bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
New York Sam Shikaze, Private Eye
Authors: Kaplan Jon
Published: June 2023

It’s a familiar scene—the tough private detective steps out of the shadows, lights his cigarette, and, against a background of 40s jazz, begins his monologue to the audience. But though this is the world of Sam Spade, the figure is the Japanese-Canadian private eye, Sam Shikaze, and his beat is Vancouver’s Powell Street.
British Columbia White Rock Summer Theatre 1976-85
Authors: Page Malcolm
Published: June 2023

White Rock, on the American border an hour’s drive from downtown Vancouver, is not exactly a dormitory suburb for commuters, and not quite a seaside resort either, despite a good beach and annual sandcastle contest. Many of the population are retired; a substantial proportion are volunteers for good causes; artists and craftspeople gather there and in nearby Crescent Beach.
Readings in Review
Authors: Wagner Anton
Published: June 2023

Professional production opportunities for Canadian playwrights, meagre as they are in most parts of the country, have always been particularly limited in the Atlantic provinces. The region has never enjoyed the profusion of alternate theatre companies which, since the early 70s, have largely created the English-Canadian and Québécois drama we have today. While the more highly subsidized Neptune and Theatre New Brunswick have premiered works by John Gray, Alden Nowlan, and Walter Learning, major writers such as Gray, Michael Cook, and New Brunswick-born Sharon Pollock have made their reputations in other parts of Canada
An Introduction
Authors: Wallace Robert
Published: June 2023

A garrison is a closely knit and beleaguered society. . . . In such a society the terror is not for the common enemy, even when the enemy is or seems victorious. . . . The real terror comes when the individual feels himself becoming an individual, pulling away from the group, losing the sense of driving power that the group gives him, aware of a conflict within himself. . . .

— Northrop Frye, Conclusion to A Literary History of Canada.
The Princess of the Stars
Authors: Schafer R. Murray
Published: June 2023

The Princess of the Stars is an environmental performance piece created for solo soprano or mezzo-soprano, two mixed quartets or choruses, four actors or sound poets, six dancers, flute, clarinet, trumpet, horn, trombone, tuba, four percussionists, and about 20 canoeists. It was designed for performance at dawn on an autumn morning. The work was performed last August on Two-Jack Lake, just outside the Banff town-site, in celebration of the National Park centennial. Its principal characters, costumed and masked, occupy the bows of the canoes from which they chant an unknown language constructed principally from various key words in a number of Amerindian dialects. The audience, seated on the shore of the lake, is informed of the action by a Presenter who also Interprets some of the events. The musicians and singers are positioned around the perimeter of the lake whose irregular shoreline allows the canoes to enter from “off-stage.” The Princess of the Stars was co-directed by its composer, R. Murray Schafer and Brian Macdonald, designed by Diana and Jerrard Smith, and stage-managed by Robert Pel, Janet Anderson, and Louise Currie.
The Theatre of the Oppressed /1: To Rehearse the Revolution
Authors: Usmiani Renate
Published: June 2023

May 1985, and every theatre space in Montreal has come vibrantly alive as the Festival of the Americas brings together companies, critics, and theatre-lovers from all over the world. One of the most intriguing offerings: a “Conférence-spectacle sur le Théâtre de l’Opprimé” given by Augusto Boal and his team. The large hall at the Maison de Culture du Plateau Mont-Royal, in the heart of east-end Montreal, is packed. The crowd has settled on large cushions on the floor and is chatting away in many different languages. On stage is the “set”: some screens in the back of the acting area, percussion instruments to one side, and, in the centre, a formal-looking table complete with a carafe of water and a glass - the traditional paraphernalia of a public lecture. There is a difference, though: a closer look reveals a small goldfish swimming in the carafe, poking his nose at the audience through the glass. This is our first glimpse of Boal’s whimsical mix of reality and theatricality. We are intrigued.
Miranda
Authors: Ritter Erika
Published: June 2023

Caution © 1985 Erika Ritter. This play is fully protected under the copyright laws of Canada and all other countries of the Copyright Union and all performances are subject to royalty. Change to the script is expressly forbidden without written consent of Erika Ritter. Rights to produce, film, or record, in whole or in part, in any medium in any language, by any group amateur or professional, are retained by Erika Ritter. Interested persons are requested to apply for permission and terms to Erika Ritter, c/o CBC, Department of Communication, Box 500, Station A, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5W 1E6.
Vancouver Getting Physical
Authors: Grace-Warrick Christa
Published: June 2023

Poltergeists are loose in Vancouver theatre. Things are moving on the physical plane. Disciplines won’t stay apart and traditional associations are coming unglued. Dancers are acting, directors are creating movement scores, mimes are speaking, and playwrights are writing visual plays. All this kinesthetic upheaval is being caused by the emerging prominence of physical theatre.
Vancouver Who is Peter Eliot Weiss?
Authors: Thompson Peggy
Published: June 2023

