Ontario Off Stage

Behind The Scenes at Ontario’s Theatres

• The Shaw Directors Day is always a highlight of my calendar; Casts for this year’s productions from Intern Directors Michael Wheeler and Krista Jackson have been announced on PraxisTheatre.com
• Kate Taylor reports in the Globe and Mail about how renovation capital is out of reach of medium-sized performing arts groups
• How many actors does it take to performing a home renovation?  Also from the Globe (in the Housing section)—how Ross Manson and Neema Bickersteth organized a metaphoric “barn raising”

Conversations Across Borders

• “Experience audits” are a way for theatres to examine the ways they are open to participation in their venues; Andrew Taylor explores on the Artful Manager how to audit the obvious?
• I was recently introduced to Holger Syme’s blog “dispositio” on which he offered “Five points of contention on Toronto theatre” arguing 1) our theatre needs classics, 2) our theatre is predictable, 3) there is never enough time, 4) our theatre is a deeply immoral institution, and 5) money isn’t doing what money should be doing; this also has trigged a good conversation with Jacob Zimmer and some back-and-forth between them
• Jacob is also continuing with his Public Application for the position of Artistic Director at Factory Theatre

Migrations

• Anita Gaffney is the new Executive Director of the Stratford Shakespeare Festival (PDF)
• Kate Smith is the new Artistic Director at Salamander Theatre for Young Audiences in Ottawa
• Peter Smith is the new Interim Artistic Director of the Blyth Festival

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Assembled by Brandon Moore, Communications Coordinator