The show must go on: How York theatre students helped adapt a local high-school musical for pandemic times

A year-end musical theatre production can be as important to the heart and soul of a high school as its season-opening football game or senior prom. So when the COVID-19 pandemic hit last year and began robbing students of some of their most formative experiences, drama educators scrambled to keep the curtains from closing. Karen […]

Theatre grad wins prestigious Ontario Arts Council prize

Theatre alumna Dana Osborne (BFA ’96), a costume and set designer with the Stratford Shakespeare Festival, has been honoured with the Ontario Arts Council’s prestigious Virginia and Myrtle Cooper Award in Costume Design. The $15,000 prize, given annually to a professional Canadian costume designer in mid-career working in Ontario, allows recipients to further enrich their […]

Grads team up to honour prof's life with a documentary film

York contract faculty members and alumni Laurel Paetz (MFA Theatre’07) and L.J. Nelles (BA Music ’84, MFA  Theatre ’07) are teaming up to make a documentary about theatre Professor Emeritus David Smukler, a master teacher of voice and speech. Titled Breath is Alive, the film’s intent is to capture the essence of Smukler’s work by […]

Master's students study direction at Canadian Stage and beyond

In the high stakes field of large-scale theatre directing, experience is usually gained on the job and in a sink-or-swim situation. While there’s no prescribed career path, most directors develop their chops on small- and mid-sized stages while waiting for the big break. Theatre artists Ted Witzel and Ker Wells are going about it somewhat […]

Book showcases stage 'designs that mattered'

Performance design professionals, historians and arts audiences alike have reason to celebrate the publication of World Scenography 1975-1990. This thoughtfully curated, lavishly illustrated anthology documents the most influential theatrical designs of the period. World Scenography 1975-1990 documents lighting, set and costume design The book covers set, lighting and costume design for all forms of performance, […]

Bruce Jay Friedman plays published by York students

Oscar-nominated screenwriter and accomplished American playwright Bruce Jay Friedman has a new collection of selected works coming out, and it’s being published by York University’s Leaping Lion Books, which is run by students in the Professional Writing Program. The launch of 3.1 Plays will take place Thursday, March 1, from noon to 3pm, at the […]

York artists offer fresh take on Dido and Aeneas

Established and emerging artists in York University’s Faculty of Fine Arts bring their collective talents to a riveting new production of a baroque classic: Henry Purcell’s opera Dido and Aeneas. This epic story of love and betrayal plays out at the Sandra Faire & Ivan Fecan Theatre on York’s Keele campus for two performances only, March […]

Emerging dance masters unveil new works

Graduate students Shannon Roberts, Nancy Latoszewski Greyeyes and Ilse Gudiño, candidates in York’s Master of Fine Arts (MFA) program in choreography and dance dramaturgy, premiere new choreographies for ensembles in Temenos. The show, performed by professional and pre-professional dancers, runs Feb. 15 to 17 in the Sandra Faire & Ivan Fecan Theatre at the Keele campus. Shannon Roberts. […]

Playwright and director to discuss his work tomorrow

Alistair Newton, a Toronto-based playwright and director of theatre and opera, will digitally screen some of his work and engage in a discussion and Q&A tomorrow with film Professor Marie Rickard, the master of York’s Winters College. The event, Queering Theatre in Toronto, will take place Thursday, from 2 to 4pm, in Winters Senior Common Room, […]

Playwright discusses his recent work onstage in January

Toronto-based playwright and director of theatre and opera, Alistair Newton will digitally screen some of his work and engage in a discussion and Q&A with film Professor Marie Rickard, the master of York’s Winters College, in January. The event, Queering Theatre in Toronto, will take place Thursday, Jan 5, 2012, from 2 to 4pm in […]