Peter Eliot Weiss is one of the West Coast’s best-kept secrets. A talented actor and theatre artist, in Vancouver he also is known as an innovative playwright who is constantly redefining the writer’s role in theatre. Co-originator with his wife, director Kathleen Weiss, and myself, of Canada’s first improvised serial plays, West End, Pendrell At Bute, and A.B.C. Romance, he pioneered a number of performance/ writing techniques which he’s incorporated into his most recent works. These include the extremely successful collective creation Sex Tips for Modern Girls and the breath-takingly visual Going Down For The Count, along with other works like More Than Two Sides, Knitequest, and Saint Mar.
St. John’s The Pursuits of Cathy Jones
Authors: Clark Annette
Published: June 2023

The St. John’s Evening Telegram published the following wedding announcement last January, contributing an added dimension to the latest performance work of local artist, Cathy Jones:

Mr. and Mrs. Edgar J. Ffoxx are pleased to announce the wedding of their daughter Helen Faye to His Worship “Love” Murphy. Wedding to take place at the mayoral seat in Forksaw, Texas (elevation 7,000 feet). Codco’s Wedding in Texas, LSPU Hall, January 9–12, 14–19, 8:30 pm.
Newfoundland / 1: The Powers That Be
Authors: Goldie Terry
Published: June 2023

This year the LSPU Hall, the centre of theatre in St. John’s, is celebrating “A Decade of Performance.” But that strange dramatic flavour for which Newfoundland is justly famous didn’t really begin 10 years ago. Its birth took place a few years before, when Chris Brookes started the Mummers. Then came Codco and Newfoundland became a byword for energetic alternative theatre.
Newfoundland / 2: Giving Culture a Shape
Authors: Borlase Tim
Published: June 2023

Over the past number of years the performing arts in Labrador have stimulated a small but significant cultural revolution. The formula has been simple: where there was an idea, a crisis, or a way of life that needed to be explored, disentangled, or re-discovered, the creation of original dramatic material has provided a safe but captivating way to come to grips with it. This transmission through drama of indigenous culture in Eastern Labrador has directly benefited its creators and has also done a good deal to raise public awareness of social and cultural issues. As people witness and examine the issues that affect others, they at the same time identify the issues that are of artistic and intellectual significance to their own lives.
3 Enterprise Theatre Inc.
Authors: Etheridge David , Fitch Sheree , Ruganda John
Published: June 2023

When we watch a play, we want it to disturb us, unsettle us, scare us, or make us laugh until we have to think about the absurdity, or horror, of the situation. We want the play to make us rethink how we experience the world, to give us new perspectives: we don’t want our personal values reinforced, we want them challenged. For us, there are two kinds of theatre: theatre determined to entertain by telling us what we already know, and theatre that says something by assaulting or confronting what we think we know. Our idea of a good play is one with a message, a play in which there are at least two levels: action, and what we understand from the action - the meaning that the author is trying to convey through his or her characters, silences, and subtext. In short, we want to see works of art. More often than not, we’re disappointed. The plays may be artistic; there may be artful performances; but seldom Is there the excitement of art, or even failed art. These are exorbitant demands, but we don’t go to the theatre to be entertained any more than we go to the art gallery to be entertained. We go to the gallery to see what’s new in colour, what’s different In perspective, and we go to the theatre to see what’s new in the handling of human relationships.
Acadie: The Lights Around the Shore
Authors: Fancy Alex
Published: June 2023

The emergence of an Acadian theatre establishment in New Brunswick was the subject of a recent article in this publication by Zénon Chiasson.1 In it, Chiasson lauds the establishment of “. . . permanent, professional institutions to support local theatrical activities“ (p. 53). The theatre arts department of l’Université de Moncton, la Co-opérative de Théâtre de l’Escaouette, and le Théâtre Populaire d’Acadie are the most important of these ”institutions.“
Nova Scotia / 2: The Start of a Beautiful Relationship?
Authors: Regan Tom
Published: June 2023

To get to the Cunard Street Theatre you have to go into an area of Halifax that many locals prefer to avoid. From the downtown area, you travel up Duke Street, until you turn right at the police station that looks like a brick Gestapo headquarters. You cruise down Gottingen Street, past Buckley’s Music Shop with its barred windows protecting baby grands, past the St. Vincent de Paul shop with its statue of the patron saint, his fist vainly attempting to clutch a missing crucifix, and past the amusement hall where the kids gather to breakdance in the summertime. Cunard Street intersects Gottingen across from the deserted Tap Beverage Room, where Trevor Berbick one sparred for uninterested, unbelieving onlookers. The theatre sits beside an empty bank building and its yawning parking lot. Cunard Street Theatre looks like the Salvation Army building it once was: squat, solid and unimaginative. The whole area appears to be devoid of life, like the theatre community in Halifax that the new building waits to serve.
Parrsboro Environmental Marine Theatre
Authors: Vingoe Mary
Published: June 2023

In the summer of 1983 I was in Nova Scotia writing a play inspired by Thomas Raddall’s novel, His Majesty’s Yankees, about how the American Revolution almost took my native province. My research took me from the Public Archives of Nova Scotia to Parrsboro, over the boar’s back to Minudie and the “ Elysian Fields.“ Although I had grown up in Nova Scotia I had never driven up the Parrsboro shore from Great Village to Advocate Harbour, and I will never forget the first time I did. The physical beauty of this stretch of shoreline, only a few hours from Halifax, is staggering. The Minas Basin, with its tides that retreat forever and its startlingly red clay and sandstone cliffs, gives rise to all sorts of flights of the imagination. The place names alone are tantalizing - Lower Economy, Diligent River, and Advocate Harbour. There were stories behind these names.
Wolfville Playwright-in-Residence, Horton District High
Authors: Heide Christopher
Published: June 2023

