentically bring myself to this role? How can I make it something that’s current and something that’s interesting and something that says something that nobody else could have because so many people have said their own thing with it already? So that’s been a lovely challenge and something I always welcome. And I’m really proud of the work, and I’m really proud of the room, and I’m really proud of all of the people that are involved in this production.
***
VERTIGO THEATRE presents
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde By Robert Louis Stevenson. Adapted by Nick Lane Four actors bring Robert Louis Stevenson’s gothic horror to life.
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde features Joe Perry as Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde, Daniel Fong as Hastings Lanyon, Allison Lynch as Eleanor Lanyon, and Grant Tilly as Gabriel Utterson with Bernardo Pacheco and Tiffany Thomas as Understudies.
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is written by Robert Louis Stevenson and adapted by Nick Lane. Directed by Javier Vilalta, Set Design by Lauren Acheson, Costume Design by Ralamy Kneeshaw, Lighting Design by John Webber, Sound Design, Composition and Musical Direction by Kristin Eveleigh, Dialect Coaching by Laurann Brown, Fight & Intimacy Direction by Brianna Johnston, Stage Management by Laurel Oneil, Ashley Rees and Caaryn Sadoway.
Nathan Schmidt as W.O. Mitchell in the Rosebud Theatre production of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell.
Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell is a joyful, fun, and feel-good night at the theatre all brought to life on the Rosebud Theatre’s Opera House stage in a brilliant performance by Nathan Schmidt.
Based on the works of W.O. Mitchell and penned by his son and daughter-in-law, Orm Mitchell and his wife Barbara, the play weaves together an entertaining and insightful script that travels between Mitchell’s fiction and the story of his life.
Mitchell was a writer, performer, and teacher who is best known for his 1947 novel Who Has Seen the Wind. The novel beautifully captures small-town life and the world as seen through the eyes of a young Brian O’Connal growing up on the Saskatchewan prairie. Mitchell is also known for his Jake and the Kid stories which were popular radio plays during the 1950s. No stranger to the stage himself W.O. Mitchell was a storyteller who performed his one-man shows across Canada and penned several plays for the stage including The Kite, The Devil’s Instrument, and The Black Bonspiel of Wullie MacCrimmon.
I contacted Nathan Schmidt to talk with him about the production and the challenges of performing a one-man show. You can read that interview by following the link above. I also spoke with Orm Mitchell to talk with him about his father’s work and the journey Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell took to reach the stage.
JAMES HUTCHISON
Orm, every literary work takes a journey from idea to finished work. Tell me a little bit about the journey that Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell took to reach the stage.
ORM MITCHELL
Well, it’s a journey that took close to twenty-six years. My father had prostate cancer so his last three or four years were not pleasant. He was in a hospital bed in the family room on the first floor of the house in Calgary and he was withdrawing more and more. And Barb and I wanted to keep him engaged. So, we suggested, why don’t you do a collection of your performance pieces that you’ve done over the years in your one-man shows? And he loved the idea. So that came together in a book called An Evening with W. O. Mitchell.
And as soon as that came out, two people came to us who wanted to use that book and turn some of the pieces into a one-man stage show, but Eric Peterson who they wanted to do the piece said he felt uneasy about doing this while a living author is still around and especially an author who has really put his distinctive stamp on the pieces.
There were other people who came to us over the years, and we were always in the role of acting as script consultants. And it never really got off the ground. So about 2008, Barb and I decided we’re going to write this ourselves. We did a really thorough rewrite and we sent it out to Theater Calgary and a few other places, but no one bit. So, we put it in a drawer and forgot about it.
Then during COVID, we realized that theatres were going through a very rough time. They couldn’t have an audience. There was no money coming in. And we’ve been really fond of Rosebud Theatre because they’ve produced W.O. Mitchell’s plays. They did Jake and the Kid, and they did The Kite twice, and we’d heard how wonderful Nathan Schmidt was playing Daddy Sherry in The Kite.
And so, I wrote to Morris Ertman the artistic director of Rosebud and said, “Look, Barb and I were thinking of making a donation to you guys because we know all theatres are struggling and we came up with what might be a better idea. Why don’t you do this one-man show and use Nathan Schmidt because we hear he’s been wonderful. And it’s inexpensive. It’s one person. You can stream it. And you might be able to get some income from streaming it during the COVID years.”
And I never heard back from Morris until about a year ago, July. And he said, “Orm, could you send me that script? I seem to have lost it.” And so, I sent it to him, and we saw him last November and he said, “I have decided to do this show and to use Nathan Schmidt.” It was close to twenty-six years from when the idea first came up to finally getting it on the stage.
Nathan Schmidt as W.O. Mitchell in the Rosebud Theatre production of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell.
Nathan Schmidt as W.O. Mitchell in the Rosebud Theatre production of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell.
Nathan Schmidt as W.O. Mitchell in the Rosebud Theatre production of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell.
Nathan Schmidt as W.O. Mitchell in the Rosebud Theatre production of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell.
Nathan Schmidt as W.O. Mitchell in the Rosebud Theatre production of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell.
JAMES
You call the play Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell and I’m curious about the choice of title. Why did you choose Magic Lies? What’s the significance behind that?
ORM
That’s one of his favourite phrases. And he always used to say when people asked him about his creative process and his stories that every bit is the truth. What he meant by that was that he was a very observant watcher of the world, and he would pick up bits and pieces of people or details of landscape.
And I remember he used to tell his writers in his writing groups that you have to draw on your own autobiographical experience and find images, bits and pieces of sensuous detail, and you have to appeal to your reader’s sense of smell, taste, and touch. You’ve got to make them see something that you are describing. You’ve got to make your reader smell what it is that you are describing. All of those sensuous details that he collects and puts together to form and create that illusion of reality draw the reader into the story. So, every bit is the truth, but the whole thing is a lie. A magic lie. It’s a magic lie because it’s the catalyst that helps a reader explore consciously and unconsciously various universal human truths.
Morris Ertman and Orm Mitchell Opening Weekend Talk Back of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell
W.O. Mitchell with Orm Mitchell at Trent University – Honorary Degree – 1985
W.O. Mitchell and Merna at Mabel Lake Cottage 1984
Mitchell Family Vacation
W.O. Mitchell reading at Trent University
Orm and Barb Mitchell celebrating the publication of their W.O. biography with his mother’s favourite champagne, Piper Heidsieck’s.
Orm and Barb Mitchell at Chapters Book Signing
Orm Mitchell fishing the Highwood River in 2018
Barbara and Orm Mitchell
Barbara and Orm Mitchell
W.O. Mitchell
JAMES
What do you think your father’s reactions and musings would be if he was able to see himself portrayed on stage?
ORM
My father was a master at timing, and he really admired an actor who had that sense of timing. You know someone who pauses in the right places and lets the audience into the story with those pauses. He was once told by someone when he was doing an acting role, “Bill, you’re overdoing it. It’s like an orange. Don’t squeeze all the juice out of the orange. Leave some there for the audience.” It’s a lovely metaphor for an actor who knows not to overdo it. And Nathan was just so good at that, and my father would have admired that.
JAMES
It takes a lot of discipline to put in the pause.
ORM
It’s a wonderful storytelling technique. And Nathan did this beautifully. In the story in which the boys blow up Melvin’s Grandpa in the back house when the dynamite goes off Nathan as W. O. stops and looks at the audience and takes out his snuffbox and he takes a piece of snuff and the audience is hanging there. Okay, the dynamite has gone off. The old man is in the back house. What happens next? And it is a lovely long pause, and then Nathan as W.O. looks at the audience and says, “Let me tell you something about dynamite.” And the audience just loved it.
The other thing my father would have admired was Nathan the actor has to make the role his own. He can’t just mimic my father. He uses bits and pieces of W.O. but at the same time the storytelling if it’s going to be effective – if it’s really going to zing with the audience – Nathan has to make it his own. By opening night he had made it his own and as the show goes on that role will more and more become his, and I think my father would have recognized that and would have admired that very much.
75th Anniversary Edition of Who Has Seen the Wind by W.O. Mitchell. Illustrated by William Kurelek. Available from Freehand Books.
JAMES
Let’s talk a little bit about Who Has Seen the Wind your father’s best-known work. It was published in 1947 and was an immediate success. And at the time the Montreal Gazette said, “When a star is born in any field of Canadian fiction it is an exciting event…Here in this deeply moving story of a Western Canadian boy, his folk and his country, emerges a writer whose insight, humanity and technical skill have given the simple elements of birth and death, of the inconspicuous lives of common man etched against the bleak western landscape, the imprint of significance and value.” Why do you think this book and this story resonate so deeply with its readers?
ORM
Here you have a book that is set in the prairies during the dirty thirties. It’s very specific. One of the things that critics in Canada used to say was, “Who cares about Canada? Who cares about a story where Bill and Molly meet in Winnipeg and fall in love?” W.O. was one of the first, if not the first writer, to put the Saskatchewan Prairie and the Alberta foothills on the literary map.
But then the corollary to that is you want people whether they are in London England, or Australia, or China or wherever they are to read that story, and you want that story to come alive for them. It’s what Alistair MacLeod used to say, “When you write your stories about a specific place and characters you want to make them travel.” I love that line. You want to make them travel. Who Has Seen the Wind sure as hell travelled. It has been translated into Chinese. And it has been translated into South Korean. It has sold over a million copies in Canada, and I think it will continue to travel.
One of the reasons why I think it travelled is that my father was wonderful in understanding the child’s world. He was really good with kids, and he managed in Who Has Seen the Wind to get inside the head of a kid in a way that has rarely been done. He manages to dramatize how Brian a four – five – six – seven – up to eleven-year-old looks at the world – and that’s universal. He managed to create characters and in particular Brian looking at the world in a way that resonates with readers all over the world.
Saint Sammy and Brian: Saint Sammy calling down the wrath of the Lord to smite Bent Candy’s new red barn. Illustration by William Kurelek from the 75th Anniversary Edition of Who Has Seen the Wind. Available from Freehand Books.
JAMES
So, I got the 75th-anniversary edition of Who Has Seen the Wind out of the Calgary library and it’s a very beautiful book. It came out last year. Has beautiful illustrations. The typeset. The cover. The paper that you use. It’s really just a work of art. And I came across a passage early in the book where he’s describing Brian lying in his bed trying to fall asleep.
“For a long time he had lain listening to the night noises that stole out of the dark to him. Distant he had heard the sound of grown up voices casual in the silence, welling up to almost spilling over, then subsiding. The cuckoo clock had poked the stillness nine times; the house cracked its knuckles, the night wind stirring through the leaves of the poplar just outside his room on the third floor strengthening in its intensity until it was wild at his screen.”
And that’s just beautiful and that reminded me of my own childhood and being in bed listening to the sounds of the house before falling asleep, and I know this is probably an impossible task, but do you have a favourite passage? Is there a passage you could select from your father’s writing that is for you perfect?
ORM
There are so many. I was thinking about Who Has Seen the Wind and the last three pages of Who Has Seen the Wind – is a wonderful prose poem. And in fact, when he was writing that he had his Bible open at Ecclesiastes and he was trying to catch the rhythms and pauses and repetitions of Ecclesiastics. It’s a very significant passage for me because I can remember standing in the High River Cemetery when we buried my father and that was the passage that I read from as part of our family ceremony.
But there’s one passage from How I Spent My Summer Holidays which is kind of a companion novel to Who Has Seen the Wind. You can imagine Brian, now grown up and going into adolescence. How I Spent My Summer Holidays at the human level is a much darker book than Who Has Seen the Wind. But there’s a scene right at the beginning where Hugh the narrator, who’s in his 70s, has gone back to his prairie town roots and he says,
“As I walked from Government Road toward the Little Souris, the wind and the grasshoppers and the very smell of the prairie itself – grass cured under the August Sun, with the subtle menthol of sage – worked nostalgic magic on me. These were the same bannering gophers suddenly stopping up into tent-pegs, the same stilting killdeer dragging her wing ahead of me to lure me away from her young; this was the same sun fierce on my vulnerable and mortal head. Now and as a child I walked out here to ultimate emptiness, and gazed to no sight destination at all. Here was the melodramatic part of the earth’s skin that had stained me during my litmus years, fixing my inner and outer perspective, dictating the terms of the fragile identity contract I would have with my self for the rest of my life.”
And I just love that prose that is so rich in detail. And my sense of the three most significant novels that he wrote are Who Has Seen the Wind his first novel, The Vanishing Point, and How I Spent My Summer Holidays. Those are books that will last, I think.
W.O. Mitchell
JAMES
I know it’s hard to sum up the life of a man in a short interview, after all, you and Barb have written a two-volume biography about your father. But how would you describe your father, the writer, the public person? And then how would you describe W.O. Mitchell, the man – your father?
ORM
The main thing he wanted to write was a story set in the real world and to create characters that interact in a very realistic way in order to explore larger human truths. But he wasn’t just a writer who typed stories that would appear in print. He also was an oral storyteller, and he gave his one-man shows – and he always used to call them one-man shows – because he didn’t give the usual literary readings where someone is introduced and then he reads a passage and takes questions from the audience. He gave one-man shows where he went on stage and he performed. And even something like his Jake and the Kid series on CBC – those are oral narratives. He really drew on the oral storytelling traditions of Western Canada.
Hugh, Willa, and Orm along with their mother Merna, Demi Tasse their minature poodle, and Beau their Chesapeake Bay Retriever listen to W.O. tell a story. High River 1956
And I suppose that’s one of the reasons why both Barb and I have this feeling – not an obligation – but this feeling that we want to continue that legacy of my father’s writing, but also both Barb and I were very moved on opening night because we felt we had achieved the goal of continuing his legacy as a storyteller on the stage as well.
As a private person, as a father, he really knew the child’s world. Not only did he know how to write about children, but he also knew how to react with them, and how to interact with them. And my brother Hugh and my sister Willa and I were blessed with a father who was sympathetic and who knew that child’s world, and he played with us, and he was really a wonderful parent to have and to grow up with.
Nathan Schmidt as W.O. Mitchell in the Rosebud Theatre production of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell.
Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell is a joyful, fun, and feel-good night at the theatre all brought to life on the Rosebud Theatre’s Opera House stage in a brilliant performance by Nathan Schmidt.
Based on the works of W.O. Mitchell and penned by his son and daughter-in-law, Orm and Barbara Mitchell, the play weaves together an entertaining and insightful script that travels between Mitchell’s fiction and the story of his life.
Mitchell was a writer, performer, and teacher who is best known for his 1947 novel Who Has Seen the Wind. The novel beautifully captures small-town life and the world as seen through the eyes of a young Brian O’Connal growing up on the Saskatchewan prairie. Mitchell is also known for his Jake and the Kid stories which were popular radio plays during the 1950s. No stranger to the stage himself W.O. Mitchell was a storyteller who performed his one-man shows across Canada and penned several plays for the stage including The Kite, The Devil’s Instrument, and The Black Bonspiel of Wullie MacCrimmon.
I contacted Orm Mitchell to talk with him about his father’s work and the journey Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell took to reach the stage. You can read that interview by following the link above. I also spoke with Nathan Schmidt to talk with him about the production and the challenges of performing a one-man show.
JAMES HUTCHISON
What was your reaction when you first read the script and knew you were going to be playing W.O. Mitchell?
NATHAN SCHMIDT
I’ve done a couple of W.O. Mitchell shows. I’ve been in Jake and the Kid, and I’ve done The Kite twice, so lots about the script felt familiar, and I had experienced W.O.’s writing. So, I knew that he was funny, but the scarier thing was I thought, “Oh, man, I’ve got to play this real person who people know.” Whereas Daddy Sherry or Jake – those are characters. Those live in the imagination. It’s a different thing when somebody lives in the real world. And Morris Ertman our Artistic Director would say “When we open Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell all the family is going to come and watch the show.” And I was like, “Oh, my gosh. I’m going to have to play the father or the grandparent of these people in the audience.” So that was the most intimidating thing.
Morris Ertman and Orm Mitchell Opening Weekend Talk Back of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell
Barbara and Orm Mitchell
Orm and Barbara Mitchell at Chapters Book Signing
75th Anniversary Edition of Who Has Seen the Wind by W.O. Mitchell. Illustrated by William Kurelek. Available from Freehand Books.
W.O. Mitchell
JAMES
Even a one-man show needs a director. For this show, it was Karen Johnson-Diamond. How did the two of you work on the play? What was that process like?
NATHAN
As an actor, Karen has done a number of W.O. Mitchell plays. I think she had been in Who Has Seen the Wind and Jake the Kid and she had a love of W.O. Mitchell as well. So, she came in with a lot of love for the stories and a lot of knowledge about W.O. Mitchell. But she’s also just a wonderfully comedic actor and performer, and so her sense of comedy and her sense of how this thing would play was really just spot on. And all of the direction that she offered to me was really helpful to clarify the joke and to clarify how the show moves forward.
What she really loved about the structure of the play is how it follows him through his life from like six to seven when he loses his father – to ten to eleven – to high school – all the way through to Daddy Sherry and misses a bit of the middle, because as W.O. Mitchell says in the story – he’s kind of focused on the first part of life and the end part of life. Those are the concentrated bits that it seemed his imagination was drawn to.
So, we would do a lot of work with linking. Linking how this story moved to this story and then to this story. And W.O Mitchell had a way of making it feel like it was all sort of off the cuff, but in the end, it was all very planned, and he was coming back to stuff he’d set up earlier and he had really worked out how the punchlines worked and how the ideas and stories came around. So, we did a lot of work like that to try and get into the head of the writer and the storyteller. It was a great process. She was wonderful.
