News

  • DART alumna to co-host session at the SHIFT Professional Development Conference

    Tuesday, April 18, 2017 | By

    ARTS AND CULTURE: CAREER CONVERSATIONS

    Date/Time: April 28, 2017, 3 pm – 4:15 pm
    Location: Plaza Rm. 410, Brock University

    DART alumna Victoria Mountain will feature at the SHIFT Professional Development Conference for graduate students alongside VISA alumna Shauna Daley with their session, “ARTS AND CULTURE: CAREER CONVERSATIONS”. From the conference website: “A modern cultural worker can thrive in variety of careers in education, media and the arts. The reach and satisfaction of creative practice can be the cusp of personal freedom and a condition for seeking satisfying work. How do we negotiate and harness creative energies within professions that embrace those creative forces? Join our conversation!”

     

    Victoria is a writer, performer, researcher and cultural manager residing in Toronto, Ontario. In addition to her Honours Bachelor of Arts in Theatre from Brock University, she also holds a Master of Arts in Drama from the University of Toronto, and an Erasmus Mundus Master of International Performance Research from the Universities of Warwick, United Kingdom and Helsinki, Finland. Victoria currently works for the City of Brampton as the Manager of Culture with the Economic Development and Culture Division, leading the City through its first cultural master planning process.

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    Categories: Alumni, Announcements, News

  • Brock Dramatic Arts alumni nominated for St. Catharines Arts Awards

    Tuesday, April 18, 2017 | By

    The Department of Dramatic Arts is proud to announce that several DART graduates and one of our DART professors have been nominated for the Emerging Artist award at this year’s St. Catharines Arts Awards!

    More information can be found at this news entry on the main MIWSFPA website. Congratulations, and good luck!

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    Categories: Alumni, Announcements, Faculty & Instructors, In the Media, News

  • Brock escape rooms at Niagara Military Museum ready for testing

    Thursday, April 13, 2017 | By

    (Source: The Brock News, Thursday, April 13, 2017 | by )

    Two new escape rooms carefully crafted by Brock University students are undergoing final testing while readying for their public debut.

    Brock’s Dramatic Arts and Interactive Arts and Science students have been working since January to create the physical adventure games through a partnership with the Niagara Military Museum in Niagara Falls.

    The interactive experience sees players locked in a series of rooms and challenged to solve puzzles in exchange for their freedom as they race against the clock.

    Brock University Dramatic Arts and Interactive Arts and Science students have been working since January to create two escape rooms in the Niagara Military Museum in Niagara Falls.

    A group of about 30 students worked at the Victoria Avenue museum throughout the winter term to develop each aspect of the rooms, from the costumes to the puzzles to the props and sets.

    The building, which dates back to 1911 and was once used as an armoury, inspired the historical First World War and Cold War escape room themes.

    The rooms are unique in that they include live actors who guide players through the narrative.

    “That’s how students hope to differentiate their rooms within Niagara’s escape room market,” said Dramatic Arts Associate Professor Natalie Alvarez, who was the driving force behind the experiential education project.

    “I’m really hoping this will be a niche for students.”

    Students are now working to test the rooms and will be evaluated on their work during an upcoming live testing event on Tuesday, April 18.

    In attendance to evaluate the rooms will be representatives from Casa Loma’s escape room team, Canadian author and historian Christian Cameron, curator Kathleen Powell and archivist Alicia Floyd of the St. Catharines Museum, and Brock University faculty.

    The escape rooms are set to open to the public at the end of May at a cost of roughly $25 per person.

    Brock University Dramatic Arts and Interactive Arts and Science students have been working since January to create two escape rooms in the Niagara Military Museum in Niagara Falls.

    Proceeds will assist in the maintenance and continued operation of the museum.

    “It’s meant to leave a lasting mark on Niagara tourism, helping to make the museum more sustainable,” Alvarez said, while expressing gratitude to museum operators Jim and Kathy Doherty for their ongoing support.

    “It’s been really rewarding to see the students form what I hope will be a lasting relationship with the museum,” she said.

    Students will have the opportunity to remain at the helm of the escape rooms going forward, first on a voluntary basis and then potentially in paid positions if the rooms become financially viable.

    The museum’s partnership with Brock was made possible through a cultural development grant provided by the City of Niagara Falls, as well as a service-learning grant provided by the University.