But start I did, 5 September 1984, at the tender age of 33, the oldest student at Horton District High, enrolled not in order to be among the graduates of my class, 12 B, but rather, believe it or not, in order to write a play.
Halifax Walter Borden, Child of Time
Authors: Brunner Astrid
Published: June 2023

“What time is it?” asks the Old Man, and the Minister of Justice answers, surprisingly: “The small electric clock perched on the nightstand is humming that it’s way past tightrope time.”
Sackville “Theatre in Atlantic Canada” at Mount Allison
Authors: Bessai Diane
Published: June 2023

Last spring more than 150 people met at Mount Allison University in Sackville, New Brunswick, for Theatre in Atlantic Canada, a conference in the Anchorage Series in Canadian Studies, organized by Professor Richard Knowles. That a high proportion of those in attendance were students is an important indication of the widening interest in Canadian drama and theatre; in some degree it was also an answer to keynote speaker John Gray’s warnings of the danger of Canadian cultural crippledom among the younger generations. At this conference neither the students nor the judicious mixture of writers, performers, academics, and other theatre devotees could possibly be disappointed at the range and quality of discussion and at the variety of performance packed into barely two days between 4 and 6 April. One came away feeling that a window had been opened on a whole range of Atlantic Canadian theatre achievements as well as on its current controversies and concerns. The conference reinforced my own conviction that the regional element in Canadian theatre is still its most vital characteristic and that colonization and homogenization are still its most serious threats.
Readings in Review
Authors: Lynn Heery
Published: June 2023

For lovers of radio drama who never enjoy the chance to read new Canadian radio scripts, this book will be a pleasure. It is well-designed and includes a preface, a critical Introduction, notes on production and textual provenance, a bibliography, and the scripts retain their extensive stage directions, including music and sound. The following sample from Gawain and the Green Knight reminds us of the demands playwrights felt free to make on producers, composers, and technicians in the golden age of radio drama:
2 Dran Turgia
Authors: Brask Per
Published: June 2023

Whereas debates are raging in the theatres of many countries about what a dramaturg can, should, and would do under certain circumstances, the prevailing question in Canada is still “what does the word mean?” This unfortunate reality has robbed the Canadian theatre of a most important ingredient, and one which is increasingly necessary for our theatre’s mature development. In the following I shall attempt to describe some of the fundamental principles of applied dramaturgy as I understand them. I will not discuss the role of the dramaturg in translated or classical works. This is not because this role is unimportant or uninteresting, but rather because very little dramaturgical work is being done in these areas in Canada.
Workshopping Plays
Authors: Selman Jan
Published: June 2023

At the Playwrights Union of Canada “Workshop Workshop” last August the statement was made that playwrights are not integral to the structure of Canadian theatre, and that they should be. Such a statement could be made for all the freelance artists who support theatre production in this country. Actors, directors, and designers, as well as writers, suffer such alienation unless they are on long-term contract to a theatre organization. The point is an important one, and certainly addresses some of the problems I have experienced in workshop situations.
A Playwright’s Guide to Workshop Survival: 1
Authors: Wylie Betty Jane
Published: June 2023

Workshops of new plays have always been with us, but they used to have different names. They were called “Having a few friends [read: actors] in to read a play”; they were called “try-outs in New Haven”; they were called the “studio or warehouse series.” When money and time were looser than they seem to be now, everyone could afford a softer, more leisurely approach to the mounting of a new play. But now, when everyone is running in the fast track and, though spending more, enjoying less money, even studio productions are big bucks and no one can afford to gamble on an untried play. As a playwright, you’ve heard all the arguments from artistic directors and producers who tell you why your latest play, concocted though it may be from your life-blood and bone marrow, must be workshopped.
A Playwright’s Guide to Workshop Survival: 2
Authors: Lazarus John
Published: June 2023

There is some indication that the dramaturgical game with the oddly funky name of “workshop” is one that has always been with us. When I started attending workshops some years ago at Vancouver’s New Play Centre, I assumed that they were a recent West Coast innovation. Later I would get Into arguments with writers from other cities who also claimed to have been first.
The Banff Playwrights Colony: Finishing School
Authors: Brennan Brian
Published: June 2023

Oscar Wilde dashed off The Importance Of Being Earnest in less than a month and George Bernard Shaw never corrected a line. But for most playwrights the process is more laborious. Plays today are not so much written as rewritten. Of course, poems are rewritten too. But a poet usually knows when his work is finished. A playwright can’t tell until he has heard the words spoken by actors. This can lead to acute emotional turmoil when opening night is just a couple of weeks away. Hence the importance of the Banff Playwrights Colony. Here a playwright can have his work read by professional actors, without worrying about opening night. If something is wrong, there is still time to fix it.
The Workshop Syndrome: Stasis
Authors: Hayes Elliott
Published: June 2023

