Stageworthy

Good Old Neon is a theatre and performance company committed to interrogating moral, social, and political paradoxes by integrating avant-garde aesthetics with traditional storytelling. Since its founding in 2013, Good Old Neon has mounted four productions, each of which has received universal critical acclaim, but then of course what do critics know anyway? Good Old Neon Presents Dennis Potter's Blue Remembered Hills February 13-24th at Artscape Youngplace. http://goodoldneon.ca/ Twitter: @gontheatre Instagram: gontheatre Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/goodoldneontheatre/ Alexander Offord Alexander Offord is a writer, director, performer, &c. His written work includes the plays The Hystericon, Potosí, and the upcoming Donald Trump-inspired Willy Loman's America, as well as numerous essays and articles for publications as diverse as #CdnCult Times, BlogTO, The Literary Review of Canada, and his own blog, alexanderofford.com. He is periodically involved with various kinds of political agitation. He was

Cate (aka Cathy) McKim studied visual arts at York University and acting at George Brown Theatre School. By day, she works as a consultant at words with cowbell (website to come), providing copy editing, writing and voice-over services. After hours, she writes, acts, sings, and works on visual arts projects and stand-up comedy.A published short story and creative non-fiction writer, Cate has also contributed theatre and arts posts to Lipstik Indie Reviews, appears (credited as Cathy) in DJ Paul V’s Born This Way Blog and is a featured contributer in a Glamour Magazine piece about the 2012 launch of the book version Born This Way: Real Stories of Growing Up Gay.Prior to starting life with more cowbell, she worked (volunteer) with Toronto’s Alumnae Theatre Company as an actor, singer, playwright, scenic artist, bartender, newsletter columnist, company blogger and general go-to gal.www.lifewithmorecowbell.com Twitter: @lifemorecowbell Instagram: lifewithmorecowbell Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cowbellcate/

Phil is an actor and playwright, and a founding a member of Keystone Theatre, a Toronto company that creates plays inspired by silent film. You may have seen him as Gormless Joe in Keystone Theatre’s The Belle of Winnipeg, The Last Man on Earth, and Gold Fever, as well as in the films Abolition, The Dragon and the Unicorn and So You’ve Decided to be Attacked by Zombies. Phil is also the host of the Canadian theatre podcast, Stageworthy.www.philrickaby.com Twitter: @philrickaby Instagram: philrickaby Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PhiRickaby/Stageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://facebook.com/stageworthyPod

A boxing day message.

Sara Meurling is the Executive Director of the Professional Association of Canadian Theatres and has had a thirty year career in theatre with management roles at the Theatre Centre, the Young Centre for the Performing Arts, and Managing Director of Factory Theatre (as well as independent producing). Her community work has included: juror, advisor and committee member, and as Member of the Board of a number of organizations including STAF, Theatre Gargantua, the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts (and it predecessor, the TTA), and as a member of the Toronto Arts Council Theatre Committee. Sara has been PACT’s Executive Director since September 2014.@smeurling231http://www.pact.ca Twitter: @PACTtweets Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pactpageStageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://facebook.com/stageworthyPod

Filipina-Canadian playwright, director, dramaturge, actor, and Artistic Director of Factory Theatre. Nina Lee Aquino completed a Bachelor of Arts in drama at the University of Guelph and a Master of Arts in theatre at the Drama Centre, University of Toronto. She was a founding member and Artistic Director of fu-GEN Asian-Canadian Theatre Company (2002-10), and Associate Artistic Director of Factory Theatre, as well as the Artistic Producer of the CrossCurrents Festival at Factory Theatre. She has also worked for Native Earth Performing Arts. From 2009 to 2013 she was Artistic Director of Cahoots Theatre Projects. In September 2012, she was appointed a member of an interim artistic team with Nigel Shawn Williams at Factory Theatre.With Nadine Villasin, she co-wrote Miss Orient(ed) ( Carlos Bulosan Theatre 2003, directed by Guillermo Verdecchia) a comedy about a beauty pageant set in the Philippines, which satirizes the idealization of Western standards of attractiveness. In January 2013, her examination of her

Starting December 9, Toronto’s Soulpepper presents the cherished holiday classic It’s a Wonderful Life, reimagined as a 1940s live-radio broadcast. Directed by Soulpepper Artistic Director Albert Schultz and designed by Lorenzo Sovoini. Albert Schultz Albert Schultz was born 1963 in Port Hope, Ontario and was drawn to acting through his mother's community theatre work. He trained at York University and the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art before joining the Stratford Festival Young Company under Robin Phillips where he played several leading roles including a lauded turn as Romeo. Beginning in 1992, Albert spent three years on CBC's hit television series Street Legal, followed by two seasons as the lead in the series Side Effects. His feature film work includes Beautiful Dreamers, I Love a Man in Uniform, Maximum Risk, Balls Up, Under My Skin, and most recently the lead in CTV's made for TV film Shades of Black (a biography of Conrad Black) which aired in December 2006. Albert is the Founding Artistic

