2016 Dora Mavor Moore Award Recipients

GENERAL THEATRE DIVISION

 

Outstanding Production

Botticelli in the Fire & Sunday in Sodom A Canadian Stage Production in collaboration with the Department of Theatre in the School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design at York University

 

Outstanding New Play

Kat Sandler   Mustard

 

Outstanding Direction

Ravi Jain Salt-Water Moon

 

Outstanding Performance – Male

Anand Rajaram   Mustard

 

Outstanding Performance – Female

Rebecca Northan   Blind Date

 

Outstanding Performance – Ensemble

The Ensemble of The Great War VideoCabaret

 

Outstanding Scenic Design

Judith Bowden Chimerica

 

Outstanding Costume Design

Astrid Janson, Melanie McNeill   The Great War

 

Outstanding Lighting Design

Jennifer Lennon Bombay Black

 

Outstanding Sound Design/Composition

Debashis Sinha   We Are Proud to Present…

 

 

INDEPENDENT THEATRE DIVISION

 

Outstanding Production

The Winter’s Tale Groundling Theatre Company

 

Outstanding New Play

Cliff Cardinal   Huff

 

Outstanding Direction

Weyni Mengesha Butcher

 

Outstanding Performance – Male

Cliff Cardinal   Huff

 

Outstanding Performance – Female

d’bi. young anitafrika   She Mami Wata & the Pussy Witchhunt

 

Outstanding Performance – Ensemble

The Ensemble of La Chasse Galerie Red One Theatre Collective

 

Outstanding Scenic Design

Patrick Lavender   CRAWLSPACE

 

Outstanding Costume Design

Anna Treusch   Tails from the City

 

Outstanding Lighting Design

Patrick Lavender   It Comes In Waves

 

Outstanding Sound Design/Composition

James Smith   La Chasse Galerie

 

 

MUSICAL THEATRE DIVISION

 

Outstanding Production

Kinky Boots   Daryl Roth & Hal Luftig by arrangement with David Mirvish

 

Outstanding Performance – Male

Alan Mingo Jr.   Kinky Boots

 

Outstanding Performance – Female

Lisa Horner    Grey Gardens

 

Outstanding Performance – Ensemble

The Ensemble of The Wizard of Oz Young People’s Theatre

 

OPERA DIVISION

 

Outstanding Production

Siegfried   Canadian Opera Company

 

Outstanding Performance – Male

Quinn Kelsey   La Traviata

 

Outstanding Performance – Female

Ekaterina Siurina   La Traviata

 

Outstanding Performance – Ensemble

The Ensemble of AtG’s Messiah Against the Grain

 

 

MUSICAL THEATRE / OPERA DIVISION

 

Outstanding New Musical or Opera

Marjorie Chan (Librettist) & John Harris (Composer)   M’dea Undone

 

Outstanding Direction

François Girard   Siegfried

 

Outstanding Scenic Design

Michael Levine   Siegfried

 

Outstanding Costume Design

Cait O’Connor   La Traviata

 

Outstanding Lighting Design

David Finn   Siegfried

 

Outstanding Choreography

Jerry Mitchell   Kinky Boots

 

Outstanding Musical Direction

Johannes Debus Siegfried

 

 

THEATRE FOR YOUNG AUDIENCES DIVISION

 

Outstanding Production

Goodnight Moon   Young People’s Theatre presents Seattle Children’s Theatre

 

Outstanding New Play

Maja Ardal, Audrey Dwyer, Julia Tribe, Mary Francis Moore   One Thing Leads to Another

 

Outstanding Direction

Sébastien Bertrand   Les Zinspirés puissance Quatre

 

Outstanding Performance – Individual

Mishka Thébaud   Scarberia

 

Outstanding Performance – Ensemble

The Ensemble of One Thing Leads to Another Young People’s Theatre

 

DANCE DIVISION

 

Outstanding Production

Betroffenheit   A Kidd Pivot, Electric Company Theatre Production, presented by Canadian Stage

 

Outstanding Choreography

Zhenya Cerneacov, Mairéad Filgate, Brodie Stevenson

Various Concert (dance: made in canada/ fait au canada – Morrison Series)

 

Outstanding Performance – Male

Fabien Piché

Waiting for a Sleepless Night (dance: made in canada/ fait au canada – Robinson Series)

 

Outstanding Performance – Female

Jillian Peever   The Mystery of Mr. Leftovers

 