Stasis comes from the Greek word meaning “to stand” and, in pathological terms, it refers to the stagnation or stoppage of any of the body’s fluids, especially the blood. In dramatic terms the life-blood of the theatre must surely be the play text. Therefore, to merge these images by saying that the Canadian theatre is in stasis is to imply that theatres in Canada are not producing enough Canadian drama to sustain a healthy flow. Canadian theatre is in a state of stagnation.
Alan Williams: The Actor as Playwright
Authors: Skene Reg
Published: June 2023

Alan Williams was born 12 August 1954, at 2 Elaine Avenue, Mostom, In Manchester. He received his early education at Manchester Grammar School. After the age of 15, his involvement in education was, in his own words, “peripheral,” although in 1974-75 he put in one year of a three-year programme at Manchester Polytechnical School of Theatre, after which he was, again In his own words, “thrown out.”
The Collective from a Playwright’s Perspective
Authors: Weiss Peter Eliot
Published: June 2023

Sex Tips for Modern Girls began as a backstage conversation between Kim Seary and Christine Willes. The subject of the conversation was their sex lives, which they found so funny that they decided that they could make a play out of them. It is a testament to the determination of these two actors that, like so many good ideas discussed backstage or in the bar or in the hallway, they didn’t simply end there. Chris and Kim got organized and with Hilary Strang and Susannah Bell-1 rving formed a core group which met and brainstormed. The objective was to create a comedy based on the roles and values of contemporary heterosexual women. They approached other theatre artists, both female and male, and discussed various rehearsal and developmental techniques. The following history documents the evolution of the play from the original concept to the finished acting script published in this issue of CTR.
Festival Follies
Authors: Wallace Robert
Published: June 2023

In the midst of the trials and triumphs of the winter theatre season, the reminder that theatre in Canada has become a year-round activity can be both irksome and welcome. While some artistic directors are just beginning to see the light at the end of this season’s tunnel, others are quickly organizing their summer schedules, hedging bets on late-season hold-overs, and brushing up their spring brochure copy. For organizers of theatre festivals such as Le Festival de théâtre des Amériques that opens in Montreal next 26 May, this time is even more fraught; travel and accommodation arrangements for hundreds of visiting theatre artists, deadlines for programme and promo material (not to mention unconfirmed programme bookings), the scheduling of technicians and rental equipment that will transform halls and auditoria throughout the city into working theatres: these are just some of the tasks that turn the next few months into an obstacle course. Obviously this does not allow time for a festival director like Les Amériques’s Marie-Hélène Falcon to reflect on the nature and effect of the festival she is hurrying to open: questions about its purpose and programming must have been addressed long ago or remain unanswered until it’s over. For a critic, however, this lull before the storm is an opportune time to appraise last spring’s festival activity and to suggest what we can anticipate this year.
Edmonton Fringe Binge
Authors: Wallace Robert
Published: June 2023

Edmonton’s Fringe Theatre Event celebrated its fifth anniversay last 16 to 24 August with its most successful showing to date. Over 130,000 tickets – twice as many as last year – were sold for the 130 shows mounted on the streets and in the 13 venues of the city’s newly restored Old Strathcona district. Press coverage and media interest increased; ticket-selling was reorganized to eliminate the lengthy queues that were a problem last year; local restaurants and shops rallied strong business backing; and the crowds, judging from those I saw, went home happy.
Vancouver Hamlet, A New Canadian Play
Authors: Rubess Baņuta
Published: June 2023

The audience sits on chairs and sofas in the basement of a house. Here even dishes are shrouded in ripped dustcloths and the walls are pockmarked with death-masks: they say this place is haunted. A bloodied and bandaged musician (composer Jeff Corness) looms over a computer to conjure lugubrious airs from keyboard and synthesizer. Suddenly the lights go out. The music stops. Hold my hand. Someone is breaking through the window. It’s a boy in a black leather jacket playing Motley Crue on his blaster. The beam of his flashlight catches a ghoulish Hamlet (Morris Panych) grieving for his father. Hamlet mistakes the kid, Jimmy “Spider” McEwen (Tim Battle), for his most beloved friend Horatio. And when Spider plays along, the whole audience is “welcomed” to a ghostly Elsinore.
Behind the Scenes … A Guide to Canadian Non-profit Professional Theatres and Theatre-related Resources
Authors: Wittes Carla , Leonard Paul
Published: June 2023

As the theatre community in Canada continues to grow, a single central source of information about where theatres are, what they do, and who they work with is becoming essential. Fortunately, the Professional Association of Canadian Theatres (PACT) has recently created a new division, the PACT Communications Centre, which has a mandate to publish works like Behind the Scenes, the first of which will be a variety of publications of interest to people involved in Canadian theatre.
New Play Development: An Introduction
Authors: Wallace Robert
Published: June 2023

At its annual general meeting last August, the Playwrights Union of Canada devoted a day-and-a-half to the subject of new play development in a series of panels and small group discussions collectively titled “The Workshop Workshop.” From across the country, playwrights, directors, dramaturgs, and producers debated the methods and processes by which our theatre production system promotes and inhibits the development of indigenous drama. I say drama, for the emphasis in the PUC deliberations was very much on the play text – a piece of writing intended for production that is sometimes conceived and created by a group but which, more usually, is the work of an individual writer. Throughout the various meetings, the playwright’s preeminence in the process of making theatre rarely was questioned; and the centrality of the word, hence the script, was taken for granted.
A Dialogue: The State of Theatre in Canada
Authors: Davies Robertson
Published: June 2023