The Kite – Rosebud Theatre – 2019
The Sunset Limited – Rosebud Theatre – 2016
Freud’s Last Session – Rosebud Theatre – 2014
Doubt, A Parable – Rosebud Theatre – 2014
Fiddler on the Roof – Rosebud Theatre – 2008
Man of La Mancha – Rosebud Theatre – 2009
The Spitfire Grill – Rosebud Theatre – 2017
A Christmas Carol – Rosebud Theatre – 2020 & 2021
The Diary of Adam & Eve – Rosebud Theatre – 2011
Oliver! – Rosebud Theatre – 2010
Damien – Rosebud Theatre – 2018
The Drawer Boy – Rosebud Theatre – 2006
May & Joe – Rosebud Theatre – 2011
The Secret Garden – Rosebud Theatre – 2010
Jake and the Kid: Prairie Seasons – Rosebud Theatre – 2011
Underneath the Lintel – Rosebud Theatre Production – 2013
The Kite – Rosebud Theatre – 2005
The Lion, The Witch And the Wardrobe – Rosebud Theatre – 2014
An Inspector Calls – Rosebud Theatre – 2016
Stones In His Pockets – Rosebud Theatre – 2022
The Trip to Bountiful – Rosebud Theatre – 2023
Cotton Patch Gospell – Rosebud Theatre – 2013
It’s a Wonderful Life: The Radio Play – Rosebud Theatre – 2013
Nathan Schmidt as W.O. Mitchell in the Rosebud Theatre production of Magic Lies: An Evening with W.O. Mitchell.
JAMES
This is your 50th performance on the Rosebud stage and so I’m wondering when you look back on all the parts you’ve played do some of those characters have a lasting influence on you in any way?
NATHAN
Yeah, there’s a couple that really stick – that I learned a lot about myself from and sometimes that’s uncomfortable. I was in Doubt by John Patrick Shanley and that was a really uncomfortable play for me to be in. It taught me a lot about who I am when I’m helpless and so those things kind of stick. The character teaches you something about who you really are because your instincts as a person are either in conflict with the character or line up with the character in ways that are surprising. That was a big one. I did a Cormac McCarthy play called The Sunset Limited and that was also another hard one.
As W.O. Mitchell says, those characters marked me. And I think the thing I love most is the relationship that characters create with the audience. One of my favourite things I ever got to do was The Drawer Boy by Michael Healey. I was playing one of the farmers. In The Drawer Boy, this young kid comes to hang out at the farm and find out about these two old guys. It was an older character, and I was younger, and I was really worried because it didn’t feel real. I didn’t feel in it, and I was really up in my head about it and nervous, you know, that I was a fraud or I was going to fail, and then one of the things that actually cinched me into it was – I don’t remember how it came about – but maybe it was offered by Morris and he said, “Here’s a toothpick. Just chew on the toothpick for the whole show.”
And so, I would have these toothpicks in the show, and I just chewed on this toothpick the whole time, and it helped me feel like that cranky grumpy guy in that story. Well, you know, a bit later – after the run, I got a little blue index card in the mail and on it was glued a toothpick, and on the backside, this person had written, “We attended the show and your Morgan was like seeing my grandfather alive again, and he passed away in 80 whatever.” She was so clear that she had an experience of seeing her grandpa that day, and I was able to offer her unbeknownst to me an experience like that. And so, you know that play holds a special place for me too because of that story. It’s quite a lovely play.
W.O. Mitchell reading at Trent University
JAMES
W.O. Mitchell perfected the technique of appearing not to be performing. To be spontaneous and to appear as if he was telling the story for the first time. So, he’d draw his audience in through deliberate mistakes or confusion, he’d say, “Oh, did I tell you? Or I forgot to mention.” And in your performance, you totally capture that sense of spontaneous and unrehearsed storytelling. So much so that my son heard a couple of ladies leaving the theatre and they enjoyed the show, but they remarked that they were surprised that you seemed to lose your place and had to go back. Which means to them it was completely natural. So, to me you’re one of those actors who really achieves a feeling of reality in your performance no matter what part you’re playing. That’s a long speil just to ask, how do you do that?
NATHAN
Morris said this the other day and I think it’s true. I think when we get curious about people then we kind of fall in love with them. And I think it’s true of the characters we play, and I think in the rehearsal there is something about just falling in love with the reality of whoever they are and whatever drives them. You’ve heard it said that one of the actor’s adages is don’t judge the character even if you’re a villain. Villains are motivated by what they believe to be true or good or at least by what is in their best interests.
And I think the actor’s job overall – and W.O. Mitchell did this in spades too – is to collect people. To watch people and to observe what they do and why they do it without judgment and to allow them to steep into you and to become part of you and the energy of being them and how they participate in the world. It’s partly that and it’s partly just having fun. It’s just fun to try and make it as real as possible.
Saint Sammy and Brian: Saint Sammy calling down the wrath of the Lord to smite Bent Candy’s new red barn. Illustration by William Kurelek from the 75th Anniversary Edition of Who Has Seen the Wind. Available from Freehand Books.
JAMES
You know, it’s interesting that you mentioned fun, and I think W.O. Mitchell is able to capture the feeling of childhood and play and imagination and curiosity. What are your thoughts about the child within you in terms of that living in you as an actor?
NATHAN
I have three kids now and when I watch the four-year-old and two-year-old play for them every game is real. They just believe it. My little guy just thinks he’s the Flash. He thinks he’s the fastest thing going and so he’ll be like, “Watch this Dad.” And he will just run through and he’s like, “You didn’t even see me, did you.” And I remember as a kid wearing my North Star Velcro runners and those are the fastest shoes, and I can run so fast in my North Star shoes because they’ve got shooting stars on them and that makes my feet fast. And I believed it to be true.
Our adult logic brains know it’s not true, but it could be in your imagination. And the audience does the same thing. They all know they’re not seeing W.O. Mitchell. Karen said, “Nobody’s coming to see the actual W.O. Mitchell. They’re coming to have an experience of W.O. Mitchell and if we deliver it in a way that doesn’t give them any reason to doubt too much – then the audience will let their imagination see me as him.” And so, you know, I think our imagination is a remarkable and amazing gift, and I think as creatives we may access it a little bit more at times, but it’s there for everyone. They just have to access it.
JAMES
This is storytelling at its simplest and best. One actor. Minimal set. What is it like for you as a performer doing a one-man show? How do you create that connection with your audience?
NATHAN
I’ve done a number of one-person shows now and it gets to be a lonely room as opposed to having one or two other people or a group of actors to hang out with. It can be lonely in that way, but the audience really becomes the best friend of the show. And especially in something like this where it’s such a direct address. The whole point of the show is the relationship of the storyteller to the audience. At the end of the play, W.O. says that this is the thing – the energy of a live audience responding to a story – that’s where it’s at.
And for me, that is where it’s at. I love that relationship. I’m always curious about it and excited about it. Sometimes puzzled by it, you know, sometimes it lands really well, and people just explode with laughter and sometimes they don’t, and you can’t put together all of why that is, but people get to be who they are and so it’s a really lovely sort of bond that I’ve come to love about performing. And that’s the amazing thing about storytelling in theatre. And at the end of the play he says,
“You know…the energy of death lies behind everything I’ve written—it’s death and solitude that justify story telling. Telling stories draws us human aliens together in the mortal family, uniting us against the heart of darkness, defending us against the terror of being human. Writing’s a lonely act—like playing a dart game with the lights out. You have no idea whether your darts are coming anywhere near the bull’s-eye. But this (open handed gesture to audience)…this dilutes the darkness, gives me what all stage performers love—that immediate thrust of a live audience responding to story magic. (Looking out to audience, grins). We were flying tonight!”
Bronwyn Steinberg Artistic Director of Lunchbox Theatre – Photo by David Leyes
Bronwyn Steinberg the Artistic Director of Lunchbox Theatre is a passionate community builder focused on making theatre an inclusive gathering space where stories are shared that celebrate the diversity of human experience.
“The thing is humans are storytellers and stories are the best way I know to help people understand different people’s perspectives, and if you do understand different perspectives that will – at least in my dreams and in my hopes – help lead to more equity and egalitarian workings in the world and something that is less dominated by money and power.”
I sat down with Bronwyn a few weeks ago to talk with her about Bertolt Brecht, the exciting new season at Lunchbox, and her passion for theatre.
JAMES HUTCHISON
Since you were six years of age, you’ve been sitting in on rehearsals because your mother was a drama teacher at the time and she’s now a professor at the University of Calgary. Tell me a little bit about growing up in the rehearsal hall, and how you think that relates to your life’s path.
BRONWYN STEINBERG
Some of my earliest memories are of going with my mom to the rehearsal hall, and I remember she was directing Grease, the musical. And she was very serious about her rehearsal hall. The kids had to be in character all the time. Even if they weren’t on stage. And I just thought it was fun. I just thought it was normal that you grew up and you did plays. And it wasn’t just seeing my mom in rehearsal. She also took me to plays my whole life, and as soon as I had opportunities to do after-school plays I always did them, and so the magic of theatre was always there, and I got to see so many shows, and I just always knew it was something I wanted to do.
The Great Canadian Theatre Company’s 2018 production of Drowning Girls. Directed by Bronwyn Steinberg.
The Great Canadian Theatre Company’s 2018 production of Drowning Girls. Directed by Bronwyn Steinberg.
Bronwyn Steinberg embarking on a life in the theatre.
Bronwyn Steinberg rehearsing Pirate Jenny’s Circus for the 2009 Ottawa Fringe. Devised creation based on the works of Bertolt Brecht.
Bronwyn Steinberg rehearsing Pirate Jenny’s Circus for the 2009 Ottawa Fringe. Devised creation based on the works of Bertolt Brecht.
Breath of Kings: Rebellion at Stratford. Directed by Weyni Mengesha with Assistant Director Bronwyn Steinberg
JAMES
Would you attribute any of your style of directing to having spent those early years watching your mother direct?
BRONWYN
I don’t know if I can pinpoint anything. I have certainly learned a lot from my mom both from just watching the way that she works and the way she is in the world and the way she is as my mom because she’s an incredibly powerful personality and super smart and very strong. I’ve learned how to step into a leadership role when needed, but also I’ve learned how to let someone else lead. And I think that serves me as a director. So, when I need to really take charge in the room I can, but I’m also really good at stepping back and empowering other folks to also have leadership within the space.
JAMES
I was doing some research and I came across a couple of past interviews where you mentioned you studied Bertolt Brecht.1 Brecht was an innovative voice in the theatre, and he was very unconventional in his thinking and approach. He believed theatre should challenge an audience and their view of the world not simply be entertainment. So, what is it about Brecht’s approach to theatre that you find exciting, and what influence has it had on your own work?
BRONWYN
It comes back to my folks and my background and who I am in the world, thanks to my family. My parents Shirley and Joe were always very politically engaged and very much on the left end of the spectrum. And their approach to education was deeply influenced by Paulo Freire2 and critical pedagogy. I am not a Freire scholar, nor would I call myself a Brecht scholar either but what’s interesting is both Freire and Brecht are coming out of similar times even though they are in very different places in the world. They’re coming out of a need to speak against powerful regimes and speak up for the common person. And there was always a feeling observing my parents growing up that felt like whatever I did, whether it was in theatre or otherwise, I had to have a sense of social justice and doing good in the world, and speaking up for people or finding a way to help empower people whose voices haven’t been heard.
And so, when I started learning about Brecht, I found he was one of those theatre creators who took a political philosophy that kind of inherently made sense to me and figured out a way to play with it on stage in his practice. The thing is humans are storytellers and stories are the best way I know to help people understand different people’s perspectives, and if you do understand different perspectives that will – at least in my dreams and in my hopes – help lead to more equity and egalitarian workings in the world and something that is less dominated by money and power.
Lincoln Centre Theatre 2018 Directors Lab. Photograph Joan Marcus
JAMES
So, you’ve gotten experience early in your career at the Lincoln Center in New York and at the Stratford Festival here in Canada. I’m wondering how those particular experiences were a value to both your artistic practice and the development of your career.
BRONWYN
The Lincoln Center was an opportunity to be part of the Directors Lab, so it wasn’t part of their regular programming. I didn’t work on any shows but for three weeks in two summers, I got to be part of a seventy-person lab of people from all over the world talking about directing and engaging with ideas about why we make theatre and how we do it. There was about a third from the New York region and then another third from across the US and then the other third was from all over the world. And at Lincoln Center and at Stratford part of what was so important to my development, both as an artist and within the structure of my career was meeting people. It’s all about the people you meet and the different ideas that are sparked in random conversations over lunch or sitting under a tree or in the rehearsal hall.
It was really powerful for me to learn at Stratford that yes, I was surrounded by some of Canada’s most talented and experienced theatre artists, but they’re also humans and everybody making a play kind of does some of the same things. We all go into rehearsal and put a thing on stage, and we speak the same language even though our approaches are really different. But we’re all just trying to tell a good story and reach an audience and make it clear and make it compelling and make it entertaining and make it meaningful. And both of those experiences, I think, really helped me accept myself as an artist.
Stratford Langhamites – a group photo of participants from the Michael Langham Workshop for Classical Direction after a masterclass with Mary Zimmerman
JAMES
You lived in Ottawa for twelve years. You got your MFA there and you made it home and you became a vital part of the local arts community. In 2013, you formed Theater Artists Cooperative: the Independent Collective Series, which is known by its acronym TACTICS.
TACTICS was designed to give independent artists an opportunity to stage larger-scale works beyond the production limitations of things like the Fringe and to let artists have larger casts and more sophisticated design elements.
And now we’re ten years later; TACTICS has been a huge success. You’ve staged multiple shows. You have a main stage series as well as a number of play development opportunities and though you are no longer in Ottawa as the artistic producer, you are still on the board.
So big congratulations. You started something and not everything that people start succeeds, you succeeded, and it must have taken a lot of drive, determination, and long hours. What was the process like? How did you stay motivated? And what sort of future do you envision for the festival?
BRONWYN
I’m really delighted that I was able to create something that didn’t just end when I left, which is so often what happens to a passion project, and it doesn’t mean the passion project isn’t valuable. It just means that it’s hard to sustain. And so, I’m really glad to see that the Ottawa community has embraced TACTICS and felt like it’s really a necessary thing.
Back in the beginning, I was slow to incorporate the organization. Slow to bring on a board of directors and slow to try to switch from project funding to operating funding because one of the things I really wanted to be sure of was, does Ottawa even need this? Or does Bronwyn need this?
And it was clear that I felt I needed something. I knew I wanted to be an artistic director and I didn’t know how to get a company to take me seriously if I didn’t have any experience. So, I thought, “Well, I’ll create something and be the artistic director of it, and I’ll learn a bunch and that will be a great stepping stone in my career, and hopefully it will make a contribution to the community.” But I wanted to see what contribution it was making in the community before I tried to put all the things in place so that it could sustain a transition.
And it was always a labour of love and always a passion project and I don’t ever want to try to consider how many hours I put into it and what money I actually got paid out of it because there was a lot of unpaid labour as I was building it. That’s not necessarily a good model to start an organization, but that’s the world we live in. If you’re some sort of entrepreneur, you kind of have to build it and hope that they come and then pass it on to new leadership.
I’m so deeply proud of it, and I’m so excited about the new leadership and the growth that is continuing to happen there. Micah Jondel DeShazer is now the Artistic Director, and Lydia Talajic is the General Manager. They’re the staff and now they actually do get to invoice all the hours that they work and have a salary.
TACTICS 2019 – Swedish Furniture by Matt Hertendy
TACTICS 2017 – girls! girls! girls! by Greg MacArthur, produced by Cart Before the Horse
TACTICS 2019 – Albumen by Mishka Lavigne
TACTICS 2018 workshop of Mad Margaret adapted by Bronwyn Steinberg from Shakespeare’s history plays
TACTICS 2019 – The Omnibus Bill by Darrah Teitel, directed by Esther Jun. Behind the Scenes.
TACTICS 2017 – The Hottentot Venus Untold by Jacqui du Toit
JAMES
You did an interview a couple of years ago where you said, Lunchbox is the right job of all the artistic director jobs you’d applied for. You said, “It’s the best fit, but it is also the best timing.” So, what made it the best fit? Why was it the best timing? And now that you’ve been in the job for a couple of years, how is it working out?
BRONWYN
I love Ottawa, but it’s a smaller city and I was ready for new opportunities. So, the timing was really good because we had incorporated TACTICS and had already started to think about a succession plan. But it was also late 2020 and my independent artist career was kind of like staring into a terrifying void like so many of us because everything had been cancelled. And I thought, “Oh, my God. What am I even going to do?” And I felt like I’d won the lottery getting an actual salary and a job at a time when no one knew when theatres were going to open again.
And I also think everything kind of happens for a reason because I did end up at the right place. I think Lunchbox’s emphasis on new works and new Canadian works is really something that is just very beloved by me. With TACTICS I did a lot of new play development and a lot of working with emerging artists. And Lunchbox has quite a history of being a place where emerging artists get their first professional gig or where more established artists get to try something new and actors get to become directors and a lot of what I was doing at TACTICS was creating opportunities for folks to work on a scale they hadn’t before.
And so, it just felt like such a natural fit in those ways. And the programming over the years has kind of a tradition of it’s at lunchtime and you want to have a good time at the theatre. And as much as I talk about socially relevant and political and meaningful work, I still always want to have a good time at the theatre. And even if I am doing something that could have quite heavy themes, I want people to leave feeling uplifted, and as I looked at the history of Lunchbox shows I could see that type of programming. So artistically it felt like a really good fit as well.
Garret Smith and Barbara Gates Wilson in Cottagers and Indians at LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird.
Chris Enright, Trevor Schmidt and Jake Tcaczyk in Flora and Fawna Have Beaver Fever (and so does Fleurette!) at LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird.
Kim Kilpatrick and Ginger in Raising Stanley / Life with Tulia at LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird
Raising Stanley / Life with Tulia by Kim Kilpatrick, Karen Bailey and Bronwyn Steinberg at LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird.
Jameela McNeil and Christopher Clare in Heaven at LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird.
Emily Dallas, Valerie Pearson, Eric Wigston, Sepidar Yeganeh Farid in Home for the Holidays at LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird.
LBT Stage Two workshop of These Moments of Shine by Camille Pavlenko.
Tiffany Thomas and Anna Dalgleish in Countries Shaped Like Stars at LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird.
Maezy Reign and Robert Klein in Shark Bite at LBT. Photo Tim Nguyen.
Kit Benz, Ali DeRegt and Jamie Konchak in All I Want for Christmas at LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird.
Kit Benz, Ali DeRegt and Jamie Konchak in All I Want for Christmas by LBT. Photo Benjamin Laird.