    Students who created the escape rooms will be doing a takeover of Brock’s Snapchat account on the afternoon of April 18 when the escape room testing takes place. To follow along and view behind-the-scenes footage, add brockuni to Snapchat.

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    Categories: Announcements, Current Students, Faculty & Instructors, Future students, In the Media, News

  • Moving on up!

    Wednesday, April 05, 2017 | By

    The Department of Dramatic Arts has moved to our new location! We are part of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts located at 15 Artists’ Common, adjacent to the FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre in downtown St. Catharines. During the summer of 2015 we will preparing our new location for the very first classes to begin in September 2015. Please visit this page again to read about our excellent new facilities.

    When we were located on the main campus at 500 Glenridge we had a variety of facilities including 3 stages and numerous workshops to allow students to work in all aspects of design, set building, wardrobe and rehearsal.

    Students had access to the following facilities at Brock:

    • 543-seat Sean O’Sullivan Theatre with its thrust stage
    • The Studio Theatre, a 99-seat proscenium stage (renovated 2009)
    • The Playhouse Theatre, a 508-seat proscenium theatre
    • three Acting studios, including Black which doubles as a ‘black box’ theatre (renovated 2005, 2009)
    • Scenery and properties construction workshops
    • Wardrobe workshop
    • Wardrobe Storage for 7000 items (new 2009)
    • Design Studio (renovated 2005)
    • Green Room/student lounge
    • For more information about the two large performing venues, please click here.

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    Categories: Announcements, News

  • Brock Professor Collaborates with Dramatic Arts Graduates on New Circus Theatre Show in Niagara Falls

    Monday, March 06, 2017 | By

    MEDIA RELEASE
    David Fancy, a faculty member of the Department of Dramatic Arts at the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, is no stranger to new ventures.

    A veteran creator of new theatre productions that explore current events and engage the Niagara Region, he joined forces with former Cirque du Soleil performers Kosta Zakharenko and Christine Cadeau in 2010 to form Zacada Entertainment.

    “We wanted to combine theatre and circus in new ways,” says Fancy, who’s equally comfortable in the classroom as in the rehearsal studio. “The fusion of genres really permits some unique opportunities for dynamic forms of contemporary expression,” he notes.

    This year, the Zacada Entertainment crew will present a new Cirque Cabaret show, entitled Shotgun Wedding, at Niagara Falls’ 650-seat Greg Frewin Theatre.

    Shotgun Wedding features the story of two star-crossed lovers forced to get married by their deeply religious parents. On their way to Niagara Falls for the ceremony they each secretly decide to have one last fling with the person of their dreams.

    “The production deals with perennial concerns of love and relationships,” says Fancy, “but also shines a humorous and probing light on issues pertaining to Niagara, including migrant labour, tourism, and gambling.”

    Zacada is particularly happy to be working with three recent graduates of Brock University’s Department of Dramatic Arts (DART) who will be taking up the acting and singing roles in Shotgun Wedding.

    Mitchell Allanson, Marley Kajan, and Sean Rintoul have all finished their Honours Dramatic Arts degrees over the past three years, and have gone on to further training and professional creative opportunities around the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA).

    Kajan, a native of Welland, is pleased to be joining the company. “All three of us DART grads are super-happy to have been brought aboard to help bring this show to life,” she says.

    “These kinds of opportunities for intensive professionalization are gold,” says Rintoul, a 2- year veteran of other Zacada productions.

    Marly Kajan, DART Graduate

    Recent Zacada show Fancy has written and directed that have toured Ontario include Circus Revolution, a story about Marxist clowns who escape a gulag by means of their circus prowess, and Circus Labyrinth, a piece that explores creative responses to contemporary forms of social control.

    For its part, Shotgun Wedding features original Niagara-themed musical theatre numbers with support from a seven-piece band, as well as high-octane performances from over 10 cirque artists from Zacada Entertainment’s extensive pool of talent.Silks artists, contortionists, acrobats, and a host of other highly skilled cirque performances each grace the stage for every performance of Shotgun Wedding.

    The production team for Shotgun Wedding is currently in high gear with rehearsals and development for the June 9th opening. The show will be performed sixty times over the course of the summer.