In 1950, Robertson Davies was identified by the Massey Commission as editor of the Peterborough Examiner, author and playwright. At that time, he was asked to do a special study for the Commission on the state of theatre in Canada and, unlike others who were asked to do similar studies in other areas, Davies offered up his in the form of a dialogue. When the Commission’s final report appeared in 1951 (Report Of The Royal Commission On National Development In The Arts, Letters and Sciences, Ottawa), its prime recommendation was for the establish- ment of a council for the arts, letters, humanities and social sciences. When that agency was finally formed some years later (the Canada Council) it was obvious that many of Davies’ ideas had been kept in mind. Professor Davies’ study is reprinted here with his own permission and with the permission of Information Canada which holds the copyright. It originally appeared as a Royal Commission Study under the title A Selection Of Essays Prepared For The Royal Commission On National Development In The Arts, Letters and Sciences (Ottawa, 1951).
Murder Pattern
Authors: Voaden Herman
Published: June 2023

First presented at the Play Workshop at the Central High School of Commerce in Toronto on January 24, 1936, Murder Pattern was later repeated at the Central Ontario Region Drama Festival held at the Hart House Theatre on March 25, 1936. The play had a musical setting by Mr. Voaden and Dorothy Addison and had the following cast:
Gwen Pharis Ringwood Rediscovered
Authors: Wagner Anton
Published: June 2023

The current interest in pre-1950 Canadian theatre history which has brought the plays and personality of Merrill Denison to renewed critical attention has so far ignored the much more substantial and prolific dramatic output of Gwen Pharis Ringwood. Mrs. Ringwood, along with Denison and Robertson Davies, has long been considered one of the most important early 20th century Canadian playwrights.
Dark Harvest: A Tragedy of the Canadian Prairie
Authors: Ringwood Gwen Pharis
Published: June 2023

I wrote the first version of Dark Harvest in 1939. I say “I wrote it” but the play is really no longer mine. I finished it long ago and now it exists only in the value and interest and acceptance it gains from the reader or the playgoer. The fact is that it was just the other day that I re-read the play for the first time in many years.
The Case for New Plays
Authors: Hornby Richard
Published: June 2023

Both George Ryga, in his argument for a “Canadian Content” quota (CTR 1) and Fred Euringer’s reply (CTR 4) miss the point in their discussions of the production of Canadian plays: the crucial issue is not so much nationalism as originality. Contemporary experience, as well as the entire history of Western drama, demonstrate that any viable theatre is primarily concerned with the production of new plays. A quota system would be of little value if, for example, it merely led to another thousand token productions of Leaving Home. It is new, original plays that form the vital core in a healthy theatre — whether that theatre is commercial or subsidized, establishment or fringe.
Neptune’s New Messiah?
Authors: Anthony Geraldine
Published: June 2023

“And what, therefore, shall this man do?” Saint Matthew’s Gospel, via this season’s initial production at the Neptune Theatre, Godspell, reflects the question being asked in Halifax about John Wood, the theatre’s new artistic director.
What’s Wrong With Audiences
Authors: Soule Donald
Published: June 2023

With all the hand-wringing and breast-beating in these and other pages about What’s Wrong with the Canadian Theatre, there is still one complaint which doesn’t seem to have been made. Amidst all the pained verbiage, I haven’t seen a single article on What’s Wrong with the Canadian Audience. Which is surprising in view of the fact that the subject offers plenty to write about.
The National and the Nation
Authors: Itzin Catherine
Published: June 2023

Britain’s new £10 million National Theatre—extending the concrete jungle of the Festival Hall arts complex eastwards along the South Bank—was to open in April. Now the opening has been cancelled again for at least six months (the opening date is still not definite) and the cost will be at least £12 million, the additional sum having been approved by Parliament, after heated debate, in November. But feelings about this 127-year-old-dream-nearly-come-true are mixed; there is concern and controversy amongst theatre workers, who are now asking questions like “who wants it?” and “who needs it?”
Looking Back and Ahead
Authors: Rubin Don
Published: June 2023

Canada may well be a backward-looking country when it comes to certain aspects of its cultural development, but for students of theatre, archivists, researchers, historians, critics and teachers, Canada is not quite backward-looking enough. To put it in its simplest form, our history is disappearing daily. Those who pioneered Canadian theatrical endeavours in centuries past are being forgotten and many of our own century’s theatrical luminaries too often are disappearing from the scene with their experiences unrecorded.
Action to Image
Authors: Feldman Peter
Published: June 2023