Outstanding Performance – Ensemble

The Ensemble of DanceWorks DW212: Woven DanceWorks/Tribal Crackling Wind

 

Outstanding Sound Design/Composition

John Kameel Farah and Fides Krucker Phase Space

 

Outstanding Lighting Design

Marc Parent  Phase Space

 

 

TOURING

 

Outstanding Touring Production (open to General Theatre & Musical Theatre/ Opera)

Cold Blood created by Michèle Anne De Mey and Jaco Van Dormael presented by Canadian Stage

 

Truth or Dare Play Toronto

Lindsay Mullan and Jamie Northan brought their improve show “Truth or Dare” to Toronto. Having performed at once very popular Bad Dog Theatre on Oct. 1 and Oct. 3, Mullan and Northan did the easiest (one might think) thing there is. They played a well-known game live on stage, engaging the audience in the show from time to time. Both actors usually do their “homework” preparing questions for future game. However, those questions remain secret to the partner up until they are both on stage and there is no turning back. This is how they end up telling personal stories about sex and dating, eating whatever the spectators have in their pockets and sometimes even getting naked in front of the crowd. This might sound like a piece of cake, especially if you perform for a relatively small audience, which was the case at the Bad Dog with only around 30 spectators. However, Mullan and Northan, both originally from Calgary, traveled with their show across Canada and “played” in front of several hundred people.

After the show both actors stayed for a couple drinks and talked to spectators. As it turned out, many of them have seen the show before, either in Edmonton, Calgary or Vancouver. This is a perfect illustration of the beauty of improv shows in general and “Truth or Dare” in particular. It never gets boring and even if you go every day you can still laugh your head off.

By Aliona Kuts
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Art Of Building A Bunker- Factory Theatre Toronto

Art Of Building A Bunker- Factory Theatre Toronto

The Art Of Building A Bunker was an unexpected shocking pleasure, to say the least.

Guillermo and Adam teamed together to pen the 1.5 hour theatrical performance based on our subconscious prejudice against other cultures. The thoughts that we’re afraid to say out loud are portrayed by Adam effortlessly as he depicts the life and times of himself, alongside seven other characters. 

The solo performance of these characters conveyed through Adam’s artistic portrayal was everything that I didn’t expect from a traditional theatrical standpoint. Adam’s talent was equally as apparent and full of a captivatingly flawless edge. The overall bold humor and shock value was an absolute understatement, further instilling our inner inferiority against other races. This piece was all about the way society thinks and feels but without the harsh wrath of social appropriatism

The Art Of Building A Bunker was presented by Factory Theatre. The newly renovated theatre now holds a refreshingly contemporary spin on the 145 year old  heritage building, housing a new age vibe of creativity and inspiration.

Reviewed by Tara Haggar
Bloor News

 

Acting, Art Of Building A Bunker,Canadian Rep Theatre, Factory Theatre Toronto, live theater, play scripts, plays, Playwright, reviews,stage, Theater, theater, theatre company, theatre toronto, toronto,toronto theatre, toronto theatres

DanceWorks: Marie France Forcier Tracey Norman

DanceWorks: Marie France Forcier Tracey Norman

DanceWorks presents the world premieres of Marie France Forcier’s Scars are All the Rage and Tracey Norman’s what goes between Get VIZ of world premieres by Toronto indie favourites exploring loss and transformation

 

WHAT :

Forcier’s Scars are All the Rage comments on western societies’ mass consumption of trauma for entertainment purposes. The work is highly suggestive, examining the rise of trauma culture and our growing desensitization to sexual voyeurism.
Norman’s what goes between examines relationships, loss, attraction and decision as it physically explores the phenomenon of one person’s thoughts or emotions affecting another’s mood, otherwise known as emotional contagion or synchrony.
WHO :

Artistic Director of Forcier Stage Works, choreographer, performer and writer Marie France Forcier recently provided choreography for Elif Izikozlu’s short film Two, which premiered at the Chicago International Movies and Music Festival. Among other works, she independently produced the Dora-nominated Facts of Influence (2010) and Dora-winning Lab Rats (2013). She serves as co-artistic director of Hub 14, a Toronto-based arts incubator catering to independent movement-based practitioners.
For the past decade Tracey Norman has been splitting her time between choreographing, teaching, performing and researching dance. Currently on faculty in the Department of Dance at York University, she served on the board of directors for the Canadian Alliance of Dance Artists and recently collaborated on the sold-out runs of Blumberg/Norman Double Bill with choreographer Angela Blumberg, and episodes | andscapes with JDdance and DanceWorks.
Dancers: Justine Comfort, Jesse Dell, Beth Despres, Brittany Duggan, Sky Fairchild-Waller, Molly Johnson, Louis Laberge-Côté
WHEN AND WHERE :