    “We’re deeply excited about this new show,” says Vittoria Wikston, General Manager of the Greg Frewin Theatre, “Especially with how it offers national level talent and serves as a unique reflection of the many strengths and talents of our region.”

    “We couldn’t be happier about having this exciting new addition to our roster of shows,” says master magician and theatre owner, Greg Frewin.

    He adds, “It’s going to be an awesome summer.”

    Website: shotgunwedding.ca
    Brock Promotional code for 20% discount is ShotgunBrock

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    Categories: Alumni, Announcements, Faculty & Instructors, Media Releases, News

  • Moral decay exposed! Radium Girls on stage at the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre

    Monday, January 30, 2017 | By

    Brock University
    MEDIA RELEASE

    Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts
    905.688.5550, x4765

    Moral decay exposed! Radium Girls on stage at the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre

    Radium Girls, by D.W. Gregory, is a chilling tale of unchecked corporate greed, market demand, and scientific ambition exceeding human empathy. This production runs March 3 – 11, 2017 in the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre, at the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, 15 Artists’ Common.

    Between 1918 and 1928 in Orange, New Jersey, towards the end of World War I, applying luminous paint to watches, clocks and military dials was thought of as a desirable occupation for young working-class American women. Their employer, United States Radium Corporation (U.S. Radium), lead them to believe that the paint was harmless, that it contained only minute quantities of radium, and besides, radium was good for your health. Across the country, patent medicines pushed radium as a cure for all ailments. So, the young women happily painted, often putting their paint-covered brushes into their mouths to create a finer point.

    Within a year or so, an alarming number of women fell ill: their teeth were falling out, their jaws were rotting away, and cancer was rampant. U.S. Radium denied all liability, suppressed information that supported the women’s claim of negligence, and smeared their reputations to protect their bottom line.

    In today’s political landscape, where dangers to human health are suppressed to protect corporate interests, this story of women labourers struggling to claim a voice in an unjust society is hauntingly appropriate.

    Directed by Philip McKee and designed by Kelly Wolf, with music composed by Holger Schoorl, Radium Girls showcases the talents of students in the Department of Dramatic Arts undergraduate program. Performers include: Nikka Collison, Olivia De Sousa, Rebecca Downing, Ben Fallis, Sydney Fracolini, Bernadette Kahnert, Mackenzie Kerr, Adrian Marchesano, Samantha Mastrella, Elena Milenkovski, Michelle Mohammad, Sean Rashotte, Naomi Richardson, and Colin Williams.

    Director Philip McKee stated, “Today, the excitement of innovation and the opportunity to make money results in ordinary workers around the world being exposed to deadly substances. This is especially true in the global south where the laws which protect labourers in more developed countries don’t apply. The protagonists of the play discover that laws cannot guarantee our safety or our guiltlessness, as there will always be ways in which laws can be manipulated or ignored. Radium Girls helps us to see that we are ultimately dependent on the ethics and good intentions of individuals to protect ourselves and others from harm.”

    Radium Girls runs March 3, 4, 10, 11 at 7:30 pm; March 5 at 2 pm.; and March 10 at 11:30 am, and will be held in the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre, Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, 15 Artists’ Common, St. Catharines.

    Tickets are $18 Adults; $15 Students/Seniors; $10 Groups; $5 eyeGo high school program, and are available through the FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre Box Office at 905.688.0722, or online, or via email: boxoffice@firstontariopac.ca

    Such programs from the Department of Dramatic Arts (https://brocku.ca/miwsfpa/dramatic-arts) are an integral part of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts’ mandate in building connections between the community and the breadth of talent and creativity at Brock University.

    Parking is not available on-site, however, there are more than 1,000 spots available in nearby parking garages, surface lots, and on city streets within a five-minute walk to our address at 15 Artists’ Common. Visit http://www.stcatharines.ca/en/livein/ParkingLotsGarages.asp for a list of parking locations.

    Media Day: Thursday, February 16 at 5:30 pm, held in the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre, 15 Artists’ Common, St. Catharines, ON.