Lunchbox Theatre 2023/24 Season Graphics by Maezy Reign
Lunchbox Theatre 2023/24 Season Grapics by Maezy Reign
Lunchbox Theatre 2023/24 Season Graphics by Maezy Reign
Lunchbox Theatre 2023/24 Season Graphics by Maezy Reign
JAMES
Well, then why don’t we talk about how your current season of plays feeds into that and reflects Lunchbox in the Calgary theatre community and maybe in the Canadian theatre community?
BRONWYN
I don’t usually think of programming around a theme, but as I look at these four pieces, I have realized that all four of them depict moments in people’s lives where another person really changes who they are and changes who they are in the world, which is I hope what theatre does for everyone.
In The Dark Lady there’s this imagined relationship between William Shakespeare and Emilia Bassano that if it happened, it actually transformed the world for all of us because it transformed Shakespearean literature. With Bells On is about this unlikely pair that gets stuck in an elevator together, and it totally opens each of their eyes to different experiences of the world. Kisapmata is a beautiful love story between a visitor to Canada and a Canadian resident who is part of her diaspora. And then The Ballad of Georges Boivin is about this guy who after his wife of fifty years dies decides to go on a road trip from Quebec to Vancouver with his friends to see if his first love is still in Vancouver. He’s not trying to get back together with her he just wants to know if someone who meant something to him fifty years ago is still there.
When I look at these four plays, they really go together in that theme while also being wildly different styles and different kinds of playwrights. Kisapmata is a new play by emerging Calgary artist Bianca Miranda, so it’s very local. With Bells On was developed at Lunchbox about ten or fifteen years ago by Darrin Hagen. The Ballad of Georges Boivin is a translation from Quebec playwright Martin Bellemare. And The Dark Lady by Jessica B. Hill just premiered this summer at Shakespeare in the Ruins in Winnipeg and at Shakespeare on the Saskatchewan in Saskatoon. So, this season is a neat mix of things from – right here, right now; right here, ten years ago; and from other places across the country.
JAMES
In a time of infinite entertainment, we have YouTube, TikTok streaming services like Netflix and Disney+. There are all sorts of amazing shows out there, Game of Thrones, Mad Men, Flea Bag, and The Good Place. There are interactive games – Red Dead Redemption, The Last of Us and The Last of Us crossed over and made an amazing mini-series. And you still find good old-fashioned radio, books, and music. So, where in this massive, modern, mix of art, storytelling, and entertainment do you think theatre fits. What does it offer that makes it unique or special?
BRONWYN
I think it offers what it always offered, which is a chance to be in community while you hear a story. And I think that all the amazing entertainment that is out there and the different media that is out there is really exciting. I love it. I consume all kinds of different things as a watcher and sometimes player but that doesn’t replace the need to actually share in the live theatrical experience. It’s similar to watching the game on TV or going to the game. Going to the concert or listening to the recording. Even going to the movies versus watching it at home on Netflix. Humans are social and we understand something differently when we do it with other people.
This amazing thing always happens when the first audience arrives for a show. Suddenly as a director I see the play differently. The whole time I have been rehearsing the show I’m trying to think what will audiences not understand? What will they find funny. And all that stuff? And then when I have someone sitting next to me, and they don’t have to do anything. They don’t have to laugh. They don’t have to ask me a question. They don’t have to give me feedback. The fact of them sitting there while we watch the same thing together in the room – boom – makes me see it differently. The way we observe something is different in company.
And I think that theatre will always have an important place in our storytelling and in that human need for storytelling because of what it offers by doing it live. You feel it as an audience member and you certainly feel it as a performer or theatre maker and it’s like, okay, we have this moment together. We’re here. You’re watching me. I am watching you and we are sharing in this creation of this idea about this story or character. And it is something we do together.
Maezy Reign and Robert Klein in the Lunchbox Theatre Production of Shark Bite by Meredith Taylor-Parry, directed by Chantelle Han. Set and Costumes by Bianca Guimarães, Sound by Kathryn Smith, Lighting by Ajay Bodoni. Photograph by Tim Nguyen.
JAMES
I noticed when I was doing some research for this interview that back in 2012 you did a production of The Hobbit at a prison. The only reason I mentioned it is because some years ago, I had an adaptation of my version of A Christmas Carol produced at a prison down in the US and I wrote a blog post about it. What was it like to do that show?
BRONWYN
Getting to do that show in the prison was a really special experience. It really taught me a lot about how important what we do is and how transformative it can be for people. And I got to attend a really neat conference presentation about prison theatre at an international theatre conference and they do a lot of theatre in prison in Italy. And it was an Italian director talking about it and everything he presented was amazing to me, but also completely unsurprising after my experience. They have found that in their prisons before the theatre program it was 60% of people that would re-offend or something like that and with inmates that had gone through their theatre program the rate was 6% and it was like this wild reduction.3
There is something really powerful about being a part of something like a theatre experience. It takes a person completely out of their day-to-day in the prison and gets them to be part of serving a greater purpose, which is the story and offering it to someone else, which is the audience. And I think we don’t realize how important it is for people to feel valued in the world and that they matter, and theatre is such a simple way to do that and it’s incredibly powerful. And actually, A Christmas Carol is kind of a great parallel because I think so much of Scrooge’s journey parallels what the guys that I worked with in prison were learning about being a part of something bigger and being a part of society in a way that a lot of them were never told they could.
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To purchase individual tickets to any Lunchbox show or play passes for the season visit the Lunchbox Theatre Box Office online or call 403-221-3708.
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1Bertolt Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956) was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. He developed the theory and practice of Epic Theatre. Epic Theatre proposes that a play should not cause the spectator to identify emotionally with the characters or action before him or her. Instead, theatre should provoke rational self-reflection and a critical view of the action on the stage. Brecht wanted audiences to have a critical perspective in order for them to recognize social injustice and exploitation and to be moved in order to go from the theatre and effect change in the outside world.
2Paulo Freire (19 September 1921 – 2 May 1997) was a Brazilian educator and philosopher who was a leading advocate of critical pedagogy. Critical pedagogy insists that issues of social justice and democracy are not distinct from acts of teaching and learning. The goal of critical pedagogy is emancipation from oppression through an awakening of the critical consciousness. When achieved, critical consciousness encourages individuals to effect change in their world through social critique and political action in order to self-actualize. His influential work, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, is considered one of the foundational texts of the critical pedagogy movement.
INTiP – International Network of Theatre in Prison The INTiP intends to support theatre projects for planning, relationship-building, debate and qualification in prison institutions around the world. INTiP presents itself as an instrument, a reference to the many operators of this growing field in the context of a phenomenon that originated internationally over 60 years ago.
The 1000 Monkeys Project featuring five Calgary playwrights is just one of the many shows you can see during the unrestricted, unexpected, unforgettable 17th Annual Calgary Fringe Festival running in Inglewood from Friday, August 4th to Saturday, August 12th.
Other shows include:
Mail Ordered by Shanice Stanislaus – a “Pick of the Fringe” at last year’s Vancouver Fringe Festival that has been described as “Wildly Funny” and “Delightfully Interactive.”
Date Night by the Sunflower Collective Theatre – an interactive, semi-improvised play about dating, caring, and mental illness in today’s world where audiences navigate the awkwardness and joy of second dates and the intimacy of telling someone who you really are behind the dating profile.
Underbelly by Ragmop Theatre – a one-woman surrealist physical comedy featuring monsters, dismemberment, shower opera, inconceivable truths, and a hot date.
For complete details about all the shows in this year’s festival and to purchase tickets for in-person shows or on-demand shows visit the Calgary Fringe Festival Website or drop by the Fringe Festival Box Office at Festival Hall and pick up a program. Regular tickets are just $20 bucks with several shows offering multiple pay-what-you-want performances.
My own ten-minute comedy Happy Birthday Theo about two old friends who have fallen on hard times and now live in a junk heap is a part of the 1000 Monkeys Project and is presented by the Alberta Playwrights’ Network. I contacted Trevor Rueger the Executive Director of APN by e-mail to ask him a few questions about the Fringe and what exactly the 1000 Monkeys Project is all about.
TREVOR RUEGER
The two previous years we partnered with the Calgary Fringe and invited playwrights to spend 24 continuous hours writing a piece for presentation at the end of the 24 hours. We housed, fed, and watered the playwrights at Festival Hall the first weekend of the Fringe. When the 24 hours were up, the writers would go home and sleep, while we would read and rehearse the plays and then present them to an audience that evening.
Because the Fringe is getting back to pre-COVID levels for the amount of work they present (which is a great thing), our presentation time was limited. So, this year we decided to model the 1000 Monkeys Project on an event we produce in Edmonton called EDMONten. We invited Calgary and area playwrights to submit complete 10-minute plays. We had 23 entries, and a jury selected the 5 works that are being presented at this year’s Festival. So, we are considering ourselves the best value for money at the Calgary Fringe – you’re going to get 5 plays for the price of 1.
JAMES HUTCHISON
I like the ten-minute format. In fact, I think you can cover a lot in ten minutes. What are the things you think make for a great ten-minute play and just how big a story can you tell in that time?
TREVOR
I love 10-minute plays, not just because I have a short attention span… (stops writing because he gets a Twitter notification) …sorry where was I? I love 10–minute plays because as a writer you have to get to the crux of the story immediately. You don’t have a lot of time to linger in exposition, specifically about the time and setting.
This means that as a writer you are kind of forced to create a situation that is immediately recognizable to an audience and is universal in its theme. You are also forced as a writer to make the action immediate. If Hamlet was a ten-minute play, you would have the ghost of Hamlet’s father show up and say he was murdered by Claudius. “Ghost: Revenge my untimely murder. / Hamlet: I’m on it pops!” The plays this year are a variety of big themes and events, and small snapshots of human interaction.
JAMES
So, tell me a little about the plays we’re going to see. Are they comedies? Dramas? Rants about corporate greed or diatribes about pineapple on pizza? Are they stories of love? Ambition? Hope? Despair? What are we going to see?
TREVOR
You’re going to see a beautiful mix of plays – an absurdist look at corporate culture, a drama about the restaurant industry, a Beckett-esque search for the meaning of life, a scene from a mysterious waiting room, and a memory play. Each play is wildly different from the next, but what makes them fantastic is the well-crafted characters in a variety of situations dealing with a myriad of crises.
JAMES
Alright, you can’t have a reading without actors. Who are some of the actors you’ve lined up for the show?
TREVOR
Casting a number of plays for one presentation always presents a challenge. We can’t afford to hire the perfect actor for each character. So we cast an ensemble of really talented character actors who are able to make big, strong, and quick choices. What we tell the audience before we start the presentation is that “not every character will be portrayed exactly as written in terms of age, race, or gender, so we ask you to use your imagination.”
In the cast, this year is Elinor Holt who was most recently seen in the Stage West production of 9 to 5: The Musical, for which she received a Betty Mitchell Award for Outstanding Performance, Lara Schmitz an incredibly talented actor and writer, Eric Wigston who audiences will have seen on stages all over the city, and myself reading stage directions and taking on a couple of roles.
JAMES
This is the 17th year for the Calgary Fringe. We have Fringe Festivals all across Canada including some big ones in Edmonton and Winnipeg. There are lots of festivals in the U.S. and of course the big one in Edinburgh. I’m curious about a couple of things. First, what do you think the Fringe offers artists and second, what do you think audiences get out of Fringe Festivals?
TREVOR
What the Fringe offers artists is an opportunity to create and present without limits. It provides an artist, or collective of artists an opportunity to experiment, develop, and test-drive their material in front of a live breathing audience. What audiences get are the fruits of those labours. The Fringe offers both the artist and the audience an opportunity to take risks. As an artist you might discover that your work has the opportunity for a bigger life after the Fringe, and for an audience you might be seeing the first version of a play that makes it big!
JAMES
I’ve seen some great shows at the Fringe including Six Guitars and Nashville Hurricane by Chase Padgett, God is a Scottish Drag Queen by Mike Delamont, and Clarence Darrow with Brian Jensen playing the legendary lawyer. What has been a great show or two you’ve seen at the Fringe and why and what has it been that has made them so memorable or inventive?
TREVOR
My very first Fringe (Edmonton) as an artist, in 1990 I saw a production of Macbeth by a company called English Theatre In A Suitcase – 5 actors, 90 minutes, 7-minute two-handed broadsword fight at the end. It blew my mind. The only thing that wasn’t created on the stage by the actors was the lighting. It was so simple and dynamic at the same time.
Two of the other memorable shows were made memorable by the fact that they were one-person shows by people who were not actors. They were people who had overcome something major in their lives and shared their very personal experiences. What made them both great was that what they shared was not for the benefit of their own personal healing, but was for the audience to examine themselves and their own situations and hardships. What makes a Fringe show great to me, is the same thing that makes theatre great – the sharing a story with an audience, not the indulging in a story for the artist’s ego.
Katharine Venour in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Syringa Tree by Pamela Gien. Directed by Morris Ertman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
The stage lets us travel to other times and places and this summer Rosebud Theatre is taking audiences on a journey to South Africa during the time of Apartheid in Pamela Gien’s 2001 Obie Award-winning play The Syringa Tree. Apartheid was an institutionalized system of legalized racial segregation between South Africa’s white minority and nonwhite majority that existed from 1948 until the early 1990s.
Katharine Venour plays twenty-two different characters in a one-woman show that tells a story about two families – one white and one black – caught in the grips of a system where the colour of your skin determines your place and opportunities in South African society. The primary narrator of the story is Elizabeth the six-year-old white daughter of Isaac her Jewish father and Eugenie her Catholic mother. In the play her nanny Salamina secretly gives birth to a daughter she names Moliseng. Elizabeth’s family and Salamina’s family are forced to hide and protect Moliseng from the authorities and other members of the community. Although the story contains tragic events the play ultimately delivers a message of love and hope.
The Syringa Tree is a powerful story told on an intimate stage in a brilliantly directed production by Morris Ertman that mixes a simple set with sound and lights to create a world where Katharine Venour delivers a compelling and deeply moving performance. I contacted Katharine after seeing the show to ask her some questions about her approach to acting as well as questions about the play including how seeing the story through the eyes of a child impacts how the story is told.
JAMES HUTCHISON
What do we mean when we say that an actor’s job is to serve the story?
KATHARINE VENOUR
I think the story is the most important part of the theatre experience. The story is everything. And the actor’s job is to speak the story, speak the words as truthfully and powerfully and clearly as possible and to bring that story to life for an audience.
Most professional actors go through a 4-year training program – either at a university or an acting school – to train their bodies, voices, hearts, and minds to become good instruments in the telling of story. As an actor, my goal is to be the best storyteller that I can be.
I believe that an actor is engaged in an act of service when she takes on a role. You are serving something bigger than you. Your job is to lift up and embody the words and character and vision that the playwright has created for you on the page. The playwright has woven a world, and as an actor I need to figure how I fit into the world and vision of the playwright.
Words are at the heart of the theatre and they can be the conveyors of truth and beauty. I want to speak those words in a truthful and compelling way for an audience, and that takes technique and imagination and inspiration. These are tools that an actor learns and hones in an acting program and throughout one’s career.
Many actors continue to take workshops with master teachers throughout their careers to continue to grow and improve as artists. It’s a life-long craft and process that requires humility and courage. For me, the best way I take it on is to know that it’s bigger than me. That makes the work meaningful.
Katharine Venour in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Syringa Tree by Pamela Gien. Directed by Morris Ertman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
How much do you think an actor’s performance is based on analysis and reason and how much do you think is based on instinct? Or maybe how do those two things mix when you’re working on a part?
KATHARINE
Yes, this is a great question. I think critical analytical skills in reading a play as well as instinct and gut response are all valuable and crucial for me as an actor.
During my acting training at the University of Calgary, acting students were required to take courses on theatre history where we read three plays a week and analyzed them. I think this was great for me as an actor – and also coincided with my love for literature which I continued in my graduate literature studies at UBC – so I loved it.
I think learning about themes, imagery, character relationships, conflict and the overall structure of a play – as varied as that can be – is so helpful to me as an actor and fires up my imagination and helps me to understand the vision of a playwright and then the director and how I can bring the character I play to life.
But instinct and that gut reaction and the way a play calls to you as an actor are also powerful tools for the actor. For me, I have to feel a heart connection to a story. And I don’t really know how to explain that except that I feel like I want to be part of the story. I want to be a part of speaking it into the world because it is meaningful to me and I connect emotionally or spiritually to it. And in the acting moment on stage, you learn as an actor how to follow your instincts for playing a scene or a moment. For me, the physicality of the character and the voice are significant places where I start and where I really live as an actor onstage.
I think this is why I’m so drawn to and fascinated by athletes. I think acting is about action – doing – and figuring how the body communicates. You want to embody a character and that requires attention and figuring out what the physical life is for the character moment by moment. Once you figure that out, acting is very, very liberating and free.
Katharine Venour in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Syringa Tree by Pamela Gien. Directed by Morris Ertman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
Let’s talk a little bit about the play you’re currently in – The Syringa Tree. The play starts in 1963 and is told for a large part by Elizabeth a young child living with her parents in South Africa during Apartheid. It’s always an interesting choice to have a story told from a child’s perspective and I’m curious what you think having that viewpoint brings to the telling of the story.
KATHARINE
Well to begin with, the play is based on the playwright, Pamela Gien’s, experience as a child growing up in South Africa. Though most of the characters are fictional, they are shaped and informed by her life as a child. So, there is that somewhat autobiographical element to the choice of speaking the story through a child as Gien herself was a child growing up in South Africa during apartheid, and this is her story.
Also, the choice of telling this story through a child is a powerful way for an audience to connect to and empathize with the main character of the play, who is an innocent. Her naivety leads her to report what she sees, and she doesn’t judge or have the skills of an adult to fully process them. We see her experience and begin to work things out.
Lizzy is also an imaginative and emotionally open child, and so it’s fascinating to see into her world. We see her powerful love for her black nanny, Salamina, and Salamina’s child, Moliseng. And that relationship is at the very heart of the play.