What is an image in acting terms? It usually means one of three things: verbal imagery (in the traditional literary sense, a word-picture); an imaginary object, place, situation or physical state to be explored as if it were real (in acting parlance, called an adjustment, particularization, or substitution); and the visual/physical statement the actors make with their bodies in a space. Today, directors are exploring such imagery in ways that fulfill some of the ideals of V.E. Meyerhold, Antonin Artaud, the Surrealist writers, and the Futurists. Their work also can be looked at in relation to the spectacle of earlier theatre (the Romans, for example) if we for once suspend our usual judgement of those theatres as decadent simply because they were physical/visual rather than intellectual/verbal. But the immediate antecedents are certainly the Theatre of the Absurd, and the Happening.
Jean-Pierre Ronfard: (Im)Pure Theatre
Authors: Vigeant Louise , Gannon Roger E.
Published: June 2023

It is not easy to talk about Jean-Pierre Ronfard. Like his plays and his characters, Ronfard is a hybrid, and his verve, ardour, passion, writing, and flamboyant gestures must be viewed as a whole if we are to understand him. I shall nevertheless attempt to give some idea of the diversity of his work and of his impact on Quebec theatre. I shall speak about what I like about Jean-Pierre Ronfard, because it is not only essential to give some idea of what he creates but also of how he affects Quebec theatre, of what he “does” to us, the audience. I want to talk about his beautiful absurdities, about his great creativity, about the risks that he takes, about the freedom with which he takes hold of culture to raise questions in us and to expand our horizons.
The Power of the Image
Authors: Lévesque Solange , Gill Rosalind
Published: June 2023

Pierre A. Larocque began his theatrical career in 1974 when he joined l’Eskabel, an atelier de recherche théâtrale founded by director Jacques Crêtes in 1971. Quickly attracting young people from a variety of disciplines, who were dissatisfied with traditional theatre and who wished to experiment with new forms, Larocque wrote scripts and collaborated on the production of a number of the company’s performances. By 1979 he had acquired enough expertise to know where his real interests lay: he wanted to explore new approaches, to experiment with new techniques and, above all, to work within an entirely different thematic framework. He left l’Eskabel to found a multidisciplinary theatrical group which he called Opéra-fête, the title of a performance event he had conceived and presented in the spring of 1974 with l’Eskabel.
Being at Home with Claude
Authors: Dubois René-Daniel , Gaboriau Linda
Published: June 2023

Gong. Lights go up. Freeze-frame onstage for three seconds. Gong rings again. The three actors begin to move. Immediately: Inspector: [shouting] And whatabout me? Dontcha think I’d rather be standing in line at the Japanese Pavillion, instead of being stuck here with a trick from Pare Lafontaine who gets off on slitting people’s throats? You think I got nothing better to do in life?
Canada Apartheid on Tour
Authors: Sher Emil
Published: June 2023

Beneath Thami Cele’s right eye there is a scar that blends into his weathered face like a natural crease. Only when you see him face-to-face do you notice it. On a stark stage that for 90 minutes is a South African jail, it would be very difficult for anyone in the audience to see the scar beyond the imaginary prison walls. Cele’s infectious gap-toothed smile spreads as far back as the last row. But in the darkened theatre, only his four other cell-mates who sweat under the same bright lights and share their stories can see the scar.
Quebec Triangular Play Development
Authors: Dumas Hélène , Gaboriau Linda
Published: June 2023

Over the past 20 years, CEAD has followed a course which has paralleled that of the emergence of what is now known as “le théâtre québécois.” The early manifestations of Québécois theatre were bolstered and nurtured by the movement of political and cultural affirmation which marked the early 60s in Quebec. This interaction between theatrical activity and social and political trends in Quebec continues to exist. In a similar way, CEAD has continued to reflect and to adapt to trends in the Quebec theatre scene as a whole.
Edmonton Three for the Road
Authors: Nothof Anne
Published: June 2023

At the end of this season, three artistic directors in Edmonton will leave their positions: Brian Paisley at Chinook, Bob Baker at the Phoenix, and Gordon McDougall at the Citadel. The timing is perhaps coincidental, but Brian Paisley sees the changeover as beginning another cycle in Edmonton theatre: in the last five years there has been a tremendous amount of activity – the regeneration of the Phoenix from the ashes of Theatre Three, the rebirth of Theatre Network under Stephen Heatley, the construction of the second-largest thrust stage in Canada at the Citadel, and the inauguration of the Fringe Festival. As Paisley, Baker, and McDougall all agree, from 1976 to 1981 the Citadel established itself as a strong, regional theatre in Edmonton, in relation to which the smaller theatres had to find distinct identities and particular mandates. According to Paisley, by 1981 the battle was over, and a new crop of revitalized theatres looked at the Citadel in a different way – not as the enemy, but as the ally. Now it is the Citadel which is attempting definition and vitality, trying to identify an audience which it can best serve.
Toronto Brecht: 30 Years After
Authors: Burgess David
Published: June 2023

From the 20th to the 26th of October of last year, in commemoration of the 30th anniversary of Bertholt Brecht’s death, the University of Toronto harnessed the organizational drive of Pia Kleber and some of millionaire Ed Mirvish’s dollars to host Biecht: 30 Years After, a retrospective and re-assessment of the impact of the Marxist German playwright/director. The prominence of practical theatre workers and their companies distinguished this event from other academic symposia, with visitors attending from Europe, the US, Latin America, and both French and English Canada. The public relations coup anchoring the event was the North American debut of the company Brecht founded in the 1950s, the celebrated Berliner Ensemble, which performed two of Brecht’s plays at Mirvish’s rococo palace, The Royal Alexandra Theatre. The disappointing Berliner, and the exciting example of a more modest company – Scotland’s 7:84 – helped shape a lesson to Canadians interested in developing political (read: leftist) theatre – namely that there is a semiotics of affluence, and that official culture cannot agitate to change a society.
St. John’s Collective Concern
Authors: Goldie Terry
Published: June 2023