Wednesday, March 11 @ 2:15pm (arrival time 2:00pm)

Harbourfront Centre Theatre (formerly Enwave Theatre), 231 Queens Quay West

 

LISTING INFO:
DanceWorks presents the world premieres of

Marie France Forcier’s Scars are All the Rage and Tracey Norman’s what goes between

as part of Harbourfront Centre’s NextSteps

Choreographed by Marie France Forcier and Tracey Norman

Performed by Justine Comfort, Jesse Dell, Beth Despres, Brittany Duggan,

Sky Fairchild-Waller, Molly Johnson, Louis Laberge-Côté

Composers: James Bunton, Joshua Van Tassel

Artistic Associate: Julia Sasso

Lighting Designer: Gabriel Cropley

Harbourfront Centre Theatre (formerly Enwave Theatre)

231 Queens Quay West, Toronto, ON M5J 2G8

Harbourfront Centre Box Office: 416-973-4000 OR online: www.danceworks.ca

Tarragon Theatre presents Abyss by Maria Milisavljevic

Tarragon Theatre presents Abyss by Maria Milisavljevic

Get VIZ of poetic thriller about a missing woman and Europe’s underground

WHAT:
Karla Richter, 24, a loving and trusting young woman goes missing. The police and papers ignore the disappearance, leaving her three friends – whose roots lie in Serbia and Croatia – to discover the truth. A search for Karla becomes a search for the self in this lyrical thriller and modern day epic cloaked in the mystery of Europe’s underworld.

WHO:
Maria Milisavljevic, born in Arnsberg, Germany, is an award-winning playwright, theatre creator and director and is Tarragon’s International Playwright-in-Residence. Her latest play Brandung (Abyss) received the 2013 Kleist Promotional Award for Young Dramatists and opened at Deutsches Theater Berlin and continues to run in rep there. Brandung was further named one of the five best new plays of 2013 by Spiegel Magazine.

Richard Rose is the Artistic Director of Tarragon Theatre. Rose is well known for developing new work, including four plays that won the Governor General’s Award and nine other nominated plays. He is a four-time Dora Award winner for direction and production and has had numerous nominations. He has also been honoured with the Canada Council Walter Carsen Award for Excellence in the Arts and the City of Toronto’s Barbara Hamilton Award for the same.

Abyss’s cast:

Gord Rand – Shaw Festival’s The Philanderer, The Cherry Orchard and more; Necessary Angel’s Hamlet; Mirvish’s The Innocent Eye Test (Dora Award), Volcano’s Goodness, which he made into the feature documentary Goodness in Rwanda which won the Audience Choice Award at the 2013 ReelWorld Film Festival and Best Feature Documentary at the Thin Line Film Festival in Denton, Texas.

Sarah Sherman – Canadian Stage’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream; Theatre By The Bay’s Twelfth Night; That Choir Unplugged member.

Cara Pifko – Tarragon’s Léo; O Rejane for Bootleg Theater in Los Angeles; Soulpepper’s Top Girls; CBC TV drama This is Wonderland, which garnered her a Gemini Award for best actress; Stratford Festival – Coriolanus, Much Ado About Nothing; Canadian Stage – The Clean House; 2013 Best Actress in a Feature Film award from the FilmOut San Diego for her performance in Margarita.

LISTING INFO
Tarragon Theatre presents the English language premiere of
Abyss
Written and translated by Maria Milisavljevic
Directed by Richard Rose
Starring Cara Pifko, Gord Rand, Sarah Sherman
Set and Lighting Design by Jason Hand
Sound Design by Thomas Ryder Payne

Opens February 11 and runs to March 15, 2015 (previews from February 3)
Tarragon Theatre’s Extraspace, 30 Bridgman Avenue, Toronto, M5R 1X3
Tuesday-Saturday at 8pm; Sunday at 2:30pm and select Saturdays at 2:30pm: Feb.14, Feb. 21, Feb. 28.
Regular Tickets: $42-$55; Previews: $27 (Discounts for seniors, students, arts workers and groups)

Rush Tickets: For every performance excluding opening night, specially priced $15 Rush Tickets will be sold (subject to availability) in person at the Box Office two hours before show time.