The play is, in part, about family – two families who cross racial divides to bond with one another. Two mothers. Two children. And we see how their lives are intertwined even when living in a brutally divisive and dangerous apartheid society that actively and in the most authoritarian way seeks to divide them. In the telling of her story, Lizzy conjures up, as an imaginative child would do, the people who had a profound impact on her.
Having the main character as a child, also allows the play to gesture towards the invisible world of imagination, and then also to the invisible world of faith or the miraculous as moments of grace subtly break through into the characters’ lives at different moments in the story. The things we cannot see are given a part to play in this story.
Katharine Venour in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Syringa Tree by Pamela Gien. Directed by Morris Ertman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
You’ve worked with Morris Ertman the director of the show many times before but this is your first time working out here in Rosebud. And in The Syringa Tree, you’re portraying over twenty different characters. So, I’m curious about a couple of things. First, how would you describe your working relationship with Morris and second, what was the process like as the two of you lifted this story from the page to the stage and brought it to life?
KATHARINE
It is always a gift for an actor to work with a director you know really well. Morris is just brilliant at so many aspects of directing. He understands narrative and identifies the heart of a story. He communicates very well with me and he understands me as an actor. He knows sometimes I just need to work out a moment and he gives me the space and time to do that.
He is rigorous and clear about keeping the acting “grounded” – that means finding the psychological and emotional and physical reality of a moment or scene and that it is a real gift to an actor when a director can articulate that so clearly and in a way that inspires. He is specific and he is very generous in filling out the thoughts and feelings of a moment so that it makes sense for the actor.
He can see when something isn’t clear and he was particularly insightful in this process at bringing a clarity to my flips between characters in an elegant way that also allows the story to spill out and gives the blocking – the movement of the piece – a real natural flow that one can follow and understand.
Morris is passionate about the telling of story in a way that is authentic and true to life, rewarding for an audience, and he does this with great kindness to his actor. And besides his deep understanding of the acting process, he also knows how to weave sound and lights within the acting moments so beautifully. That has been particularly powerful in this production where the sound and lights create a world that we can imagine and feel.
Morris also has a great sense of humour so we have good laughs too, and the rehearsal hall is a place where the rigour of our work gets done in a joyful way.
Katharine Venour in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Syringa Tree by Pamela Gien. Directed by Morris Ertman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
I love small intimate theatre spaces like the Rosebud Studio Stage because I find these types of spaces are particularly compelling for telling stories. Small gestures and a change in voice or a moment of silence seem to have a bigger emotional impact since you’re not trying to reach the second balcony as you would in a large theatre space. How do you think the Studio Stage – lends itself to the telling of this story and this production of The Syringa Tree?
KATHARINE
Yes, I love intimate theatre spaces too – as an actor and an audience member. It allows for an intimacy between performer and audience member and that really serves this story. The smaller space gives the audience that wonderful experience of being very close to the performer and seeing every nuance – like a close-up in a movie. I’ve worked a lot on “alley staging” which is the stage formation for our production and where the audience sits on both sides of the playing space. I really like alley staging as it feels natural to me and allows me to use the whole space for movement as I’m working every side of the stage. It’s great for a one-person show as well as it provides a lot of visual variety for the audience.
JAMES
When we look at the story and its depiction of Apartheid, I think it not only shines a light on South Africa and its racial policies at the time but it makes us reflect in a bigger sense on Man’s tendency to oppress and divide throughout history. Every nation including our own has examples of these kinds of attitudes and behaviour. What do you think the story has to say about those aspects of humanity?
KATHARINE
Yes, humans dominating humans has certainly been a part of the history for many nations and it is good and healthy, though difficult, to reflect on that. But there are also examples throughout human history of moral frameworks which challenge bigotry, discrimination, and the will to dominate and instead encourage us to see all humans as integrally connected and valuable.
Christian scriptures, for example, teach that all humans are created in the ‘image of God’ and every human being has an inherent, intrinsic value that should be cherished and honoured. One of the commandments Jesus gave was to love one’s neighbour as oneself. The ancient South African philosophy of Ubuntu also shares this view of the interconnectedness of all human beings. According to Ubuntu philosophy, if a person hurts another person, they also hurt themselves. Systems like apartheid create a twisted and disturbed society that does not reflect what I see to be the fundamental human spiritual impulse towards love and connection – that ‘image of God’ planted in us.
The play reveals characters who struggle against division and oppression and towards loving relationships across racial lines. In that, it expresses something very deep and true about who we really are as humans and what we really long for in life, while not shying away from or minimizing the evil that we are capable of. The human spirit is strong, and I believe that when we acknowledge a power greater than ourselves – that is God – we can really live into our true calling by helping and loving others. And that way of being human aligns with the ‘image of God’ in us. For me, the play reveals that divine calling for humanity and in a haunting and beautifully subtle way gestures towards moments of grace and the invisible realm of the miraculous, as well as portraying the strength and perseverance of the human heart to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles.
Katharine Venour in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Syringa Tree by Pamela Gien. Directed by Morris Ertman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
You make your home in Vancouver now but you grew up in Calgary and lived in Priddis and went to the University of Calgary where you studied with Grant Reddick a well-known actor and teacher in the Calgary theatre community and so you have a history here – this was once home and so I’m wondering what’s it like to get a chance to perform on the Rosebud stage and share this story?
KATHARINE
It’s so lovely to be staying in Rosebud and performing in this beautiful play on their Studio Stage. It’s a one-woman show, but really I feel like the whole creative team is up there onstage with me. Luke Ertman has created an exquisite sound design and Brad Graham a beautiful lighting design and those elements of sound and lights feel like acting partners to me as they are so beautifully woven into the story by my director, Morris Ertman.
My costume is designed by Amy Castro and I love it as it moves with me through the portrayal of 22 different characters. The set I play on was built by Mark Lewandowski and scenic painter Cheryl Daugherty, creating an intimate space for me and the audience to explore the life of this play. My stage manager, Shannon Klassen, is the only other human who accompanies me on this journey, besides every member of the audience, and I am so grateful for her diligent and exacting work.
Katharine Venour
And then, of course, there is the playwright Pamela Gien whose words and wondrous story I am given to embody when I walk on stage. Theatre is always a collaboration of many artists, regardless of how many actors appear onstage, and I am so grateful to be surrounded by such gifted designers and artists here at Rosebud. The people of Rosebud are kind and hospitable, and it is also such a delight to be surrounded by the natural beauty of the land every day I walk to the theatre.
Vancouver has been home for me for 30 years now, and I have had beautiful professional opportunities there and great friendships. It is really wonderful to see my friends from Vancouver travel out to Rosebud to see the show – like two worlds – two homes – coming together.
And Alberta will always feel like home to me too. My husband and I and my two boys have travelled to Alberta every summer for the past 23 years to visit family. My parents spent 60 years of married life in Alberta. Both have died now – my Dad last Spring – so performing in Alberta this summer has a poignancy to it. I know my parents would be delighted that I am here on stage as they always supported my acting dreams and career. I have an enduring connection to Alberta.
I am forever grateful to my acting teacher and mentor, Grant Reddick, for his friendship and giving me such a strong and powerful foundation for acting when he taught me at the Theatre Department at the University of Calgary. He has been one of those people who has profoundly formed me.
This play is about home, as well as the deep bonds and influences that certain people have in one’s life and growth, so I resonate with that as I certainly feel the deep and loving influences of my parents, my family, my friends, my colleagues, and my teacher, Grant, in my life. The play also speaks to one’s connection to the land, and I feel that in Alberta. The prairies and the people of this province will always be a part of me.
This summer you can travel to Rosebud and enjoy a family-friendly and thoroughly entertaining production of the Rogers and Hammerstein much beloved musical The Sound of Music. The story is based on the 1949 memoir of Maria von Trapp, The Story of the Trapp Family Singers and contains many popular songs including “Do-Re-Mi”, “My Favorite Things”, “Sixteen Going on Seventeen”, “Edelweiss”, “Climb Every Mountain”, “So Long, Farewell”, and the title song, “The Sound of Music”.
The original Broadway production won five Tony Awards including Best Musical and the play was adapted into the 1965 film starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer and went on to win five Academy Awards including Best Picture.
The story is set in 1938 Austria in the dark days leading up to the start of World War II and shortly before Germany annexed The Federal State of Austria into the German Reich. Against this backdrop we meet Maria who has taken a job as governess to the seven von Trapp children while she decides whether or not to become a nun.
Maria soon finds herself bonding with the children and eventually falling in love with their widowed father Captain von Trapp. Once Germany marches into Austria the Captain is ordered to report to the German navy but because of his opposition to the Nazis he and Maria devise a plan to flee Austria with the children.
In the Rosebud Theatre production, Cassia Schmidt as Maria and Ian Farthing as Captain von Trapp lead a talented cast that captures the joyful spirit of the show in a terrific production that will have you humming along to all your favourite tunes.
Cassia Schmidt in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES HUTCHISON
The Sound of Music was a huge hit when it came out and it has remained a much beloved musical and I was wondering what you think are the qualities that make it so popular.
CASSIA SCHMIDT
It’s a love story. Two love stories actually. It’s a story about someone that doesn’t belong, which is always good fun for a musical. And she finds a place where she belongs. And then the story is set in World War II which is such a dramatic time in our history, and it’s based on a true story. And I think at the heart of it we love Maria, and we’re rooting for her, and we want this family to win. At the core, I think we want people to find each other and find a place where they belong.
JAMES
You say we want people to find each other and in the story, Maria falls in love with the Captain and he her. Why do you think they fall in love?
CASSIA
I think it’s the same reason anyone falls in love. It just works for them for some reason. They shouldn’t fall in love because they’re from different classes and there’s an age difference between them and they’ve lived completely different lives. But for them, it just worked. There’s a kind of magic to falling in love. And it’s so personal, too, right? This is the big question, James. How do people fall in love?
Katelyn Morishita and Cassia Schmidt in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
I read in an interview you gave to Louis Hobson in the Herald that there are parallels between your own story and Maria’s story. Maria is uncertain about whether or not she should devote her life to God or follow a different path. And you said you’d had a similar struggle. What was that journey like for you and how did you go about choosing a life of music and family and performance?
CASSIA
My biggest kind of discerning time was in my teenage years. I really felt a call and I was really attracted to the cloister. It’s a really romantic kind of idea to be contemplative and to be in community and to be separate from the world and married to God. But all these orders that I looked at never quite felt like the right place for me and I never quite got as far down the road as Maria does as actually entering a convent. I have stayed in some convents through travel and through friends and I loved staying with the sisters and there’s just something magic about a holy place. And I was really attracted to that.
And then I just thought I don’t think that’s quite where I’m called so where do I go now? And that’s when I ended up coming to Rosebud. I came here as a student. I did the program here. And the first mainstage show I did was Man of La Mancha. And we did something like ninety shows that summer. Ninety performances. And I remember about twenty shows in thinking this is awesome. If we close tomorrow, I would feel like I had a good experience. And then in my next thought, I realized that there are seventy more shows and I felt this calling because I realized this show isn’t about me it’s about what I get to offer to each new audience that comes to see it whether I feel like it or not on that particular day.
And I think there’s something about the self-sacrifice that the theatre asks for, as well as we’re in community together doing this show hoping to change hearts and hoping to inspire people. And, you know, a theatre does feel like a holy place a lot of the time. So, it was coming here that really affirmed for me that the theatre is the church I’m called to. And then I found someone that I love, and we have a family, and it didn’t feel like a big “Aha!” decision. Instead, it felt like I pieced it together and I followed a thread until it became so clear that this is where I belong.
Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Ian Farthing and Glenda Warkentin in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music. Directed by Morris Ertman.
Lacey Cornelsen and Cassia Schmidt in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Lacey Cornelsen and Travis Edwards in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Lacey Cornelsen and Travis Edwards in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Cassia Schmidt and Logan Hope in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
Cassia Schmidt and Ian Farthing in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
The play has several young performers playing the von Trapp children, and so it provides an opportunity to pass on musical knowledge and mentor up-and-coming theatre artists. In what ways do you think mentorship is important for helping young people navigate their own professional development and life’s journey?
CASSIA
I’ve benefited from it. It’s such an integral part of what we do here in Rosebud. We call our training the Mentorship Program. So, we really believe in it. It’s like the good old 4-H club I was in when I was a kid. The 4-H model is – learn to do by doing.
You can go to a lot of classes, and you can read a lot about how to be an actor but standing on stage with an audience who will never lie to you because the audience is very clear about what they like and what they don’t like is indispensable. And you have a group of actors to support you and to be with you. And I think theatre can offer you a sense that you have value, and it builds confidence and it builds a sense of body and voice. And you don’t have to be the Gretel from the movie, you yourself are the perfect Gretel, and you yourself have so much to offer.
JAMES
Tell me what audiences can look forward to experiencing when they see the show.
CASSIA
I think this show is so beautifully cast and everybody is so well suited to their role. And what I’ve been seeing from our audience is a nostalgia in a way that no other show I’ve done before has had. I’ve done Anne of Green Gables – I’ve done Oliver! – and I’ve done some other musicals where people know them pretty well. But because The Sound of Music movie is so embedded in our culture people know this story and they remember watching it with their grandmother and they love this story in a way that’s physical and whatever their connection is to the story we can feel it in the show.
From the very first performance, we felt it as soon as we started the music because some people sing a little bit, or they repeat a line, and you hear them sighing or crying or laughing. And I was like, “Wow, people love this show.” And isn’t that wonderful that they get to come to see a show that they love and I’m happy to share it with them because I love the story too. It’s part of my childhood.
Cassia Schmidt and Ian Farthing in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
I know you also produce original music with your most recent release called The Lullaby Project: Songs for the Sleep Deprived. Tell me a little bit about that project and how that came about.
CASSIA
It was my COVID project. I actually just wanted to do a writing project around parenthood and lullabies and to collaborate with people. And I’m a mom. We have three kids. We have a four-year-old, a two-year-old, and a four-month-old. And before I was a mom, I always thought what a romantic idea to rock your kids to sleep but instead it’s often frustrating and you’re tired and it’s not working. And so that’s why I call it songs for the sleep deprived. It’s more about songs for parents rather than songs that might put your baby to sleep.
And my favourite song I co-wrote with Lauren Hamm and Paul Zacharias we called “Time Go Easy”. We sat together and just talked about being parents and how there’s a saying that being a parent is saying goodbye to a child over and over again because the baby is gone now. You’ll never see that baby again, but now you’re saying hello to a toddler. And then you’ll never see that toddler again because now there’s this child, and now all of a sudden there’s this teenager, and then there’s this adult before me, right? So, we all had a good cry, and then we went off and we wrote this song that’s our pride and joy from the album.
Rosebud Theatre Production of The Sound of Music by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Directed by Morris Eartman. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
What do you think it is about music that makes it such an important part of people’s lives?
CASSIA
I think it’s something Morris Ertman our director said at the end of rehearsals about the show. “This show is about music changing people’s hearts and wouldn’t that be amazing if that’s what we get to do all summer for audiences.” It’s like a softening of the heart and I think it’s a physical experience for us. Music has rhythm – like our heartbeat. Like our mom’s heartbeat. Like our family’s heartbeat. And I think when we’re listening to music, we’re part of the music. There’s something physical about it that goes into our spine and into our memory and into our feelings in a way that nothing else really can. So, just like falling in love – it’s magic. (Laughs) Everything’s magic.
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Catch The Sound of Music at Rosebud Theatre until September 2nd. Tickets are available through the Rosebud Theatre Website or by calling the Box Office at 1-800-267-7553.
Rosebud Theatre’s production of The Trip to Bountiful by Horton Foote is a rich and rewarding story about love, family, regrets, and hope all brought to life in a wonderful production that provides audiences with a memorable and highly entertaining night at the theatre.
Bringing the play to life is a terrific cast including Judith Buchan as Carrie Watts, Nathan Schmidt as Ludie, Heather Pattengale as Jessie Mae, Rebbekah Ogden as Thelma, and Caleb Gordon and Christopher Allan each playing multiple roles. The production is expertly directed by Morris Ertman who also designed the sets.
Judith Buchan as Carrie Watts in the Rosebud Theatre production of The Trip to Bountiful by Horton Foote. Photo by Morris Ertman.
All Carrie Watts wants to do is return to her childhood home of Bountiful but without money and being an old woman living with her son Ludie and his wife Jessie Mae her dream of returning home isn’t going to be an easy task to accomplish. She’s tried it before and failed but this time she’s secretly been making plans and preparations, and no one is going to stop her.
But she’s not the only one dealing with life’s difficulties. Ludie and Jessie Mae have had their own regrets because sometimes careers stall and stumble or our hopes for a family don’t work out the way we planned. In the end, all three characters have to figure out how to come to terms with life’s regrets and move forward.
After seeing the show on opening weekend, I arranged an interview with Judith Buchan to talk with her about the play and her portrayal of the feisty and determined Carrie Watts.
JAMES HUTCHISON
So, I saw the play and you know, we talk about the magic of theatre but the true magic of being deeply moved and at times getting lost in a play doesn’t happen very often. It’s a rare experience. But your production had that magic. And I wonder how much of that magic do you sense on the stage and what’s it like to be in a production that has the power to move an audience.
JUDITH BUCHAN
It’s beautiful to hear that actually. I am not sure how much I can sense that. I mean obviously we’re hoping to do justice to the material. Trying to connect and trying to find the truth and the honesty in these people the best we can. And with Horton Foote’s writing nothing is wasted. I go through the whole script every day before I perform it because it is so beautifully written that you do not want to stray from it in any way. And the more I study it, the more I realize nothing is wasted and everything comes back to a payoff at the end, and everything does connect in some way.
In some ways, it’s a little story. My daughter, Rachel, has a great description of this play. She says it’s about an inch wide and about a mile deep. And that really touched me because it’s not as if big things happen yet huge things are happening between the characters. Relationships are being altered in big ways and their eyes are being opened in deeper and more meaningful ways about themselves and each other. I had seen The Trip to Bountiful myself on Broadway with Cicely Tyson playing Mrs. Watts and I was deeply moved by it.
Heather Pattengale as Jessie Mae and Nathan Schmidt as Ludie in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Trip to Bountiful by Horton Foote. Photo by Morris Eartman.