    -30-

    For more information or to set up interviews contact:
    Communications
    Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts
    T: 905.688.5550, x4765
    C: 905.964.7646
    E: miwsfpa@brocku.ca
    W: http://brocku.ca/miwsfpa

    Videos:

    View the video teaser for RADIUM GIRLS below:

     

    View the TVCogeco feature for RADIUM GIRLS below:

     

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    Categories: Events, Media Releases, News, Plays

  • Brock alumni showcase talents in The Bacchae

    Thursday, January 19, 2017 | By

    (Source: The Brock News, Thursday, January 19, 2017 | by . Photo: “The Bacchae, a Twitches & Itches Theatre production, is hitting the stage at FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre from Jan. 19 to 21. (Photo by David Vivian)”)

    The worlds of ancient Athens and modern Niagara have come together in a theatrical production led in part by Brock alumni.

    The Bacchae, a modern adaptation of a play originally performed in 405 BCE, is hitting the stage at FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre from Jan. 19 to 21.

    The Twitches & Itches Theatre production challenges ideas of identity and explores what happens when extreme left- and right-wing politics collide.

    When the ensemble began working on the play in February 2015, they had no idea how timely it would be when presented on the eve of the presidential inauguration of 2017.

    “We had no idea Brexit and Donald Trump’s rise to power were just around the corner,” said director Colin Bruce Anthes (BA ’14, MA ’16).

    “The play was miles ahead of us. Many of the play’s original themes are shockingly reflected in our present society.”

    The play engages with current social issues, as Dionysus, an androgynous foreigner, arrives in St. Cadmus and starts changing the entrenched norms. The conservative rule of King Pentheus is challenged by this new god of wine, theatre and ritual madness and the women who abandon the city core to follow him.

    “Some of the dialogue looks like headlines stolen from today’s newspapers,” Anthes said.

    “In our production, the priest of a new religion arrives as a David Bowie-esque glam-rock star, bursting through a city’s eternalized film-noir surface.”

    Issues of identity are central to this play, as xenophobia, transphobia and intolerance of different body types are all challenged.

    Brock student Iain Lidstone found playing the role of Dionysus both rewarding and exhausting.

    “I am a trans man playing a gender-fluid character,” he said.

    “On the one hand, I find utter relief and excitement that as a queer artist I get the opportunity to give a voice to queer identities on the stage.”

    Lidstone’s own experiences informed the development of his character.

    “My character’s gender-fluidity and effeminate nature means I am constantly challenging my own internalized transphobia and trans-masculine identity in order to authentically portray our ‘queerified’ image of Dionysus.”

    Hayley Malouin (BA ’15) plays the role of Agave, mother to King Pentheus.

    “As a fat actor I’ve seen my inordinately unfair share of motherly characters,” she said, while adding that her most recent role has been different.

    “(Agave) is a person before she is a mother and this production pays particular attention to her journey as an intelligent, politically savvy, but ultimately oppressed agent.”

    General manager Marcus Tuttle (BA ’15) describes the production as a play that “makes sense for St. Catharines.”

    Niagara issues are woven throughout the play: the disappearing manufacturing economy and the experiences of migrant workers, as well as challenges faced by the LGBTQIA community.

    Twitches & Itches Theatre is committed to developing local acting talent.

    The group was founded by Anthes and Tom DiMartino in 2009 and moved to St. Catharines in 2013.

    They have gradually built up a core ensemble of nine performers, eight of whom trained at Brock’s Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts.

    This is the group’s sixth full production and their first independent production at the Performing Arts Centre.

    Tickets are available on the FirstOntario Performing Art Centre’s website.

    Brock students/alumni included in the production: Iain Lidstone, Hayley Malouin, Sean Rintoul, Kaitlin Race, Sean Aileen McClelland, Chelsea Wilson, Marcus Tuttle, Colin Bruce Anthes.

    Media:

    TVCogeco’s feature on The Bacchae:

     

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    Categories: Alumni, In the Media, News

  • Humanities students partner with Falls museum on escape rooms

    Wednesday, January 18, 2017 | By

    (Source: The Brock News, Tuesday, January 17, 2017 | by . Photo: Brock University Dramatic Arts and Interactive Arts and Science students are developing two escape rooms in partnership with the Niagara Military Museum. Students are in the initial stages of the project and have been brainstorming the path the two rooms will take.)

     

    They’re planning a great escape from a 100-year-old building.

    Brock University Dramatic Arts and Interactive Arts and Science students have come together for an innovative project that in a few months will open for the public to experience.

    Throughout the winter term a group of nearly 30 students will work to create two escape rooms at the Niagara Military Museum in Niagara Falls.

