“Style is to forget all styles.”
— Jules Renard
Watson has been working as a professional writer since 2020. She has written interviews for Intermission Magazine and CBC, and works with a number of Canadian screenwriters as a developmental editor on an ongoing basis.
Her work in published under the name “Jessica Watson.”
Pakistani-Canadian actor Ahad Raza Mir 'goes back to basics' with Brampton production of Hamlet
Ahad Raza Mir is a self-described nomad. The award-winning Pakistani-Canadian actor has built a robust career across provinces, continents, and disciplines. He’s starred in critically-acclaimed films and Urdu-language television series. Most recently, he’s entered the world of film and television production. Now, four years after his last theatre production, Mir is ready to return home, and in more ways than one.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream in High Park: in conversation with Jamie Robinson
Watching Jamie Robinson talk about Shakespeare is a magical experience. It’s no wonder he was selected to direct the upcoming classical production at Canadian Stage’s Dream in High Park: the actor, director, and writer lights up, alternating between moments of introspective analysis and bursts of excitement as he weaves through nuanced discussions of the Bard’s work. It’s the type of enthusiasm and understanding that only occurs in people who are truly passionate about what they’re discussing…
Love is the first step: in conversation with A Wrinkle in Time’s Thomas Morgan Jones
Not every playwright has the opportunity or resources to work with a live-in assistant dramaturg. But while adapting Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time for the Stratford Festival, Thomas Morgan Jones found his surprisingly close to home: his six-year-old son….
(Re)casting the Shakespearean mold: in conversation with Jamie Robinson and Walter Borden
To say that Jamie Robinson and Walter Borden are fans of the Bard would be an understatement. The two accomplished actors and theatre artists actually met at the Stratford Festival in 2003, and have maintained a friendship ever since. Now, the two are joining forces to re-examine audiences’ and artists’ relationships to the Elizabethan playwright’s work at (Re)Casting Shakespeare in Canada: A Symposium. The topic of Shakespeare’s presence in and on Canadian curricula and stages has long been one of debate. Are we teaching too much of the Bard’s canon, and too often?..
To train, or not to train: exploring Stratford’s Birmingham Conservatory
It’s hard to find anyone living in Canada who hasn’t at least heard of the Stratford Festival. As the largest classical repertory theatre in North America, the internationally recognized festival offers more than a dozen shows every year across four venues. But incredible staged Shakespeare productions aren’t the only artistic opportunities the festival offers. For more than twenty years, artists across the country have looked to the Birmingham Conservatory, Stratford’s artist incubator, for opportunities to develop their craft and refine their classical technique. But despite more than two decades spent training early and mid-career artists, the conservatory remains under the radar of many theatre-makers and audience-members…
Re-discovering wonder: in conversation with Fiona Sauder & Matt Pilipiak
It’s been three years since Toronto audiences experienced Bad Hats Theatre’s Peter Pan at Soulpepper’s historic Young Centre for the Performing Arts. But now, a pandemic and a digital production later, the two companies have reunited once again to bring a new yet familiar tale to the stage just in time for the holidays. Their latest rendition of Alice in Wonderland invites audiences of all ages down the rabbit hole in a musical retelling of the classic tale.
“Everybody has access needs”: in conversation with Stratford Festival’s Kayla Besse
Kayla Besse has what might be described as a highly specific set of skills. She has both a bachelor’s and master’s degree from the University of Guelph’s school of English and Theatre Studies. Despite the school not offering a standalone disability studies program or department, she integrated disability studies into her work in English literature and theatre, examining representations of disability in the writing and performing arts, as well as the the histories of disabled people and the degrees of autonomy they have/have not had when telling their own stories and representing themselves.
Theatre Passe Muraille asks: "how do we connect"?
Throughout the pandemic, the question haunting the theatre community has remained the same: When can we return to the theatre? There are no reliable answers to this question. For more than fourteen months, the entire industry has blazed with an unsettled energy, jumping at every opportunity to return to the stage and re-experiencing the pain of loss with each subsequently cancelled show. But perhaps it’s time to take a step back from the return to traditional theatre, and ask ourselves a different question. What is theatre? How do we connect with each other, with our surroundings, and with theatre as an artform? Who are we to each other? Two new works presented by Theatre Passe Muraille are exploring these very questions.