As I write these words it seems that the oil refinery at Come-by-Chance, that greatest of white elephants, is going to start up again. To mainlanders, the Come-by-Chance fiasco must seem somehow appropriate: not just because it seems like the worst of Newfie jokes, but because it represents the failure of an attempt by Newfoundlanders to do something based on modern technology. Everyone knows that Newfoundland is folklore, a place of toothless skippers who play the accordion, sort of a living museum.
Theatre and Politics in Modern Quebec
Authors: Nardocchio Elaine F. , Usmiani Renate
Published: June 2023

Elaine Nardocchio’s Theatre and Politics in Modern Quebec has the same basic goal, in the Quebec context, as the Canadian Theatre Critics recently published Contemporary Canadian Theatre: New World Visions had in the context and Canada as a whole. As the author points out in her introduction, it “aims to provide information that will lead to a better knowledge and understanding outside of Quebec of the socio political nature and implications of French-language theatre in Quebec.” It is indeed, as Eugene Benson states in the introduction, a “lively and timely” book; but unfortunately it suffers from some of the same weaknesses as Contemporary Canadian Theatre. The fault doe not lie with the author, who has managed to assemble a wealth of material into a neatly organized package, but with the discrepancy between the vast scope of the project and its limited format: a slim 115 pages of text. The inevitable result is generalization, oversimplification, shallowness of analysis and glaring omissions. The selection and treatment of playwrights provides a perfect example of the general tone of the book. Nardocchio has singlec out eight authors for individual mini-chapters. Of these, Michel Tremblay, obviously the outstanding figure of contemporary Quebec theatre, rates a full six pages, while the others – Marcel Dubé, Gratien Gélinas, Jacques Languirand, Robert Gurik, Françoise Loranger, Jean Barbeau, and Jean-Claude Germain – average about four pages each. Eleven lesser playwrights are grouped together in one short chapter. Obviously, not much that is new to an even modestly informed student of the Canadian theatre scene can be said within such a small space.
Stratford: The First Thirty Years
Authors: Pettigrew John , Portman Jamie , Stuart Ross
Published: June 2023

The authorized history of the Stratford Shakespearean Festival was originally intended to commemorate its 25th anniversary in 1978, when the festival was enjoying critical and fiscal success under Robin Phillips. When the history finally appeared in 1985 it covered thirty seasons. The five-year expansion changed the nature of the Stratford story because those extra five years included the crisis of 1980 and John Hirsch’s initial seasons with their ballooning deficits and declining attendance. Providing sufficient coverage of these recent events necessitated publishing Stratford in two volumes. Scholar/ critic John Pettigrew wrote most of book one, which covers up to the end of Michael Langham’s artistic directorship in 1968. After Pettigrew’s death, Southam critic Jamie Portman agreed to complete the project and wrote most of volume two in the same careful judicious manner as his predecessor.
A Jury of Her Peers
Authors: Wilson Ann
Published: June 2023

The life of Moliere, as recounted in theatre-history texts, appears to have little to do with applications for Canada Council grants; yet it is with the life of Moliere that I shall begin. Moliere spent the early years of his career performing throughout the French countryside with his troupe of actors. In 1658, they appeared at court before Louis XIV who enjoyed their performance to such a degree that he became the troupe’s patron. From that time until his death, Moliere lived in the relative financial security afforded by the king’s patronage. This textbook summary of Moliere’s life depicts the artist as one who, having struggled in poverty and deprivation while honing his craft in the provinces, ultimately triumphs when his genius is acknowledged. Moliere’s life thus is constructed like a parable which might conclude with the moral: Talent is recognized and rewarded. But what remains unexamined here is the social dynamic which allows the recognition of “great” art; apparently “greatness” is something which reveals itself – but, to whom?
… Lest Ye Be Judged
Authors: Hunt Nigel
Published: June 2023

Considering the relative youth of Toronto’s professional theatre community, the Floyd S. Chalmers Canadian Play Awards have been around for a long time. Since their inception in 1972, the Chalmers have been joined by a proliferation of other playwriting awards (Doras, Jessies, Governor General’s – see elsewhere in this issue), but due to their debut at the virtual invention of a community of theatre professionals in Toronto, these awards remain “the acknowledged grand-daddy of them all.”1 Don Rubin, founding editor of Canadian Theatre Review, cites the creation of the Chalmers Play Awards as an important coming of age in the development of Toronto theatre in that these professional awards helped to “gain credibility with the public at large.”2 Despite such impressive paternity and longevity, the Chalmers Play Awards have suffered considerable controversy throughout their history. Currently, after 15 seasons, the Chalmers Play Awards are undergoing a complete review because of their flagging credibility and perceived inability to accommodate their mandate to the broadening scope of theatrical activity in Toronto. Results of this review, expected by the end of the summer, should include recommendations that will restore the tenability of the 1988 awards. In order to understand the current state of the Chalmers Canadian Play Awards a not-so-quick flip through history is required.
The Envelope Please ... / 1: Reclaiming the Doras
Authors: Sherman Jason
Published: June 2023