JAMES
It’s a play filled with ghosts because the people in it are mature characters. And I personally like plays about older characters and characters that have known each other for a long time. I just usually find those more interesting. There’s history there that includes tragedy and happiness, and that informs the relationships in the present. Tell me about your character and her journey, and why do you think all the characters in this play are so compelling?
JUDITH
Horton Foote just has the gift of writing simply but just so deeply. I had a lot of great aunts that were very powerful women and very resilient and strong and opinionated and who lived really complicated lives. And I’ve kind of been thinking about them while doing the play. My own mother loved this story, and she did say to me once you could play that part. I hadn’t actually thought of that before she said it, and she died last November so it’s been very poignant for me to be in a play and playing a character that I know she loved.
I think my character and the other characters in the play remind us of people we know. And Carrie loves her son even though his life has been a mess because of an illness. And she adores him so much and he adores both his mother and his wife Jessie Mae. And what would you call her? Well, she’s a strong flavour – Jesse Mae. Just a powerhouse of a person and loving her husband so much and she’s living in a time when she can’t really be more than what she is. And my daughter who really loves this play said Jessie Mae would’ve been a lawyer if she lived now. She’s smart but she’s kind of trapped looking after her mother-in-law and so what can she do?
I think you see the frustrations of the characters really, really well, the things they’re fighting against. And I just think there’s so much truth in the play about how we treat our elders. And I think it’s kind of unusual to have this senior lady being the one taking the journey and I love that.
Judith Buchan as Carrie Watts and Nathan Schmidt as Ludie in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Trip to Bountiful by Horton Foote. Photo by Morris Eartman.
JAMES
Let’s talk a little bit about the production itself. I’d love to hear what it’s like to work with Nathan and Heather and bring this story to life.
JUDITH
I’m so fortunate. I’ve worked with Heather a few times before and so we already start at a place where we know each other and are comfortable with each other and love each other. So, it’s just fantastic. And Nathan and I haven’t really worked with each other but thirty years ago I taught a few courses here and I would come in from Olds and teach and he was a young student then. And you know its so good to see him mature and become such a fine actor and stay in Rosebud and put his roots down and contribute here and teach. So, it’s really been fun to be on stage with him.
And Rebecca was a student from here and she’s doing all kinds of things and she is just darling. And for her to be the stranger I meet on a bus…I mean how blessed am I to meet Rebecca on the bus every night and have to tell her my life story? And Caleb and Christopher they’re just great having to play several different roles and having to move all the backstage stuff so that things roll in smoothly and roll out smoothly. I agree with Morris our director that on this small stage not having a blackout and instead having everything moved around so smoothly works better and I just love the way that’s done. And I just find the music so beautiful that it almost makes me cry sometimes.
Judith Buchan as Carrie Watts and Rebbekah Ogden as Thelma in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Trip to Bountiful by Horton Foote. Photo by Morris Eartman.
JAMES
Yeah, there’s not a production element that doesn’t work. From an audience point of view, the transitions between scenes are seamless. They dovetail beautifully. It’s like a dissolve on stage.
So, the main character is Carrie Watts. She’s older. She’s looking back at her life, and so, I’m curious about you and your thoughts about growing older and reflecting back. What’s that like?
JUDITH
It’s quite an experience to be able to play this woman and reflect back on my own life. I find certain things that she says really get to me like when she says she wants to know why her life has become so empty and so meaningless. That really gets to me every time because I think people feel that way quite often. And it’s just heartbreaking to have a lot of regrets and I think you can reach an older age and really be so full of regrets. And I can relate to her sometimes. I had one child, so my table isn’t full at Christmas or Easter, but I have great friends.
And in the play Carrie teaches me that you need to be thankful for what you have and whatever you have is enough and maybe we need to really be listening to that. So, I just think it’s really hopeful and helpful to see an older person take stock and admit she has regrets, and then manage to go past that and she sees that she gets her strength not from a house or from people but from the ocean and from the beauty around Bountiful.
Nathan Schmidt as Ludie, Heather Pattengale as Jessie Mae, and Judith Buchan as Carrie Watts in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Trip to Bountiful by Horton Foote. Photo by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
So, I’m curious to know what you think theatre can offer a modern audience in this age of TikTok.
JUDITH
Well of course, it’s the shared community experience that we were deprived of for the years during Covid. Sitting together in a room and laughing together or crying together and watching something happen in real-time right in front of you. You know, it’s a shared thing that I think is ancient and powerful.
And at Rosebud walking home from a show under the stars and the northern lights and hearing the coyotes in the distance keeps you very grounded in the land and the earth. And having a theatre school here and a community of theatre artists here there’s a big commitment to honesty in the storytelling which you know, most theatres would go along with, but I think somehow because this is an earthy place, I buy more into the honesty. And somehow Rosebud manages to find the essence of the shows they produce and so I enjoy what happens at Rosebud very, very much, and I’m so privileged to be able to work here.
Vertigo Theatre presents a highly entertaining and suspenseful production of Gaslight by Johnna Wright and Patty Jamieson based on the play Angel Street by Patrick Hamilton. Bringing the play to life is a terrific cast including Kelsey Verzotti as Bella, Braden Griffiths as Jack, Valerie Planche as Elizabeth, and Hailey Christie-Hoyle as Nancy. The production is directed by Jack Grinhaus and delivers plenty of mystery and suspense.
Kelsey Verzotti as Bella and Braden Griffiths as Jack in the Vertigo Theatre Production of Gaslight by Johnna Wright and Patty Jamieson. Directed by Jack Grinhaus. Photo by Tim Nguyen.
All devoted husband Jack Manningham wants is for his wife Bella to get well. Ever since moving into their new home in London Bella has experienced a number of episodes that have made her doubt her own sanity. Items disappear, noises are heard, and the gaslight dims on its own. Jack enlists the help of Elizabeth the housekeeper and the new maid Nancy to make sure that Bella gets the rest and quiet she needs in order to recover. But things aren’t exactly as they seem and as layers of the story are revealed – including the disturbing history of the house – Bella must figure out what’s really going on before things turn deadly.
I spoke with the director of Gaslight Jack Grinhaus about the play, his role as Artistic Director of Vertigo Theatre, and what fictional detective he’d want to clear his name if he’d been wrongly accused of murder.
JAMES HUTCHISON
So, Gaslight takes place in Victorian London. There are mysteries at play and sinister forces at work. Tell me about your production of Gaslight and what audiences can expect from spending a night with Bella and Jack.
JACK GRINHAUS
It’s a great classic thriller but because of this new adaptation it feels very present and modern. There’s this woman who feels isolated in her home and I think we’ve all known what that feels like over the last few years, and she’s in a relationship she can’t understand, and she is confused about herself. And in this new adaptation, Bella is the agent of her own freedom, as opposed to the original script which had a detective come in and help solve the puzzle. All three women in the story are extremely strong actors and characters and it’s been really exciting to work with them.
And I see the play very much as a superhero origin story because there’s this woman who starts off feeling like she can’t believe in herself. She doesn’t trust herself. She doesn’t trust the world around her. She thinks maybe something is going on in her mind, but as time progresses she’s like Neo in The Matrix. She starts to accept that she can actually expose all the truths of the story. And I think audiences will have a really great time following her because it’s from her point of view and while she’s being gaslit we’re gaslighting the audience as well with the way we’re staging the play and with the way we’re using the design elements.
Braden Griffiths as Jack and Kelsey Verzotti as Bella in the Vertigo Theatre Production of Gaslight by Johnna Wright and Patty Jamieson. Directed by Jack Grinhaus. Photo by Tim Nguyen.
JAMES
Our perception of ourselves often depends on the feedback that we get from others.
JACK
Yes.
JAMES
How much of our identity do you think comes from what others reflect back to us?
JACK
Well, that kind of goes back to that existentialism, Sartre kind of idea, right? There’s no shame until we are witnessed by others. It’s a really intriguing question. I’m going to give you a little anecdote of me gaslighting myself recently.
During our run of Murder on the Orient Express, Haysam who starred as Poirot was doing the big Poirot finale. I was in my office. I was listening to the play on the program sound outside in the hallway.
I thought, “Okay, I’ll go down and see the applause and go talk to the audience after the show. I’ll just hang out in the office until then because I’ve seen it fifty times.” And I waited for a particular point in Poirot’s final monologue, where he speaks about one of the characters and he says, “Oh, she’s in a new play called No, No, Nanette on Broadway and she’s very successful.” And I went, “Okay, great. I’m going to head down.”
And I went downstairs, and I went into the theatre, and I slowly opened the door, and as soon as I walked in Haysam was on stage saying, “Oh, she’s in a new Broadway show called No, No, Nanette and she’s very successful.” And I went, “What the hell? How? Didn’t I just hear?” And I started to question myself. I went, “Oh, no. I must have only thought I’d heard that line.” And then I found out after the show that a woman had actually shouted in the audience and they’d stopped the show. She thought her husband was having a medical emergency, but he actually just had his eyes closed and was listening.
So, they decided to restart the play and go back to the top of the monologue, and I walked out of my office and into the theatre at the same moment in Poirot’s final monologue missing all of what happened in between. I thought, “I must have lost my mind.” It was funny because why wasn’t my first instinct to think, “Oh, maybe something happened on stage, and they had to go back?” Instead, my first instinct was to think that there’s something wrong with me. I basically gaslit myself.
And I think people who are predators can really take advantage of that kind of thing. Knowing that people self-deprecate and blame themselves and their sense of shame and guilt is so high in relationship to other people that they doubt themselves. And it’s because we always want to please the people around us. That’s the secret weapon of the person who does the gaslighting.
JAMES
You’ve got Kelsey Verzotti as Bella, Braden Griffiths as her husband Jack, Valerie Planche as the housekeeper Elizabeth, and Hailey Christie-Hoyle as the new maid Nancy. What are some of the qualities this cast brings to their characters and to the telling of the story?
JACK
I’ve known Val for a long time. We’ve worked together in the past. And so, I knew Val and I knew her as a great rock in a company, a strength in a company. She’s a director as well, which I like as a director because you’ll get someone who’s looking at the big picture from the inside. And her great strength of character I knew would support some of the younger women in the show, Kelsey and Hailey, who are still new to a certain extent. They’ve both started to have burgeoning careers, but they’re still in the early stage of their career. And I thought here’s their first big chance at a really intimate big show here in Calgary. It’s good to have someone like Val who can keep them grounded and supported when needed and Val’s also such a strong actor that she brings up the people around her too.
And there’s something about Haley’s ability, even in her youth, to show great strength of character and independence. And that’s really great for her playing Nancy, who’s sort of an obstinate maid in the house who’s got her own game going. So, Haley right from the audition had this kind of maturity and wisdom that I felt was important for playing Nancy because Nancy is someone who probably came from the street, probably has a lot more street sense and streetwise than education and wealth because she came from nothing. And so, she has to have – even in her youth – this look in her eye that shows experience and life.
Hailey Christie-Hoyle as Nancy in the Vertigo Theatre Production of Gaslight by Johnna Wright and Patty Jamieson. Directed by Jack Grinhaus. Photo by Tim Nguyen.
Braden is a brilliant actor and has always been the good guy in shows in Calgary. He’s never really been known as the bad guy. So, this is a great way to gaslight the audience by going, “Hey, look it’s the nicest guy in Calgary.” And I just think Braden’s such a strong actor bar none that his ability to play the ambiguity of Jack is really exciting because that’s really hard. It’s hard to direct an actor into ambiguity. And that’s what we need because you can’t totally know whether Jack is really the bad guy or not. And maybe he isn’t. You have to see the production to find out. And that ambiguity that Braden brings to the character keeps the audience guessing for as long as possible.
And Kelsey is such a strong, young actor who needs to be able to carry the weight of the show. She has this great sensitivity and emotional availability and vulnerability, but at the same time you can see there is a powerful spirit there, a strong human there. And that’s Bella. Bella is both. And oftentimes you’ll find actors who play one or the other better. Somebody who’s better at playing somebody who’s vulnerable and not as strong. And then other people can play someone with a hard edge but not as vulnerable. And Kelsey has this great balance flowing between those two worlds which is what we need to legitimately believe Bella’s journey. We need an actor who can be vulnerable and then finds the strength to empower themselves to success.
And the cast has really great chemistry and the second we had the first read we knew we nailed it. They all have these qualities that I perceived as important for the version we are telling of Gaslight.
Kelsey Verzotti as Bella and Valerie Planche as Elizabeth in the Vertigo Theatre Production of Gaslight by Johnna Wright and Patty Jamieson. Directed by Jack Grinhaus. Photo by Tim Nguyen.
JAMES
The title of the play is Gaslight but in a greater sense we’re talking about betrayal. Being betrayed leaves a deep wound and it seems to be a common theme in a lot of plays and movies and books. Why do you think it is we like stories about betrayal?
JACK
Partly because we all understand it. We’ve all had a moment in our life where we’ve been gaslit. We’ve all had personal or professional relationships in business and in life where somebody has led us down a particular path and then pulled the rug out from under us. And I think we all know what a terrible feeling it is to go through that.
But I also think betrayal is part of the bigger picture of what we do at Vertigo, which is intrigue. I think most people in our world are honourable as humans. And for us, we’re fascinated by the underbelly of society. We’re fascinated with people who are willing to do things that we may not be willing to do. And so, you have television shows like Succession and even though these stories are dramas it’s really about the intrigue. It’s about trying to figure out why, how, and who in regard to the story. The thing about Vertigo is we lay so many breadcrumbs that our audiences are used to watching every blink, every chin movement, and every hand gesture. And so, I’m really marking those moments in the play, and I think the audiences love that. I think that we as humans love to solve puzzles and riddles.
Kelsey Verzotti as Bella, Braden Griffiths as Jack and Valerie Planche as Elizabeth in the Vertigo Theatre Production of Gaslight by Johnna Wright and Patty Jamieson. Directed by Jack Grinhaus. Photo by Tim Nguyen.
JAMES
Part of the job of the artistic director is to provide a vision forward in regard to the theatre and the plays it produces. Next season you’ll be designing your first season as Artistic Director of Vertigo Theatre. I’m curious to know what goes through your mind as you’re picking the plays you want to produce and designing an overall season.
JACK
It’s a great question. It’s a huge one. Because you’re encapsulating quite a bit. As an artistic director you have to imagine that there are maybe thirty or forty balloons that you’re trying to hold all the strings together on. First is the theatre you’re working at and its mandates. You have to serve that. Then you have to serve the needs of the patrons, the donors, the staff, the marketing, the board, the funders, the sponsors, the local community, and your own artistic interests.
Jack Grinhaus Artistic Director Vertigo Theatre Photo by Dahlia Katz
And, of course, you’re making sure that there is parody and equity in the voices and faces involved in projects. And I like to look at what the tone of the world is at the time, what’s going on in the ether at the moment. What’s the zeitgeist reading so that people always feel like there’s something interconnected in the works they’re seeing artistically.
Our current season I said was so much about people escaping isolation. Which is intriguing because that is exactly what we’ve all been doing. Next season is a season of what I call transformation. A season of people starting to look again at who they are and trying to affect the world around them and how that works. And to me, that’s very much what we’re doing now. We’re coming out of the pandemic and we’re asking ourselves, who are we now and how do we impact the world around us? And so, all the plays for next season were built around that thematic element.
And I’m interested in authenticity and intensity in the work. I think it’s really important that people are drawn into the stories and the emotional experience. And I love high theatricality, so I always pick plays that are really theatrical in nature, and I’m also interested in balancing seasoned and new audiences’ interests.
And so as an artistic director I’m trying to blend all of those things together in an exciting, engaging, and thrilling season and to offer something fun because people have been beaten up over the last little while and they want entertaining plays with great stories and I think that’s what makes Vertigo seasons so successful.
JAMES
While I was doing a little research on you and I came across Bound To Create Theatre which was formed in 2004 by yourself and Lauren Brotman. And on your website, it says in regards to the type of work you create that you are keenly interested in the beauty, boldness, and truth born from confronting the challenges that face the human spirit. So, what has been a highlight or two from the work that you’ve created with B2C Theatre about the challenges of being human and what sort of impact do you hope it’s had?
Lauren Brotman in Hedda Noir adapted by Jack Grinhaus from the Henrik Ibsen play Hedda Gabler. Photo by Philomena Hughes.
JACK
When we started the company we realized there were a lot of niche issues that were not necessarily being discussed and so we started taking on stories that we felt were about lesser-known issues and also exploring highly theatrical means and premiering incredible works by new voices in theatre.
One that really sticks out for me is dirty butterfly by Jamaican British playwright debbie tucker green, which is kind of a poetic piece about the collateral damage of domestic abuse. We had this incredible underbelly storyline, and we’re also premiering in North America for the first time this incredible black playwright from the UK. Obsidian Theater, who’s the premier black company in Canada, partnered with us for that.
And it was incredible because we would have women’s shelters coming to see the shows and women coming out saying, “You know, seeing your show made me understand that I’m not alone.” And when you hear that – that’s kind of everything. Martha Graham once said that if she affected one person in her show in the entire run then it was worth it. And now debbie tucker green’s work is world-renowned.
Lauren Brotman, Kaleb Alexander, and Beryl Bain in dirty butterfly by debbie tucker green. Photo by Joe Bucci.
Also, Meegwun Fairbrother’s Isitwendam (An Understanding) which was a play about a young man who is half indigenous and half white and he goes to work for the Conservative Government and his first job is to go and discredit a residential school survivor’s reparation claim. And when he goes there his whole life is turned upside down as he finds out about residential schools. We started this fifteen years ago and now we’re hearing more about residential schools, but at the time that was not a subject that most places or people were interested in negotiating.
We worked with Native Earth in Toronto that premiered our play and we toured it all over the country and it was just a real opportunity to deal with a really important issue but in a really unique way. It was a detective fiction basically because it was about a young man who is trying to figure out the mystery of his missing father. And it ends up that his father was at one of the schools and had taken his life. That’s what started to pull me into the detective genre because I co-wrote and co-created it with Meegwun Fairbrother – the writer – the creator. He brought his story and I sort of created this bubble of detective fiction and Lauren and I sort of tweaked and worked in that. And so that was really exciting.