Tickets can be purchased through Patron Services at 416.531.1827 or by visiting www.tarragontheatre.com

Follow Tarragon on Twitter @TarragonTheatre for updates on rush ticket availability and special ticket offers

Tarragon Theatre Toronto “Waiting Room”

Tarragon Theatre Toronto “Waiting Room”

Tarragon Theatre presents the world premiere of
Waiting Room
by Diane Flacks
Directed by Richard Greenblatt
Starring Ari Cohen, Michelle Monteith, Jordan Pettle, Warona Setshwaelo, Jane Spidell, Jenny Young

Photo Cylla-von-Tiedemann

Tarragon Theatre proudly presents the world premiere of Waiting Room, written by the talented and multi-faceted Diane Flacks, and directed by the equally talented, multi-faceted Richard Greenblatt, teaming up for a second time as writer and director for Tarragon. This powerful new drama about diagnosis, prognosis and uncertainty opens January 14, 2015 and runs to February 15 (previews from January 6) in Tarragon’s Mainspace. Six outstanding actors – Ari Cohen, Michelle Monteith, Jordan Pettle, Warona Setshwaelo, Jane Spidell, Jenny Young – are featured in this penetrating work.

What are you willing to risk to save a life? A doctor embarks on a ground-breaking medical experiment despite the objections of his colleagues. Meanwhile, a couple are torn about whether the doctor has what it takes to save their baby. This is a play about life in the waiting room of a major children’s hospital. This is a play about medical compassion and risk. This is a play about families who find the will to keep going. This is a play about the needs of the heart and the extremes of medicine. This is a play about breaking the rules. This is a play about hope.

“Hope is the thing with feathers – That perches in the soul – And sings the tune without the words
– And never stops – At all.” -Emily Dickinson
Says Flacks, “Waiting Room began percolating as an idea almost seven years ago as I sat in a coccyx-crushing rocking chair in a Neo-natal Intensive Care Unit with my baby son. During our nine-month sojourn there, and in the years to come, I could not have imagined the suffering I would witness or the deep humanity I’d encounter both from the medical staff and other parents. They became our world and our family. While inspired by my personal situation, Waiting Room is not my story – it has elements of my story as well as the stories of dozens of people I met and interviewed. It speaks to tricky, often insoluble questions of humanity that both patients and doctors confront when they find themselves on the precipice of life and death, and contemplate whether they should risk, or refrain.”
LISTING INFO:
Tarragon Theatre presents the world premiere of
Waiting Room
by Diane Flacks
Directed by Richard Greenblatt
Starring Ari Cohen, Michelle Monteith, Jordan Pettle, Warona Setshwaelo, Jane Spidell, Jenny Young
Set and Costume Design by Kelly Wolf
Lighting Design by Bonnie Beecher
Sound Design by Reza Jacobs
Video Design by Cameron Davis

Opens January 14 and runs to February 15, 2014 (previews from January 6)
Tarragon Theatre’s Mainspace, 30 Bridgman Avenue, Toronto, M5R 1X3
Tuesday-Saturday at 8pm; Sunday at 2:30pm and select Saturdays at 2:30pm: Jan.17, Jan.24, Jan.31
Tickets can be purchased through Patron Services at 416.531.1827 or by visiting www.tarragontheatre.com
Regular Tickets: $42-$55 (Previews: $23-$27)
Rush Tickets: For every performance excluding opening night, specially priced $15 Rush Tickets will be sold (subject to availability) in person at the Box Office two hours before show time. Follow us on Twitter @TarragonTheatre for regular updates on rush ticket availability and special ticket offers.

Theatre: A Slight Ache, 2012 Toronto Fringe Festival

Theatre: A Slight Ache, 2012 Toronto Fringe Festival

 

Past Reviews From 2012

Red Rabbit Theatre Productions presents Harold Pinter’s early masterpiece, A Slight Ache (1958), at the 2012 Toronto Fringe Festival. The play is typically Pinteresque: two people in a room are suddenly interrupted as a third person enters, thus intruding upon the habitual recurrence of their internal environment.