Risha Nanda is a graduate from the Randolph Academy for the Performing Arts in Toronto, Ontario. Recent credits include; Skin (Magnus Theatre), Rocky Horror Picture Show (Lower Ossington Theatre), Hair (Randolph Theatre), Giovanni D’Arco (Carnegie Hall).Twitter: @rishneee Instagram: rishneeehttp://herstorycounts.com Twitter: @herstorycounts Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HERstoryCounts/Stageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://facebook.com/stageworthyPod

Diana Tso graduated from the University of Toronto with Honors BA in English Literature & from Ecole Internationale de Théâtre de Jacques Lecoq, in Paris, France. She has worked with diverse theatres internationally for over 18 years. Her favorite theatre co-creations/ performances include: Dante’s Inferno and Chekhov Shorts, both with Theatre Smith-Gilmour, and by the way, Miss… with Urge/Theatre Direct, for which she shares the Dora Mavor Award for Outstanding Ensemble Performance. Her Monkey Queen, Journey to the East, a one-woman performance creation inspired by the Monkey King stories in Wu Cheng-En’s 16th century Chinese novel, Journey to the West premiered at the 2010 Toronto Festival of Storytelling & continues to tour it. http://redsnowcollective.ca Twitter: @diana_tso Stageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://facebook.com/stageworthyPod

Allec Toller and Joshua Browne are the playwrights of The Queen’s Conjurer from Cirnclesnake productions, playing now until November 20th, 2016.John Dee was a 16th century adviser to Queen Elizabeth, and a scientist and magician when those two professions were indistinguishable. The Queen's Conjuror follows John Dee as he tries to decipher an enticing but ominous vision which he hopes will provide critical information that will impress the QueenElizabeth enough to gain her patronage. To do this, Dee enlists the help of Edward Kelley, a scryer, medium, and possible charlatan. Kelley proves to be as brilliant as he is disturbed, and Dee must work through the wretchedness of Kelley's soul and his erratic behaviour to access his revelatory visions and gain the Queen's support. The show explores the complexity of intimacy, the dangers of vulnerability, and the necessities of both for the alchemical transformation of the soul.Joshua Browne Twitter: @joshu_ashuaAlec Toller Twitter: @alec_tollerCirclesnake Production

Victoria Laberge is an arts administrator with her fingers in many pies. Originally from Montreal, she worked with the St-Ambroise Montreal FRINGE Festival and Centaur Theatre for several years in addition to running the arts and culture blog Bloody Underrated. Since moving to Toronto in 2015, she has taken on the roles of Director of Development for Nightwood Theatre, Canada’s flagship feminist theatre; Co-Producer for the monthly storytelling series Confabulation; and Publicist for the award-winning comedy troupe Sex T-Rex.Twitter: @victorialabergeStageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://facebook.com/stageworthyPod

Michael Kras is a Hamilton-based playwright, actor, and director. His play #dirtygirl was recently the winner of the Audience Choice Award at the 2016 Hamilton Fringe, and he’s developing a new play with Theatre Aquarius. His work has been supported by Roseneath Theatre, Young People’s Theatre, and the Ontario Arts Council. Recent works include Teach Her My Name, which played to sold-out houses at the 2016 HamilTEN Festival; For Kiera, which is published internationally in Bare Fiction and was shortlisted for the HA&L Short Works Prize; and Places, winner of the 2014 Audience Choice Award at the Hamilton Fringe. This year, Michael was honoured with a nomination for a City of Hamilton Arts Award in recognition of his work as an emerging theatre artist. Michael is a graduate of Humber Theatre School, the artistic director of Broken Soil Theatre, and a member of the Theatre Aquarius Playwrights Unit. Twitter: @KrasMagic Stageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://fa

Sandi Becker strikes fear into the hearts of the weak and foolish. She has retractable fangs. And, due to a recurring battle with Early Onslaught Lycanthropy, has become a passionate advocate for promoting tolerance to Werewolfism in school age children. She can kill you with a look, and if you are not in bed by 9 o’clock, she’ll come to you in the darkness, slip you into a bag made from cat skin, and take you to her moldy, mildewed layer. What will happen there? No one has lived to tell the tale.Sandi Becker is a Toronto based stage manager. She is currently working on Eldritch Theatre’s The Harrowing of Brimstone McReedy, at the Red Sandcastle, Oct. 27 - Nov. 13, 2016.http://www.eldritchtheatre.ca/Stageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://facebook.com/stageworthyPod

Jonathan Sun is an emerging Canadian playwright whose works have been performed at the Yale School of Drama, the Hart House Theatre in Toronto, and as part of Theatre Lab's FIRST SIGHT Performance Series. He is an advocate for interdisciplinary creative practice and works across the fields of theatre, music, visual and installation art, design research, architecture, engineering, new media, and comedy. He is currently a PhD candidate at MIT, a fellow at Harvard's Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, and a recipient of the MIT De Florez Fund for Humor. His Twitter account @jonnysun, an ongoing character and comedy project, has over 175,000 followers to date and has been published in NPR, The Washington Post, The Independent, Vice, The Hollywood Reporter, Buzzfeed, Playboy, Cosmo, The Yale Herald, and was nominated for the 2015 Shorty Award for Comedian of the Year. http://www.jonathan-sun.com/ Twitter: @jonnysun Stageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://