Meegwun Fairbrother in Isitwendam by Meegwun Fairbrother and co-created by Jack Grinhaus. Photo by Joe Bucci.
For the first fifteen years or so we were purposefully tackling things that we just didn’t think people did. And we were very lucky to have a very strong audience and community-based support behind it. And it was really exciting. And we learned how to do everything – write, produce, direct and it really defined who we were as artists and our integrity as artists and our passion and how hard we work.
Ray Strachan and Lauren Brotman in Hedda Noir adapted by Jack Grinhaus from the Henrik Ibsen play Hedda Gabler. Photo by Philomena Hughes.
JAMES
For my last question let me set the scene for you. It’s been a weekend where you and a number of other artistic leaders from the Calgary community have been brought together at a remote mansion by an eccentric millionaire named Sir Cedric Digglesworth who wants to leave his fortune to the arts community, but rumours are rampant that not everyone is on his good list and he’s about to change his will. Then in the middle of the night, a gunshot rings out and when everyone rushes into the library they find you holding the proverbial smoking gun and the lifeless body of our famous arts patron Sir Digglesworth lying dead at your feet. You stand wrongly accused of murder. What famous fictional detective would you want to investigate the crime and clear your name and why would you want to pick that particular detective?
JACK
This one is going to be the shortest answer and the easiest one for me. I would take Batman, the Dark Night Detective, any day of the week. Batman would come in and not only solve the crime, but he would equally punish the appropriate criminal in a way that would be a more fitting justice than maybe what the cops would. And so my go-to is always going to be Batman.
JAMES
Was Batman a hero when you were a kid?
JACK
Oh, of course. I had all the comics on the walls and all the books as well. And he’s called the Dark Night Detective, you know, and the new Batman is that detective genre style.
JAMES
Do you have a favourite Batman?
JACK
Listen, I’m a kid in the nineties, so I gotta go with Keaton. The sound of his voice is always going to be Batman to me. And my favourite actor ever is Jack Nicholson. It’s really hard to beat that joker.
Murder on the Orient Express at Vertigo Theatre is a masterful and thrilling production of the Agatha Christie classic cleverly adapted for the stage by Ken Ludwig.
***
Everything is not as it seems. That statement has never been more true of a murder mystery than in Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express. Hercule Poirot finds himself surrounded by an eclectic assortment of characters including wealthy American businessman with a shady past Samuel Ratchett, the elderly Russian Princess Dragomiroff forced to live in exile, and the overbearing, loud, and life of the party Mrs. Hubbard, an American. Before the train can reach its destination, it is stopped by a snow drift in the mountains and during the night one of the passengers is murdered!
Poirot is assigned the task of investigating the murder by his friend and manager of the railroad Mousier Bouc who is also travelling on the train. There’s an abundance of clues. An abundance of suspects. And only Hercule Poirot can untangle the web of deception and decipher all the clues to figure out his most baffling and morally challenging case.
Vertigo Theatre takes you along for a thrilling, fun, and intriguing murder mystery featuring a terrific cast including Haysam Kadri as Hercule Poirot. I sat down with the director of the play Jovanni Sy who is also a playwright and actor to talk with him about Murder on the Orient Express, what makes the mystery genre so popular, and how he came to play Mr. Miyagi in the premiere of The Karate Kid – The Musical.
JAMES HUTCHISON
The murder mystery is a popular genre of fiction. So, I’m curious what do you think it is about that genre that has such a lasting appeal, and then I’m wondering specifically, why is Poirot such a popular figure? What did Agatha Christie stumble upon or deliberately design to make Poirot the much beloved and popular character that he is?
JOVANNI SY
I have a theory. I think people love mysteries because the detective is ultimately a seeker of truth. It’s solving a puzzle but it’s also trying to uncover the truth in the face of all your adversaries trying to inundate you with lies. There’s something really appealing about that, about being able to weed through all the deception, weed through all the artifice to uncover a nugget of truth.
And as for Poirot, I think people love him because he’s a showman. He’s so idiosyncratic. One of the really interesting things about the whole detective genre is that we get to know most well-known detectives on a reasonably superficial level. The story is not about their journey to get from point A to point B and learn something along the way. It really is a plot-driven genre, so people will like mysteries in as far as the mystery is compelling and good.
I don’t think Poirot would’ve been a popular detective if Christie weren’t extremely adept at constructing these wonderful puzzles for him. We know his characteristics, but they’re all rather external. They’re about his vanity or his pomposity or his strict moral code. But he doesn’t often undergo a dramatic journey the way protagonists in other genres do. It’s really about how good is he at solving the mystery.
Mike Tan as Monsieur Bouc, Sarah Roa as Countess Andrenyi, and Haysam Kadri as Hercule Poirot in the Vertigo Theatre Production of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express adapted for the stage by Ken Ludwig and directed by Jovanni Sy. Photo by Tim Nguyen
JAMES
In this production, you’ve assembled a stellar cast including Haysam Kadri who is portraying Poirot. What do you think are the qualities Haysam brings to his portrayal of Poirot and as the director of the play how much of that is the director’s vision and how much is the actor’s vision? How did that collaboration work on this production?
JOVANNI
What Haysam brings, other than being a superlative actor is real fierce intelligence. He’s really good at thinking through the text. I mean, I think it’s no surprise he is the artistic director of The Shakespeare Company, and you know for most interpreters of Shakespeare you really need a very rigorous sense of diction and thought. Thought and text have to be aligned and with Shakespeare it requires a real cerebral kind of technique.
And I think approaching the character ultimately, it’s him. He’s the guy doing it. I think where I help is early on in rehearsal, I felt he was doing a wonderful job right off the top, but it felt like his Poirot had a more Sherlock Holmes kind of rhythm to him. Because, you know he’s done such a wonderful job of playing Holmes where everything was super direct, and Holmes is like tunnel focused and everything is to get to the point. Poirot’s not like that.
Poirot is a hedonist. Poirot loves his rich food and his expensive wines and beautiful women. And he is a bit of a showman. In Ludwig’s text he has a lot of stuff where Poirot’s constructed something like the way a magician would present a trick – you sit there and in a second I will show you – this! And he constructs a lot of reveals in a very ostentatious almost vaudevillian kind of way.
So, we almost had to slow down Haysam’s motor. I think his own personal motor is probably more closely aligned to a Holmes-like character who is super fast, super cerebral, super to the point, and instead have him sit back and really enjoy the indulgences of a Poirot and the way he enjoys unfurling the mystery for you in a very showy manner.
JAMES
You know, it’s interesting too with Poirot being as you mentioned a hedonist that perhaps he is more in touch with the psychology and motivation of his suspects.
JOVANNI
Absolutely. I think you’re quite right. Whereas Holmes is much more evidence-driven, science-driven, and data-driven with his kind of process Poirot is about constructing the mindset of the killer. He definitely looks at a murder scene and thinks, “Is this a tidy or an untidy kind of killing? What frame of mind were the perpetrator or perpetrators in? Were they in a hurry? Were they enjoying themselves?” He really tries to pinpoint the psychological makeup and motivators for any kind of crime and match that against his range of suspects. Whereas Holmes is practically on the spectrum where he observes a lot but misses things about the way people work because he’s clinical and robotic in his approach.
Lara Schmitz as Greta Ohlsson, Haysam Kadri as Hercule Poirot, Elizabeth Stepkowski-Tarhan as Princess Dragomiroff in the Vertigo Theatre Production of Agatha Christies’s Murder on the Orient Express adapted for the stage by Ken Ludwig and directed by Jovanni Sy. Photo by Tim Nguyen
JAMES
One of the interesting things about Murder on the Orient Express is of course the setting because the play takes place on a train, and that certainly provides challenges for your set designer, Scott Reid and your actors. But it’s also fun to see on stage. Can you talk a little bit about the set design and what it was like to create that world and put the characters into it?
JOVANNI
It has its inherent challenges. Some things are really hard to circumvent as in Ratchet’s sleeping compartment must be next to Mrs. Hubbard’s on one side and Poirot’s on the other. You can’t really get around that. I think the geography of the crime is pertinent to its uncovering. So, some things are set in stone.
It’s a challenge because a train is a confined space and I think we leaned into it as much as possible. We didn’t try to do an abstract representation where a train corridor could suddenly easily accommodate the five people who needed to be in the corridor. So, you know, in that scene where they’re all passing each other, we just leaned into how even in the most luxurious train on earth you still have a problem if it gets crowded when you try to pass each other in a corridor. Or when you have nine people in a room that is literally three by five how do you stage that?
It was tricky and it takes a lot of precision so that people aren’t blocking each other. Fortunately, the sight lines are good. Scott created some really smart conventions like being able to see through the walls from the rooms to the corridor and having walls implied but not completely filled out.
Luigi Riscaldino as Michel the Conductor, Sarah Roa as Countess Andrenyi, Haysam Kadri as Hercule Poirot, Mike Tan as Monsieur Bouc the Vertigo Theatre Production of Agatha Christies’s Murder on the Orient Express adapted for the stage by Ken Ludwig and directed by Jovanni Sy. Photo by Tim Nguyen
JAMES
So, I want to talk a little bit about another iconic character because you’re also an actor and earlier this year you were in the world premiere of The Karate Kid – The Musical, and you played Mr. Miyagi, who in the original movie was played by Pat Morita. What was it like to work on that show and become part of the DNA, so to speak, of Mr. Miyagi?
JOVANNI
It was surreal is the only word I have for it. I mean, that was such an iconic movie for me. I was sixteen when it came out. And, Pat Morita, you have to understand, was like an idol to a whole generation of Asian performers, because we were so underrepresented. There were so few figures in television and film that weren’t the stereotypical background kind of guy who was a buffoon or an idiot or just inconsequential. Mr. Miyagi had power and agency and dignity and humour and pathos and Pat Morita did an incredible job. He got an Oscar nomination. So, he’s an iconic figure to so many Asian performers and artists of my generation and subsequent generations.
So, to walk into his shoes was daunting because he created a character that everybody knows – everybody loves, and the challenge was how to interpret it and make it my own and not try to just copy him because I couldn’t even if I tried. Even if I just wanted to say, “Hey, let me just crib, everything Pat Morita did.” I’m not Pat Morita. It wouldn’t work. And, in the end, what made it even more surreal was Ralph Macchio, William Zabka, and Martin Kove they all came out to see the show in St. Louis. Talk about meeting your idols. So, it was an incredible experience.
Director, Actor, Playwright Jovanni Sy
JAMES
I did read somewhere that there are plans for Broadway. Is that correct?
JOVANNI
It’s still in the works. I think if it happened it would probably happen in 2024, but you never know. It could happen. I hope it does. I would love to do that show again.
JAMES
Is that an ambition of yours to get on the Broadway stage?
JOVANNI
You know, it wasn’t. I’m pretty happy with my career in Canada. I mean it’s not an ambition in the sense of one that I would say I actively pursued. There are musical theatre specialists who move to New York, and they’re clearly working towards that trajectory. So it was, I would say more of a fantasy than an ambition. I thought about it the same way I thought it would be great to play shortstop for the Jays, you know, it’s just in the back of my mind. I took no concrete steps to get there. It just sort of happened. But would it be great to be on Broadway? Yeah.
JAMES
I understand that when this opportunity first came up you were busy with a lot of other things and you went, “Nah, I’m not going to do it.” But your wife, Leanna Brodie, had some good career advice for you.
JOVANNI
That’s absolutely true. When I got the call I was directing my thesis play at the University of Calgary. I had just started. I was at the busiest I could have been and I was also scheduled to direct a show in Winnipeg around the time that Karate Kid would’ve happened. So, I thought, you know, I already said I’d do something else, but she said, “Look your friend would understand if you got this. You could pull out of your directing commitment.” Which I ended up doing. But she told me, “If you’re going to do it, don’t just do it half-ass. Do a good job.” And I listened to her. I actually really worked on the video audition. I sent it in still thinking this is ridiculous. There’s no way. But it happened. It just happened and I almost didn’t bother submitting because I thought I’m too busy. Leona is the smartest person I know and always gives very good advice.
Daniel Chen as Victor Fung and John Ng as Tommy Lam in the Vertigo Theatre Premier of Nine Dragons by Jovanni Sy. Directed by Craig Hall. Photo by Tim Nguyen.
JAMES
You’re an actor, director, and you’re also a playwright. Your very own mystery, Nine Dragons, premiered on the Vertigo stage in 2017, which I saw, and I really liked. The story follows Chinese Detective Tommy Lam in 1920s Hong Kong, while he investigates the deaths of several women, and he finds himself battling racism and he risks losing his career, reputation, and maybe even his life. So where did the inspiration for that story come from and what does the future hold for Detective Tommy Lam?
JOVANNI
The funny thing is, I had an image of Tommy’s foil the character Victor Fung, first. I think I saw a picture of a Chinese man in a beautiful tuxedo looking very Noel Cowardesque and I thought, what an interesting man, who is he, why is he dressed like this? And I thought of a Victor Fung like character and I’ve always loved mysteries so the idea to make it noiresque and set it in 1920s Colonial Hong Kong came early.
I was working on this piece in Toronto before I moved out to Vancouver in 2012, but I ran into Craig Hall the artistic director of Vertigo Theatre at a conference in Calgary and we talked about this piece I was writing and he thought, that sounds really interesting. And Craig has his own connection to Hong Kong, and he’s been to Hong Kong a number of times. So, that’s how it started. That’s the connection to Vertigo and why it premiered there. It wouldn’t have happened without Craig.
And what’s in store for Tommy? Craig actually commissioned a prequel, which is another Tommy Lam story that takes place about thirteen years before Nine Dragons. So, we’re talking 1911, Hong Kong and I started working on it. And it may have a future at Vertigo. Jack Grinhaus the current artistic director of Vertigo Theatre and I have been talking about it but it’s early. We’ll see.
JAMES
You know, you’re writing plays and you’re creating this character have you ever thought of writing some Tommy Lam mystery novels? You could write a whole series.
JOVANNI
I haven’t. But you know I love that genre and if I were to turn to long-form fiction, I think I would go in the mystery direction.
John Ng as Tommy Lam and Duval Lang as Henderson in the Vertigo Theatre Premiere of Nine Dragons by Jovanni Sy. Directed by Craig Hall. Photo by Tim Nguyen.
JAMES
So, you not only write mystery, but you also write comedy and congratulations are in order because you recently won the Playwrights Guild of Canada Comedy Award for your play, The Tao of the World. And it’s a free adaptation of William Congreve’s Restoration comedy, The Way of the World. Your modern version takes place in Singapore, and it’s two years after a pandemic and the wealthy elite are making up for lost time by hatching schemes to bed other people’s partners and to swindle each other out of their dynastic fortunes. What’s the story behind the creation of that work?
JOVANNI
It’s really weird. I was at the UofC doing my MFA in directing and I needed to direct a thesis play. It kind of happened coincidentally because I was working on this Nine Dragons prequel which is a totally different beast and I had plans to direct this other play, a Brecht piece and then the faculty had some reservations about the viability of doing that piece so they suggested I do something else. And somebody said, “You know, we’re in the middle of COVID, we could use some laughs. Have you thought about doing a comedy?”
So, I thought, I’ve always loved Restoration comedy. I remember seeing a bunch early in my career and being a fan of a number of them. And I started looking at them and I thought about The Way of the World, but I thought at the same time, how can I take this established piece and try to reinterpret it from modern times because there’s something interesting about a new definition of restoration.
The Restoration comedies are all about the restoration of the monarchy after Cromwell. You know, the years of the Republic. So it’s the restoration of the monarchy coming in because most of the English royalists had been exiled in France. But what does restoration mean today? And to me it really meant the restoration of everyday life after we’ve been shut down.
I started working on it right in the middle of COVID when we were still working remotely, learning remotely. Masks were mandatory. Social distancing was mandatory. And so, what would it be like after COVID? Because I imagine the rich and wealthy would be just as naughty post-COVID as they were post-restoration of the monarchy, there’d be a kind of a giddy bawdiness and licentiousness.
And of course, I wanted to set it in an Asian setting because that’s what I’ve done with a lot of my works is try to recenter the experience to interpret it to a modern audience that includes Asians but doesn’t exclude everyone else. So that’s how it came about and was set in Singapore. It was almost like an experiment that just went really, really well.
JAMES
So, you know, it’s funny you mentioned needing a play and then this comes along. How much of your work do you find is just having the practical thing that you need and then inspiration strikes?
JOVANNI
That happens more often than you’d guess. I hadn’t even thought of it that way. Thank you. Wow. That’s a real, Aha! Yeah. I think it’s born of pragmatism first then the inspiration comes later. Or you know, not even inspiration. It’s like, I’ve got something to solve, so how do I solve it? I’m almost a believer that inspiration’s overrated and that if you frame creativity as a series of puzzles to be solved where you can define the parameters what you would call inspiration comes afterwards because you’ve had something active to work on.
Which is why I love writing in genre. I love the mystery genre. So, genre can actually be liberating because it sets the parameters for you and gives you something to do so you don’t have time to worry about do I have some kind of divine inspiration? You’re just trying to crack a knot, right?
JAMES
Inspiration is problem-solving.
JOVANNI
Yeah.
JAMES
We read mysteries, and we watch them on TV or at the movies, but there’s something extra fun and engaging about going to the theatre and seeing detective fiction. What makes the stage such an ideal and fun medium for experiencing a who-done-it and what sort of fun are audiences in for when they come to see your production of Murder on the Orient Express?
JOVANNI
I think first, it’s ultimately a fair test because you are literally, as an audience member, seeing everything exactly the same as the detective is seeing it. Everything that’s happening is happening in front of your eyes. There are no edits. There’s no selective choosing of things. You are solving the mystery at the same rate and with the same details that the detective has. So, it’s fair.
But the other thing is the implication that you can experience a surprise. The gasp. It’s happening right in front of your eyes – the mystery or shock, or unexpected bit of violence, or an unexpected bit of mayhem – it’s so immediate. And I think that’s why the stage is one of the best places to see mystery because it’s a visceral thing. You get that immediate connection when reading a mystery but it’s not in front of your eyes. You’re not seeing blood or a flash of light or hearing a sound that resonates to your core. So, if you’re going to see Murder on the Orient Express, you’re in for a literal ride. It’s like a train ride. You feel like you’re there on the train confined with the passengers and there’s a sense of danger and a sense of fun.