A Slight Ache can be classified as a Comedy of Menace, a pun on the Victorian-era Comedy of Manners, which is defined as a comic work that satirizes social interaction. The play employs comic elements in its criticism of the fundamental actions of Modern society, however there exists an air of violence that produces an effect of uncertainty. A Slight Ache opens with Edward (Jason Thompson) and Flora (Angela Froese) in their country house, a sphere familiar to them, however the presence of the Matchseller (Christopher Kelk) selling his wares outside of their back gate disrupts their comfortable solitude. Thus, the external world becomes menacing as it vaguely threatens to displace the conventional atmosphere of routine existence. It too becomes evident that Edward and Flora, though long married, are incapable of understanding one another. From their banal observations on the flowers blossoming in their garden emerges an ambiguity between words spoken and the portentous silences that follow, which create a depth of meaning and reveal an unsettling quality.

The Matchseller remains quiescent throughout the entire play, unable or unwilling to answer commonplace questions regarding his identity. This lack of action serves as a catalyst for Edward’s eventual breakdown; furthermore the Matchseller’s silence becomes one that bears both hostile and symbolic implications and is perceived as the intent to conceal meaning. In comparison, the tedious exchange between Edward and Flora was in itself meaningless yet potent, and Pinter suggests that such conversations are an act of evasion, an attempt to veil the emptiness within the self and society as a whole.
Under the direction of Mark Schoenberg, Pinter’s depiction of the crisis of Modernity and his visionary stylistic theatricality are accomplished with thoughtfulness and subtle ambiguity. In the darkened seats of Tarragon Main, I thought of how this playwright was not only able to perform the menial task of depicting daily experience as it occurs, but that he possessed the forethought to be capable of discerning the ethereal possibilities of the postmodern condition. With this sentiment, dear reader, I propose that, should you have the fortuity to attend a performance of any of Pinter’s works, you should immerse yourself in the deviant world of the uncanny.

Canadian Rep Theatre Toronto How Do I Love Thee

Canadian Rep Theatre Toronto How Do I Love Thee

In February, 2015, Canadian Rep Theatre presents the Toronto premiere of Florence Gibson MacDonald’s How Do I Love Thee?, directed by Ken Gass, at Berkeley Street Upstairs Theatre. Penned by the author of the award-winning Belle and Home is My Road, How Do I Love Thee? is a language-rich exploration of both the euphoric and darker sides of the  marriage of Elizabeth Barrett (Browning) and Robert Browning, poets who enjoyed ‘rock star status’ at the heights of their careers. The production will preview January 31 – February 4, open February 5 and run until February 22. The production features a stellar cast with Irene Poole as Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Matthew Edison as Robert Browning, Nora McLellan as Wilson and Richard McMillan as John Kenyon.

Calendar of this theater event

HOW DO I LOVE THEE? by Florence Gibson MacDonald – Berkeley Street Theatre Upstairs
Previews January 31 – February 4, opens February 5 and runs to February 22

 

Alumnae Theatre Blood Relations

Alumnae Theatre Blood Relations

TORONTO—Alumnae Theatre continues our 2014-2015 season with Sharon Pollock’s Governor General’s award-winning play Blood Relations January 23-February 7, 2015. Pollock’s play takes us on a psychological journey, bringing the past to life in a search for a possible answer, a motive. The only suspect, the real Lizzie Borden, was acquitted of murdering her father and stepmother, but in Blood Relations, the chilling question still repeats.

“Did you Lizzie? Did you?”

Rather than centering on the grisly details of the murders, the play focusses on the patriarchal oppressive society Lizzie Borden (played by Marisa King) has endured. Lizzie’s friend, and lover, The Actress (Andrea Brown) play a game of memory and imagination, reenacting moments of Lizzie’s life leading up to the murders as a play-in-a-play. Kathleen Jackson Allamby, Steven Burley, Rob Candy, Sheila Russell, and Thomas Gough play the cast of characters in Lizzie’s life. Director Barbara Larose has assembled an extremely talented cast and production team to bring this psychological murder mystery to the Alumnae Theatre MainStage.

“If no one looks in the mirror, I’m not even there. I don’t exist.”

Larose’s direction explores the play’s central themes of identity and the masks we wear. Blood Relations “asks questions about what is truth and about how we, as a society, treat those who are different in any way,” says Larose. “One of the more brilliant aspects of the play is how it speaks to us individually — who has not questioned their identity – their very worth – at one point or other in their lives?”

Blood Relations features a design and artistic team that includes Gabriel Cropley (lighting designer), Ed Rosing (set designer), Margaret Spence (costume designer), Rick Jones (sound designer) and Ellen Green (assistant director).

Calendar of this theater event

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