Theatre by Committee is proud to present “FAITH”, a new play by company member Ben Hayward. After a successful run at the Hamilton Fringe, “FAITH” will be performed in the Chapel of St. Luke’s United Church. “FAITH” follows the coming of age a troubled teenager and her complicated relationships with God, her father and the minister at the church she no longer attends. Written by Ben Hayward, directed by Brandon Gillespie, and featuring Lindsey Middleton and Ben Hayward, “FAITH” explores issues of morality, authority, love and finding meaning.Lindsey Middleton: Lindsey Middleton hails from the teeny town of Ridgeway, Ontario. Lindsey is best known for playing Vanessa on the internationally award winning, Toronto based web series, Out With Dad. Lindsey also co-produced her own spin off series called Vanessa’s Story and recently won the 2015 IAWTV Award for Best Female Performance in a Drama for her role. Lindsey has also worked on international best selling writer Linwood Barclay’s book trailer Tap at the Windo

With over 20 years in the theatre and 15 years as a professional voice over and television actor, Vivian Hisey made the leap to Director in 2010. Vivian brings both her life and performance experiences to her interpretation of every play she directs. She looks for opportunities to bring today’s real world messages forward in her plays so audiences can, not only enjoy the play for itself, but can think beyond what they see and feel they have something in common with the characters.While her directing experience lies primarily with comedies and farces – Don’t Dress for Dinner, Love’s a Luxury, Office Hours and Rumours, the play that brings shivers to her skin is Conspiracy. “Set in an historic church hall with amazing actors and the audience truly being on the stage with us, this interpretation became a lesson for every performance.”Vivian continues to perform on stage in musicals and plays in community theatre companies throughout the GTA. As a performer her most cherished roles include Elsa, in the Sound of M

The old boys club of late night talk shows is about to be injected with an atomic shot of millennial female. Welcome to the final taping of Marty O’Malley’s Early Late Show, where heir apparent to the host chair, comedienne Sarah Goldberg ­ (Kat Letwin ) is about the fill the very large shoes of reluctant retiree Marty O’Malley ­ (Alon Nashman). The kicker? The Early Late Show is going LIVE, for the first time in 22 years. To commemorate the passing of the torch, long time executive producer of The Early Late Show has organized to have Marty and Sarah share the host chair. A mistake, that may be the first and last of her career, after a freudian slip throws the taping into chaos.Housed in media mogul Moses Znaimer​ Zoomerplex, The Zoomer Live Theatre, will serve as both a theatre and TV studio for Late Night. The theatrical event will be recorded live for broadcast on Vision TV, providing an interesting meta theatrical TV experiment for both the audience and creative team. Kat Sandler’s original script, which

Crowdfunding offers indie theatre groups the opportunity to fundraise that doesn’t require the task of creating and organizing a fundraising event. Crowdfunding gives us the opportunity to get our campaign seen outside of our personal networks and potentially reach new people that we might not have been able to reach before. Unfortunately, many indie theatre groups do a very bad job of using crowdfunding, and seem to see it as just another way to solicit donations. But crowdfunding doesn’t really work that way. Crowdfunding needs something more. But what would it take to make crowdfunding work for indie theatre?Siobhan Richardson (@fighteractress), Adrianna Prosser (@adriannap) and Hayley Pace (@haelaaaaa) join host Phil Rickaby to talk about Crowdfunding theatre.Siobhan Richardsonwww.SiobhanRichardson.com twitter: @fighteractress Instagram: @fighteractressAdrianna Prosserhttp://www.adrianna-prosser.com Twitter: @adriannap Instagram: @adriannaprosserHayley Pacewww.hayleypace.com Instagram: @haelaaaaa Facebook

Hayley Pace is a freelance designer, technician and award-winning performer from Kitchener, Ontario. She is a graduate from the Devised Theatre & Design program at York University. Select performance credits include The Teeny Tiny Music Show (Hamilton Fringe) Rent (Vanier College Productions) and The Beggar’s Opera (Theatre@York). Select design credits include set for Hamletmachine (Theatre@York), costumes for The Village Green (Applebox Film Company/Rockzeline) and Plato’s Atlantis (Canada’s National Ballet School). Hayley has also worked as a personal assistant for the award-winning Broadway and Hollywood actress, Tovah Feldshuh during the Toronto premiere of Golda’s Balcony. www.hayleypace.com Instagram: @haelaaaaa Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/hayleypacee Sneaky Sneaky Productionshttps://www.instagram.com/sneakysneakyproductions/ Stageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://facebook.com/stageworthyPod

Rebecca Northan is a Canadian actress, improviser, theatre director, and the creator of the hit show Blind Date. Originally from Calgary Alberta, where she began her improv training at the Loose Moose Theatre. You’ve seen her on stage, TV and screen in everything from This Hour Has 22 Minutes, to Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium.Twitter: @RebeccaNorthanBlind Date: Twitter: @blinddateontour Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BlindDateOnStagehttp://www.blinddateonstage.com/Stageworthy:http://www.stageworthypodcast.com Twitter @stageworthyPod Facebook: http://facebook.com/stageworthyPod