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VERTIGO THEATRE presents Agatha Christie’s classic MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS Adapted for the stage by Ken Ludwig
Agatha Christie’s MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS features Haysam Kadri as Hercule Poirot, Luigi Riscaldino as Michel the Conductor/ Head Waiter, Stafford Perry as Col. Arbuthnot/Ratchett, Jesse Del Fierro as Mary Debenham, Elinor Holt as Mrs. Hubbard, Alexander Ariate as Hector MacQueen, Mike Tan as Monsieur Bouc, Elizabeth Stepkowski-Tarhan as Princess Dragomiroff, Lara Schmitz as Greta Ohlsson and Sarah Roa as Countess Andrenyi.
MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS is Directed by Jovanni Sy, Assistant Direction by Camryn Hathaway, Set & Projection Design by Scott Reid, Costume Design by April Viczko, Assistant Costume Design by Katriona Dunn, Lighting Design by Jonathan Kim, Sound Design & Original Composition by Andrew Blizzard, Assistant Lighting Design by Tauran Wood, Fight & Intimacy Direction by Brianna Johnston, Stage Management by Donna Sharpe, Ashley Rees, and Raynah Bourne.
This holiday season Desert Crown Theatre produced a festive and entertaining production of my stage adaption of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. A Christmas Carol is the ageless story of redemption where Ebenezer Scrooge having turned his back on love and his fellow man is visited by three Christmas spirits who teach him the error of his ways. In this fun and lively adaptation, you’ll still find all the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future along with Tiny Tim, Bob Cratchit, the Ghost of Jacob Marley, Old Fezziwig, Scrooge’s nephew Fred, and the love of Scrooge’s life, Belle. There are some scary bits, a few good laughs, a tender moment or two, and some surprises! It’s a fresh take on an old tale sure to thrill young and old alike.
Desert Crown Theatre is based in Vail, Arizona a small community of about 15,000 not too far from Tucson. Last year a group of Vail residents got together to start a new community theatre company in order to provide opportunities for youth to explore and experience the arts including drama. I sat down with Christine Ralston one of the founding members of Desert Crown Theatre and her husband Nate Ralston who is playing Scrooge this year to talk with them about Desert Crown Theatre and this year’s production of A Christmas Carol.
CHRISTINE RALSTON
I grew up in an extremely performance-oriented family. We played instruments, we did theatre, we did film, we did dance. It was really important to my parents to let us explore. Not all of us acted, not all of us sang, not all of us danced. I’m in the middle of seven siblings. There’s a lot of us. But they really wanted us to have an outlet.
All of our children are older teenagers or adults now but when they started going through middle and high school I was shocked when I found out there weren’t clubs with those types of activities available. And our schools are great schools it’s just after years of seeing no choir or drama club we decided to form Desert Crown Theatre.
I’m the director of youth programs so my passion is to do things like our summer camps and our hope is to provide kids and the community with an artistic outlet and to keep it at a low enough cost so that it’s not pricing children out. Because they might not ever try it otherwise, and we’ve already discovered some kids who are extremely talented and have really bright futures in performing who came to summer camp and who had never done anything before.
NATE RALSTON
I did some community theatre where I grew up. Even where I grew up, there was a community theatre. I didn’t start Desert Crown Theatre but I’m supportive of it because I had that opportunity as a youth. I was in three plays as a teenager. Crazy for You, Number the Stars, and Babes in Toyland. And I really liked it. I thought it was a lot of fun. And last year when we were doing A Christmas Carol I really liked the role of Marley. It seemed like it would be fun to be the mean and angry ghost. And this year I wanted the opportunity to try the main role and there are some challenges to it as well, but I enjoy that.
Nate Ralston as Scrooge, Raedin Ralston as Young Scrooge, Taylor Ralston as Niece Emma, Éowyn Ralston as Little Fan in A Christmas Carol at Desert Crown Theatre. Pete Mecozzi Photography
JAMES HUTCHISON
One of the fun things about this year’s show is your entire family is involved. Nate, you’re playing Scrooge. Christine, you’re the stage manager and also the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come. You’ve got your son Raedin playing Young Scrooge and your daughters Krystin, Éowyn, and Evelynn are also part of the cast and Afton is helping backstage. So, this is the second year the entire Ralston family has been involved with the production of A Christmas Carol. What’s it like having the whole family working on the show and what are some of your family traditions you celebrate this time of year?
CHRISTINE
It’s great. It’s building a really fun memory this year, especially with our son playing young Scrooge opposite his dad’s Scrooge. It’s brilliant because he looks like him and can mimic him so well that it makes for a very believable character.
NATE
The difficulty is that whenever we stand next to each other I have to get on my tippy toes so it doesn’t look too odd because he’s a couple of inches taller than me.
CHRISTINE
It’s definitely building a new tradition for our family. And as far as our other family traditions, we don’t really have too many. I grew up in a family and we observed Hanukkah from my dad’s side, but we also did Christmas. And we still do both.
NATE
What we do for Hanukkah is celebrate with latkes and dreidel. And now that the kids are older dreidel has kind of passed by the wayside. We have some end-of-year traditions. There’s a place we walk to and see the Christmas lights. We have our traditions about how we celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve and the way we have a Christmas Eve dinner and Christmas Day dinner.
CHRISTINE
And every year, at least one or two of us has participated in our church’s Christmas music program.
Michael Shaughnessy as The Ghost of Jacob Marley in the Desert Crown Theatre production of A Christmas Carol. Pete Mecozzi Photography
JAMES
Nate last year as you mentioned you played Jacob Marley and this year you’re playing Scrooge and the play deals with redemption and forgiveness. And I’m wondering how playing Scrooge, a man in desperate need of redemption and forgiveness, has made you think about those two aspects of life.
NATE
I have to be fully honest. I’m a religious man, and that’s a normal part of my life. It’s a daily part of my life; asking for forgiveness; looking for redemption. I believe that all men are sinners and have fallen short of the glory of God and the play focuses a lot on the idea of redemption. One of the lines in the show is Bob Cratchit telling his family what Tiny Tim had said in church earlier. And he had said that he hopes everybody can see him as a cripple so that they can remember who it was that made blind men see and lame men walk. A Christmas Carol without mentioning any names focuses quite a bit on Jesus Christ, and I think if I were to have a wish it would be that this show can help bring people closer to the saviour – to the redeemer. So, for me personally, this has not really added to or changed the way that I view forgiveness and redemption instead I guess I’d say it further strengthens my belief in it.
CHRISTINE
In the play, you can really see that the Cratchit family is a religious family. They read Psalms together when they’re in mourning and they go to Church and it shows that they have that connection and that faith that things are going to be okay, and they’re going to make it through. A Christmas Carol is a show that is all about finding hope. It’s not like redemption goes away at the end of your life. Even in your later years, it’s still attainable because it’s never too late for forgiveness or to change. I think that’s a good message that A Christmas Carol shares with everybody who comes to see it.
Nate Ralston as Scrooge, Christine Ralston as The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come in A Christmas Carol at Desert Crown Theatre. Pete Mecozzi Photography
JAMES
I don’t think until Scrooge is pleading near the end of the play in the graveyard with the Ghost of Christmas Future and he asks for forgiveness that he has a chance for redemption.
CHRISTINE
The graveyard scene is really intense. Especially for us because it’s the two of us up there alone in the graveyard with the tombstone. And we play my character the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come as a lady in full Victorian mourning with a veil. And Scrooge is asking for mercy. This man who at the beginning of the play would never have asked for something like that.
We really try to give that scene a bit of desperation. Nate ends up on the ground in full tears and is really desperate because he thinks that he can’t do anything and the spirit has turned her back on him and it’s a really powerful moment. Not only is he asking for mercy he is also realizing he has to ask for forgiveness. Mercy isn’t just given. Mercy needs to be earned as well.
That’s one of our favourite scenes especially because the following scene is so different. He has pledged that he’s going to change and he wakes up in his bedroom a completely new person. And I think that’s really symbolic.
JAMES
Every theatre company brings their own vision to the telling of the story. Tell me a little bit about the vision for this year’s production as you bring it to the stage.
CHRISTINE
Audiences come to A Christmas Carol for the atmosphere. There had been discussion of do we modernize this or do we change the time period. And the overall consensus was, no. People want to be transported back to a simpler time. People want a classic tale told in its own time which means gorgeous costumes. And we wanted to make our atmosphere immersive so the second you walk through the door we have a choir and they’re phenomenal singers in Victorian garb, and we have a Christmas tree auction set up, and we want our audience to walk in and be filled with the Christmas spirit. That’s kind of our goal with this show.
Nate Ralston as Scrooge and Porter Turner as Tiny Tim in A Christmas Carol at Desert Crown Theatre. Pete Mecozzi Photography
JAMES
When I was writing the play I wanted to create a scene that showed how Bob Cratchit is a really good dad and that he’s playful and there’s this wonderful humour and love in the family. And that’s the scene where we see the Cratchit family on Christmas day.
CHRISTINE
I think how you wrote it gives credit to Bob because despite the fact that he comes from this cold, harsh workplace and working for Scrooge he is able to leave that at his door when he comes home to his family. And so, you have this bubbly happy home and they’re playful and excited. Most portrayals don’t really put that in.
NATE
One of the difficult aspects of playing Scrooge is trying to figure out when he’s going to start having this change of heart because he’s super cold and angry, and then he goes on this journey and sees things in the past and it hurts him a little bit, but does it really make sense for that to be the thing that immediately changes his heart?
There’s got to be this gradual change and in the scene where Bob Cratchit and his family are celebrating Christmas and they’re so happy and it’s so much fun he sees what it’s like to have a happy home. I don’t think it makes any sense for Scrooge to start to feel any happiness unless he’s seen how happy Bob is with his family. So, one of the things that I try to show is how the happiness Bob is experiencing with his family is having an effect on Scrooge.
Sierra Turner as Mrs. Cratchit and Porter Turner as Tiny Tim in the Desert Crown Theatre Production of A Christmas Carol. Pete Mecozzi Photography
JAMES
One of the other things I have in my version of the play is that Mrs. Cratchit actually does get to give Scrooge a piece of her mind. That’s something she says she’d like to do in the book, but she never gets the chance.
CHRISTINE
Oh, absolutely. And our Mrs. Cratchit plays it so beautifully. She is a sweet and loving mother and she’s so kind and when she stands up for Bob in the street scene on Christmas Day, she does give Scrooge a piece of her mind because she’s a woman of her word. And then of course, Scrooge immediately triples Bob’s salary and she’s taken aback. I think sometimes Mrs. Cratchit gets left behind. So, it’s nice to let her have a moment.
I actually had the actress ask me, what’s her first name? And I said, go read the book. She doesn’t have one. Because it was written that way. In the book, she was just Mrs. Cratchit. And one of the things we have hidden on stage is an original edition of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol.
JAMES
So, maybe the spirit of Charles Dickens might be there to help you guys out.
CHRISTINE
That’s what I think. This book is from the eighteen-hundreds and it’s on our set and the audience doesn’t know it, but we know it. And we’ve got a cast of about 45 people, 20 of which are children. And it helps our board to see that so many people believe in us and support us. And when you have a large cast they bring more people to the theatre and I really stress to the cast as much as I can that you don’t know who you’re going to inspire, whether it’s an audience of 30 or 300 or 3000, you don’t know who you might inspire out there.
We had a little girl show up to auditions with her dad, who we’ve known for a few years and we convinced him to come in and read and guess who’s playing Fezziwig. He did not expect to audition. He had never done this sort of thing before and we just said to give it a go. And it turned out he had a talent for it and he had just never put himself out there. And he is having so much fun and doing the show with his daughters. His one teenage daughter is the assistant stage manager and the little one is playing Ignorance. And it’s just been so much fun to have that many people involved.
Anna Dalgleish and Caleb Gordon in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. Adapted for the stage by Ron Reed and Directed by Morris Ertman.
This holiday season Rosebud Theatre is taking audiences on a magical journey back to Narnia in a fun and family-friendly stage adaptation of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis.
In the original story Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie are four children who have been evacuated to the countryside from London during the early days of World War II. The children soon discover a wardrobe in their new home that leads them to the magical land of Narnia. Narnia is locked in a forever winter but never Christmas spell by the White Witch who rules over the land. The story revolves around the promise of spring and end of the Witch’s rule that is prophesized when two sons of Adam and two daughters of Eve mark the return of Aslan the lion who is the rightful King of Narnia.
In Ron Reed’s stage adaptation Lucy and Peter return to the wardrobe as adults many years later and relive their adventures in the land of Narnia when they were children. The production is directed by Morris Ertman and stars Anna Dalgleish and Caleb Gordon who play Lucy and Peter as well as all the other characters in the story including Aslan, the White Witch, Mr. and Mrs. Beaver, Father Christmas, and Mr. Tumnus.
I was lucky enough to catch the opening weekend of the play and experience a terrific production that reminds all of us about the joy and imagination of childhood while bringing a beloved story to life. I sat down with the talented stars of the show, Anna and Caleb, to talk with them about the production, their love of theatre, and what they want for Christmas.
ANNA DALGLEISH
For a long time, I’ve been seriously looking at adopting cats and I get an early Christmas gift this weekend. I get to adopt two little kittens and I’m very excited about that. So, Christmas comes early for me. It starts this week.
CALEB GORDON
The last time we did this show I was involved as an assistant stage manager and the gift shop sells Turkish Delight. I never thought I would like Turkish Delight, but I had a bag of their stuff, and I liked it so much that I bought them out. So, let me just hawk for the gift shop. Ten dollars a bag. It’s very tasty. Turkish Delight is my answer.
JAMES HUTCHISON
I’m curious, when did each of you discover your love of theatre and what was it about that experience or moment in time that stirred your soul?
ANNA
Well, I have a very special story that goes along with this because the very first time I saw a play, it was a two-hander version of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Pacific Theater had put on a show very similar to this one, but it was a different adaptation. I had never seen a play before. I was a four-year-old, so it was all magic to me.
And then when I was six years old the second show I ever saw was also The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. And that was when I fell in love with theatre because I have very strong memories of that. By this point I was an avid reader and already quite an imaginative kid and to see something playing out in real life embodied by people right in front of my very eyes who were profoundly affecting my emotions and whose story I was following along with captivated me. And so, my love of theatre is all tied to this story, and I was very keen to do the show when the chance came around.
Anna Dalgleish and Caleb Gordon in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. Adapted for the stage by Ron Reed and Directed by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
What about you, Caleb?
CALEB
I went into theatre when I was in grade nine, and I was very good at it. And I say good at it because I could memorize things very well, but I had no idea about emotions or that maybe I should use them on stage.
And I remember when I had just turned eighteen sitting down and having a really big conversation with myself. I had gone to a summer drama camp, and they had talked about the presence of the fool in a lot of Shakespeare’s plays. And I hated being a fool. I hated not being in control was the real thing. And I remember thinking, maybe that’s not healthy and maybe I should look into that.
And so, I did. I decided, let’s do all the things I’ve never done before. Let’s be the fool. Let’s be okay with being a fool because what we had talked about in summer school was how fools are the only ones who are comfortable in chaos and limbo. Everything and everybody else gets turned upside down, but the fools are the ones who are suddenly the guides and the way keepers in those situations. And I thought, “Wow, that sounds infinitely better than been tossed around and lost at sea and not actually knowing where I’m going.” And so, I would say from that moment onwards is where my love of theatre was truly ignited.
JAMES
Your love of theatre brought you to the Rosebud School of the Arts. Both of you are graduates. So, tell me about your relationship with Rosebud and how you feel it has helped shape you as artists.
ANNA
There’s something so intense about forming an artistic voice in such an immersive education environment. Rosebud is basically a street that crosses another street and when you dip down into the valley it’s like you’re fully immersed in theatre and in your studies. And at times that was incredibly intense and sometimes even overwhelming. But at the end of the day, I think that the immersion into the world of theatre that exists at Rosebud is what has made me such a holistic theatre person and so willing to dive into the deep end every time I get a chance to do something theatrical.
CALEB
I know that when I came to Rosebud, I used to be quite a people pleaser and I would always defer to other people and their needs, but Rosebud was small enough that I couldn’t do that anymore. Instead, I had to actually take the stage and when the light was shone on me I had to step into it. Rosebud is where I started to listen to my own voice as opposed to the voices of others and that was very helpful for me in realizing who I was. Rosebud is a place where when you graduate you are your own artist with your own voice.
JAMES
Did you find the same Anna, that you discovered your individuality as an artist when you were in Rosebud?
ANNA
Absolutely. We were all so different from one another and that’s a comforting feeling when you’re at an audition because auditions are always nerve-wracking. They’re going to see sixty people today and how in the world am I going to stand out? But my training here taught me that it is not about outshining, it’s about bringing what only you have to offer to the audition.
And then at the end of the day, if that’s a fit for the show, fantastic. If it’s not a fit for the show, it’s not because you’re a bad actor, it’s because you have shown them what you have to offer and they’re going with someone who has a different thing to offer. So, you never have to pretend to be someone you’re not. You just have to bring your unique gift. And I think that Rosebud grads are encouraged to have that sense of self and that sense of individuality and to put their own quirky stamp on who they are and what they bring.
Anna Dalgleish and Caleb Gordon in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. Adapted for the stage by Ron Reed and Directed by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
There’s a famous quote by George Bernard Shaw. “We don’t stop playing because we grow old. We grow old because we stop playing.” And I think that’s an interesting idea when we look at this particular adaptation of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe because Lucy and Peter are adults and they’re remembering their childhood adventures.
CALEB
One of my favourite parts of this show is when Aslan comes back and we just play tag for a few moments. The exuberance that I feel in that moment not only from myself but from the audience as well is so exciting. Who would’ve thought that watching two people run around on a stage playing tag was exciting? And yet it is. Even today, we just came out of a show and oh goodness, people were excited and chattering, and all I’m doing is running around on stage out of breath.