If publicists are the historians of the information age, awards are its custodians. With a well-timed call or a well-worded media release, even a mediocre publicist can plant a story that becomes news. Not only are the opinions of critics and readers thus informed, but professionals also are swayed by a successful media campaign, a fact evident to anyone who has followed the vote-influencing scandals of the Oscars during the last few years. Awards are a publicist’s greatest weapon. To both the public and the professional, an award means that an individual’s peers, fans, or critics have judged him or her “the best.” It is in this sense that awards function as the custodians of history, for they validate the partisan truths of all those publicity releases, previews, and advance stories that pass as “critical opinions.”
When Cowboys are Ranchers
Authors: Burgess David
Published: June 2023

If the Toronto theatre scene could be characterized as a bald paririe in the 60s, and as a cowboy-dominated frontier in the 70s, by the 80s the frontier has become a hotbed for rival ranchers and, importantly, some determined homesteaders. While some of the cowboys have retired or become hired hands, others, including Guy Sprung and Bill Glassco, are now ranchers running big operations – the Toronto Free Theatre and CentreStage Company respectively. When two brands merge here in the cultural badlands, as these two have done, homesteaders such as the members of the Toronto Theatre Alliance’s small theatre’s caucus, as well as rival ranchers, all have a stake in the outcome.
The Last Bus
Authors: Storey Raymond
Published: June 2023

The characters in this play are exposed at their most vulnerable, when their lives are in transition. “On the highway” then becomes more a state of being than a physical locale, although I have, hopefully within the confines of the convention, allowed the highway to serve both purposes.
Quebec Le Charme du Cirque du Soleil
Authors: White John
Published: June 2023

In the spring of 1985, I found myself part of a troupe of five clowns, 1a Ratatouille, about to embark on a Quebec/Ontario tour with Quebec’s le Cirque du Soleil. I was working with la Ratatouille in Montreal thanks to a contact I’d made while studying clown in France; I had never previously heard of them. Before rehearsals for the circus began, members of la Ratatouille who had performed in Cirque du Soleil’s 1984 tour filled me in on the nature of the show. Physically it was a one-ring circus based on the European model, but without the animal acts. As in the Chinese circus, the focus was on the energy and skills of a company of performers which included jugglers, clowns, a contortionist, and acrobats from Quebec and abroad.
Vancouver Notes from the Fringe / 2
Authors: Page Malcolm
Published: June 2023

I was running along Main Street late on a September evening. I was clutching a dozen handbills. I was short of food and sleep. I had too little time to cover the six blocks from the Anza Club to the Brunhanski Studio by 11. Suddenly I identified a feeling I had experienced previously only at Edinburgh Festival Fringe, not so much a runner’s high as a theatre-buff’s buzz. This comes from seeing four or five shows in quick succession, in varied spaces, each an unknown – possibly a waste of time, perhaps a pleasant surprise.
Look at the Record: An Album of Toronto’s Lyric Theatres compiled and annotated
Authors: Baillie Joan Parkhill , Johnson Stephen
Published: June 2023

Joan Parkhill Baillie lists herself not as writer of a book, but as compiler of an album. This is appropriate, for Look at the Record is primarily composed of pictorial reproductions of 50 physical spaces in Toronto in which “lyric” performance took place, accompanied by reproductions of newspaper clippings, advertisements, playbills, and an occasional correspondence meant to give some sense of what such performance was like in each space. It is a scrapbook, in which no apparent attempt has been made at critical analysis or historical narrative. In general, documents are arranged chronologically by first performance of lyric theatre in a particular physical space, and are accompanied by a brief statement concerning the construction of each building, a sample of productions or companies and the years in which they appeared. If Parkhill Baillie’s purpose was to convince the general reader of lyric theatre’s importance to Toronto’s history, I believe even the most unregenerate music-hater would surrender under the sheer weight of the documentation.
Competition
Authors: Wallace Bob
Published: June 2023

While the focus of this issue is awards - a seemingly innocuous subject - the concerns expressed in most of our features reveal that the topic is complex and controversial. Although awards generally are given and received as honours, the context in which they occur seriously affects our perception of them. Thus Alan File~od can discuss the Governor General’s Awards for Drama as an annual “non-event” while Jason Sherman can analyze the Dora Mavor Moore Awards as an important promotional exercise for Toronto theatre. Considering the Chalmers Canadian Play Awards, on the other hand, Nigel Hunt explains why the “honour” means little in terms of prestige to some Canadian playwrights, even though the money attached to the award means a lot.
4/ From the Conceptual to the Concrete
Authors: Conian Joanne
Published: June 2023

In summary, the Directors’ Colloquium at Calgary primarily provided its participants with an affirmation of their own working processes. Despite obvious differences in method, and presumably in product (one can only surmise as much, due to the limited scope of the event), a consensus in ideology and approach began to emerge among the diverse practitioners.