And I think I have a sense of play. I play a lot of video games and tabletop games and that sort of thing, but I’m realizing just how much a sense of play is actually something to be celebrated because it’s not that people don’t have a sense of play it’s that people can’t express it fully because they’ve been told that’s a thing that you leave as a child and now that you’re older you have responsibilities. You can have responsibility, but you can do it with a wink in the eye and a sense of play.
ANNA
This question makes me think of the dedication in the novel that C.S. Lewis wrote to his goddaughter who was named Lucy. And he says something like this, by the time I’m finished writing this book, you may have grown out of fairy tales but there will come a day – one day where you’re old enough to read fairy tales again, and I hope this book will find you then.
And I think that’s true of the characters in the story. I think Peter and Lucy are far enough away from their adventures as children and are far enough into their lives in England as adults where they need to remember how to read fairy tales and how to play again. And I think it is that sense of play and embracing that childhood belief and courage and adventure that brings a taste of that Narnian magic back to them in the present moment.
CALEB
And in this play, at one point I’m Peter playing Edmond watching Lucy play the Witch Queen and she levitates her wand. And the wand does levitate because a Narnian is holding it up for her. And there’s that moment where Peter’s thinking, “Did I just see that? Is that what’s really going on right now?” And those moments in our adulthood are just a trick of the light but as a child those moments are not a trick of the light they really happen.
ANNA
That’s another magical thing that is brought to life in this particular production because even though we have two primary storytellers we have two other actors Christopher Allen and Lacey Cornelsen involved in the process. We start out in this dusty old room and because of these two other actors the whole room bursts with magic and the involvement of these two Narnian characters makes you really believe that the magic has come back.
Anna Dalgleish, Caleb Gordon, Christopher Allen and Lacey Cornelsen in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. Adapted for the stage by Ron Reed and Directed by Morris Ertman.
JAMES
When Lucy and Peter first discovered Narnia, it’s a land of perpetual winter and never Christmas. In fact, the White Witch’s magic keeps Father Christmas from being able to visit Narnia. And the story is about the arrival of Aslan and the breaking of that spell. And the story takes place in England during World War II and it’s about living through tough times with a vision of better times in the future. What is it about Christmas do you think that renews our hopes for a more compassionate and better world?
ANNA
I think for one thing winter is a very desolate time and if it goes on for too long you begin to wonder if we are ever going to see tulips again or crocus again or all these beautiful springtime miracles. And I think that Christmas is representative of that miraculous life springing forth.
And I know that for C.S. Lewis a ton of his interest and passion was in the Christ story and of course that’s remembered at Christmas time where out of nowhere a miracle is born that turns the whole world upside down. And I think, in this story Father Christmas who comes in with this boisterous energy and gifts galore represents the turning point. And he comes with the good news that Aslan is in fact here and the balance of power is shifting, and the melt will come and you will have what you need to be prepared for the coming world.
CALEB
I remember being very young and thinking Christmas is about getting presents and it’s all about getting the Fisher-Price Knights and Castle set or whatever it was that I really wanted. And then of course you go through a little bit more and you realize, ok, maybe it’s actually more about getting socks and more about the people that I spend it with.
And I have always enjoyed the Christmases that I’ve experienced in Rosebud. I worked in the Mercantile for quite a few years while I was a student, and I remember having so many good memories of the place. Closing down and we’ve sent all the patrons home and it’s dark and there’s just a little bit of excitement because even though it’s cold outside and it’s freezing and Kevin’s car won’t start we know that we have a community out here in the middle of nowhere who gather and find warmth with each other’s kindness.
And I remember thinking in the early days of COVID that we might never have theatre again. I tried a few ZOOM readings where I read Shakespeare with a bunch of other players to an audience and it just does not feel the same. There’s no life through the digital ether, unfortunately. I think technology is great but realizing it’s never going to bridge that gap like real live theatre can was very worrisome.
So, it’s reassuring to come out of it now and I’m dealing with a cold but instead of saying sorry everybody I have a cold and you’re just going to have to deal with that I can say sorry everyone I’m going to be masked up for the next little while because I don’t want to spread that to everybody. COVID brought a lot of realities to the forefront. Theatre is a precarious career at times. It’s precarious and it’s a gift to be able to be in front of people and I should take care of myself and others while I do it.
Anna Dalgleish and Caleb Gordon in the Rosebud Theatre Production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. Adapted for the stage by Ron Reed and Directed by Morris Ertman.
ANNA
Theatre artists have always been adaptive and the fact that it’s a live art means that at any moment anything can happen and you have to adapt to it. We’ve always been good at that. But I think COVID taught us on an industry scale, just how flexible we can be and how creative we can be about solutions.
And I think bringing all of that adaptation and creativity back into the theatre when audiences have been allowed to return, has made us care for each other better and has made us even more grateful for the gift that is being inches away from your scene partner and being just feet away from the audience.
There’s nothing like a full theatre of well-fed, excited individuals ready to watch a show and Rosebud does that unlike anyone else. It’s been a glorious and joy-filled homecoming, these returns to full audiences. And now I think none of us take it for granted. So, there’s extra magic in that for sure.
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The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis adapted for the stage by Ron Reed stars Anna Dalgleish as Lucy and Caleb Gordon as Peter along with Christopher Allan and Lacey Cornelsen as Narnians. Director Morris Ertman, Fight Director Nathan Schmidt, Scenic Designer Morris Ertman, Costume Designer Hanne Loosen, Lighting Designer Michael K. Hewitt, Sound Designer/Composer Luke Ertman, Stage Manager Samantha Showalter, Assistant Stage Manager Koayla Cormack.
This interview was conducted on Friday, November 11, 2022, and has been edited for length and clarity. Last Revised on December 22, 2022.
Tara Laberge as Emily Murphy in the Drama on a Dime and Urban Stories Theatre Production of High and Splendid Braveries by playwright Caroline Russell-King. Photograph by Benjamin Laird.
Playwright Caroline Russell-King has been writing plays and entertaining audiences for more than forty years. Her Palliser Suite trilogy of one-act comedies which all take place at the Palliser Hotel in Calgary was shortlisted for the National Steven Leacock Award for humour. Her play Selma Burke, which she co-wrote with Maria Crooks, and is about the life and work of African American sculptress Selma Burke was shortlisted for this year’s Sharon Pollock Award. And her most recent play High and Splendid Braveries explores addiction, women’s rights, and prohibition all told through the life and times of Emily Murphy one of The Famous Five. Not only is Caroline a gifted playwright but she’s also a dramaturg, theatre critic, and ghostwriter. You can find out more information about her plays and professional services by visiting her website at www.carolinerusselking.com.
I saw High and Splendid Braveries a few nights ago in The Motel at the Arts Commons and I’m happy to report that it’s a play filled with wonderful moments – funny, tragic, heartbreaking, and triumphant all brought to life by a powerful script and a terrific cast of five actors playing multiple roles. The Famous Five were five Alberta women who lead the fight to have Canadian women recognized constitutionally as persons. Emily Murphy led the battle and was supported by Irene Parlby, Louise McKinney, Henrietta Muir Edwards, and Nellie McClung. Their case was rejected by The Supreme Court of Canada in 1928, but the Judicial Committee of the British Privy Council, which was the highest court in the land at the time, decided in favour of the women on October 18, 1929.
I sat down with Caroline to talk with her about High and Splendid Braveries and the journey the play took to go from page to stage.
JAMES HUTCHISON
Initially, you wanted to write a play about The Famous Five but felt that a two-hour play simply couldn’t capture the lives of all these women, and you found that one voice above the others began to speak to you. Tell me about that process and the years it took to go from your original inspiration to a finished play.
CAROLINE RUSSELL-KING
Well, the truth of the matter is that I didn’t know anything about them. I was woefully ignorant. And so, I was reading an article in Avenue magazine, and it was about the first unveiling of the statues of The Famous Five in Calgary, and I thought, “Oh, that’s interesting.” And in the back of my head I thought, “Oh, that’s a good Alberta Foundation for the Arts grant because it’s about women’s history, and somebody will fund me to write a play about that.” And then I started researching these women and I started falling in love with these women and being awestruck by these women and being completely swayed by them.
The Women are Persons! statue in Calgary honouring The Famous Five. Sculpted by Barbara Paterson. Photo courtesy of Frances Wright.
So, I did a lot of research. I read their books, and I went to Ottawa and put on the white gloves and looked at the original correspondence in the archives, and I had some copies of that sent to me. I did interviews with people including Frances Wright who’s the CEO of The Famous 5 Foundation, and my mother-in-law Angela Matthews was a contributor and supporter of The Famous Five, and I’m not sure exactly how it happened, but I got invited to the inner circle and unveiling of The Famous Five Statues on Parliament Hill. So, I got to meet The Prime Minister, Jean Chretien, and go into the Senate and meet the senators and have cocktails with Margaret Trudeau. And that was interesting because that’s where I first started thinking about loss. There were lots of activities going on at the time, and I fell down that whole rabbit hole of research, and then I started writing the play.
And the play was too much. There were too many storylines and too many parts. And I thought I can’t write about The Famous Five. I have to focus on one. So, the one I was most attracted to was Emily, and a lot of people have written about Nellie. There are a lot of Nellie plays out there. But I thought of Emily because she was literally the driving force behind getting this thing done.
People think the story is about women wanting to become persons. Well, we already knew we were persons. So, what did Emily really want? I followed that thread, and I read her book, The Black Candle, which was the first seminal book of research at the turn of the 20th century about opioids in Canada.
She went into drug dens and interviewed people and tried to make systemic change and tried to save lives. She was exposed to the idea of harm reduction. We think of harm reduction as being a new thing, but it isn’t. She would have been appalled at the closing of safe injection sites. She was really ahead of her time in a lot of ways. She was trying to save lives and stop the flow of opium. She was amazing. She was a neat broad. I liked her a lot.
Ginette Simonot as Princess Poppy with Martina Laird-Westib and Shannon Leahy in the Drama on a Dime and Urban Stories Theatre production of High and Splendid Braveries by playwright Caroline Russell-King. Photo by Benjamin Laird
JAMES
You said in the introduction to your play that she whispered to you in the night.
CAROLINE
You know what it’s like. You’re a playwright. You know what they do. They wake you up and they start talking to you and then you have to grab a pen and start writing it down.
JAMES
It makes our job easier.
CAROLINE
It does.
JAMES
The play features five actors portraying multiple characters, and the play is very fluid in terms of moving between locations. And I think it’s very cinematic with short scenes, but you can follow the major narrative quite easily. Tell me about the team of people you’ve gathered together to bring High and Splendid Braveries to the stage and to life.
CAROLINE
I have my very good friend Elizabeth Stepkowski Tarhan directing the play. She’s a fairly new director, but she has a huge wealth of theatrical experience. She’s worked all over Canada in A houses with the best directors, and she brings with her this huge wealth and passion and rigour and care.
Director Elizabeth Stepkowski Tarhan and the cast of High and Splendid Braveries by playwright Caroline Russell-King in rehearsal.
And I wanted to do it in the Arts Commons. That was important to me. I’d heard a rumour, and I don’t know if it’s true, but I’d heard a rumour that the land opposite the Arts Commons is going to be repurposed and that there was some threat that The Famous Five statues might actually be moved away from there. And I thought, “I have to do my play before the statues get moved.” So, I wanted a theatre in close proximity to the statues, and the simplest and easiest way to make that happen in six months was to co-produce the play with Urban Stories Theatre and Helen Young, who has been producing shows in the Motel for ten years.
The cast includes my really good friend Allison Smith, whom I’ve known for forty years, and she played a pregnant clown in one of my first plays at The Glenmore Dinner Theatre. She doesn’t like to talk about that. (Laughs) So, Alison Smith and Martina Laird-Westib, Shannon Leahy, and Tara Laberge. I had seen Tara Laberge in a Fire Exit show, and I was really impressed by her work. And we have Ginette Simonot. She’s a rock star.
Playwright Caroline Russell-King in rehearsal for High and Splendid Braveries.
I couldn’t afford to put this show on with a full equity slate, so these are some of the best non-equity actors in town and what’s great about being a theatre critic is I’ve gone to a lot more theatre and seen a lot more people, and I’m always scanning for who’s out there and who is going to be somebody that I want to work with in the future. That’s how we got Tara Laberge, and then because of COVID we have an understudy – the lovely Tara Blue.
JAMES
One of the things I really liked about the play is that you let your characters speak from their particular perspective and the time in which they lived. So, we have characters voicing opinions and ideas that today we wouldn’t agree with but as an audience in 2022 we recognize the ideas as being out of step with how we think today. So, I’m curious to know your thoughts in terms of trying to be fair in presenting how these characters thought and still designing the play to reflect our modern views about some of the ideas you present.
CAROLINE
Well, it’s a conundrum, and it’s interesting because there’s been a shift towards taking those attitudes out of plays. I saw a play in the past year that was a historic piece that spoke so eloquently and so vocally about everything, but they wouldn’t have spoken like that at the time. They wouldn’t have said that. This voice is the voice of the playwright who wants to apologize for these characters. And because you’re a playwright you understand we want our characters to be flawed. We don’t want these perfect people doing perfect things in perfect situations with no conflict. That’s boring and unrealistic.
And The Famous Five, as they’ve come to be known, the more they get scrutinized under the microscope the more flawed they seem to people, and then people concentrate on those flaws as opposed to acknowledging the incredible amount of worth that happened because of these women. They literally changed the world.
I believe the audience is smart. I don’t like the term bums in seats. I like the term brains in seats. I think sometimes playwrights want to make things safe and spell stuff out or be superior in some ways, but I think the audience is bright and there are always going to be people in the audience that are smarter than I am.
JAMES
Do you think sometimes playwrights don’t want to be taken to task by presenting a controversial idea?
CAROLINE
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. But you know it’s not my personality to shy away from controversy. I always say one of my worst flaws and one of my best flaws is that I’m not a people pleaser. That being said, I would like people to enjoy my art, but I don’t write thinking about pleasing certain people or certain elements of our society. That’s not where I come from.
I think we need to talk about the issues more, and I think we need to get out of our silos and talk about the things that matter. We need to build bridges. We need to be able to communicate with each other. I mean, the issue of drug addiction – how is that not bipartisan? How is it that not everybody wants to address poverty and healthcare? What kind of world are we trying to build? It’s scary when we can’t talk to each other.
JAMES
One of the things that makes your story real is that you deal with loss. Emily’s personal loss. Could you speak a little bit about including that in the play?
CAROLINE
That actually came out of talking to Margaret Trudeau because I thought there’s a woman I have nothing in common with. We’ve got our little sandwiches and our drinks, and her life and my life are completely different. But she had this enamel pin on which was a rose for her late husband, and she had lost her son. And we started talking about grief. And I thought, well, that is the universal thing that joins us all together. The older we get the more we’ve encountered loss and grief and I immediately started thinking about Emily and thinking about what the loss of a child would have been like for her. I think personally there is no greater loss than the loss of a child. A spouse is hideous, brothers and sisters are hideous, and parents are bad, but they come in order. You’re a father, you know. How would you come back from that, right? That should be another bipartisan thing. Who doesn’t care about that?
Tara Laberge as Emily and Ginette Simonot as Doris in the Drama on a Dime and Urban Stories Theatre Production of High and Splendid Braveries by playwright Caroline Russell-King. Photo by Benjamin Laird.
JAMES
I’ve seen you on social media where you do a thing called Pop Up Playwright. On your website you say, “Pop Up Playwright is about creating art in public spaces. Playwrights are generally not visible. Actors are visible. Directors are. Playwrights not so much. I think we need to come out of our offices and move away from the kitchen tables and go out. Much like painters, we need to set up our easels and create in public.” Tell me about the decision to create Pop Up Playwright and what it’s been like to create art in public.
CAROLINE
Oh, it’s fascinating. It’s been a great social experiment. I’ve done Pop Up Playwright in hospitals, airports, downtown, at City Hall, libraries, and once on the street. I have my Pop Up Playwright sign I put up, but I also put up a little plexiglass sign that will say something like, “Ask me questions about plays. Feel free to interrupt me.” I invite interactions with people.
It’s very strange because you’re regarded overwhelmingly with such suspicion and one of the things that I get asked all the time is, “What are you selling?” And while I am a dramaturg, I’m not out there trying to drum up business. It’s about having discussions about theatre with people who might not even go to theatre. I love talking to people about so many things and having people come over and ask, “What are you working on?” And I can say, “I’m writing this scene. I don’t think it’s very good right now, but I think I know how to fix it.”
Allison Smith as Arthur and Tara Laberge as Emily in the Drama on a Dime and Urban Stories Theatre Production of High and Splendid Braveries by playwright Caroline Russell-King. Photo by Benjamin Laird.
JAMES
So, now that the play is finished and it’s being produced what does Emily Murphy, the Emily Murphy who spoke to you in the middle of the night and whispered in your ear, what does she think of the play, and what do you hope comes out of this?
CAROLINE
At the moment she would channel Nellie McClung and say, “Get the thing done and let them howl.” The big dream would be to have it produced at the 100th anniversary of the Persons Case, which is in 2029. I’d like to get it on at the NAC, so I’d like the play to have a bigger profile. I think that’s the only time producers would consider putting it on at that level.
But the most important thing is that people come away from the play having had an entertaining night at the theatre. That they haven’t been lectured to. It’s not an infomercial. It’s not a heritage moment. It’s not a quaint little story about Little House on the Prairie women trying to do their thing. These are real women. These are flawed women. These are women who are fighters.
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CAST & CREW
On a Dime Productions and Urban Stories Theatre presents High and Splendid Braveries by playwright Caroline Russell-King stars Tara Laberge, Allison Smith, Martina Laird-Westib, Ginette Simonot, Shannon Leahy, Tara Blue. Co-producers Helen Young & Caroline Russell-King, Director Elizabeth Stepkowski Tarhan, Stage Manager Andrea Cortes, Assistant Stage Manager Mary Bogucka, Assistant to the director and original music AJ Tarhan, Cello Morag Northey, Lighting Concepts Elizabeth Stepkowski Tarhan, Lighting Designer Calum Maunier, Lighting Tech Support Kai Hall.