    The physical adventure games, which have become increasingly popular in recent years, lock players in a room — or in this case a series of rooms — and challenge them to solve puzzles in exchange for their freedom.

    The museum’s partnership with Brock was made possible through a cultural development grant provided by the City of Niagara Falls, as well as a service-learning grant provided by the University.

    Work on the project began Jan. 10 with students touring the Victoria Avenue museum, learning its background and brainstorming the direction the escape rooms will take.

    The building, which dates back to 1917 and was used as an armoury in the First World War, has an “incredible history,” said Dramatic Arts Associate Professor Natalie Alvarez, who was the driving force behind Brock’s involvement.

    That history, which includes an “infamous escape” by Austrian spy George Heinovitch, will act as inspiration for the stories students are planning to tell through the project, she said.

    “They’re going to build an escape room that tries to uncover that history.”

    Students will be responsible for each aspect of the project, including the narrative, puzzles, costumes, props and sets.

    “We’re building it from the ground up, tapping into my students’ expertise in costume design, directing, acting and scriptwriting,” Alvarez said.

    It was also a natural fit to include Interactive Arts and Science students and their skills with interactive narrative, game structure and puzzle building.

    “Escape rooms are this interesting hybrid of different theatre traditions,” Alvarez said.

    “It’s immersive performance. It’s kind of like a living museum. It’s also tapping into site-specific theatre, where you build a theatre piece that’s intimately attached to the site itself and its own history.”

    The escape rooms will be ready for testing by an invited audience April 4.

    “The assessment is going to be entirely in the hands of those experiencing it,” Alvarez said. It will include museum personnel as well as members of Brock’s Service-Learning Resource Centre.

    Museum operators have created a rubric based on what they hoped to see accomplished through the project and students will be evaluated accordingly.

    The escape rooms will go live to the public in May at a cost of $20 per person.

    Proceeds will assist in the maintenance and continued operation of the museum.

    Students will have the opportunity to remain at the helm of the escape rooms going forward, first on a voluntary basis and then potentially in paid positions if the rooms become financially viable.

    “That’s the incentive for them to build the social media machine to advertise it and get people out to experience it,” Alvarez said, adding she’s seen “100 per cent investment” from the students involved.

    She credited Brock for investing in such an innovative approach and nurturing the University’s connection with the community.

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    Categories: Current Students, In the Media, News

  • Brock students stage fantasy epic

    Monday, November 14, 2016 | By

    (Source: Thorold Edition, Monday, November 14, 2016 | by John Law. Photo caption: Gormenghast director Mike Griffin. CREDIT: Bob Tymczyszyn/St. Catharines Standard/Postmedia Network)

    Brock University’s Dramatic Arts students are occupying the House of Groan.

    Gormenghast, based on the cult classic fantasy series by Melvyn Peake, opened at the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts Nov. 11. Long regarded as one of the great fantasy trilogies – drawing comparisons to The Lord of the Rings – it brings a sense of the epic to the theatre’s modest 150-seat theatre.

    Director Mike Griffin says students will utilize the entire space while using different theatrical styles to tell the tale of two youths who defy ancient traditions and the government motto of ‘No Change’ to wrest control of the dysfunctional House of Groan which rules the land.

    Griffin says it will push Dramatic Arts students in ways they’re not accustomed.

    “When you look at the kind of plays students often do, they’re realistic or they’re playing sort of normal characters. I really like the opportunity for a physical play.”

    As a bonus, it’s a bonafide fantasy classic rarely ever performed in Niagara. While Griffin likes to challenge students, he also wants something with box office appeal.

    “As a professor here I definitely want to be engaging the students in something that’s going to stretch them,” he says. “But you want to have people come and see it.

    “This production in particular is exciting because of the fantasy element. You don’t often get to see a fantasy production on stage.”

    With 16 cast members, the show will run until Nov. 19. Griffin, in his second year at Brock, calls them the best group he’s ever worked with.

    “We want the students to really be engaging in the work.”

    While it has never been made into a movie, Gormenghast was adapted into a four-episode BBC series in 2000 starring Christopher Lee and Jonathan Rhys Meyers. The stage version debuted in 2006.

    Written between 1949 and 1959, the books still strike some universal chords of rebellion, says Griffin. Their influence can be spotted in modern fare like The Hunger Games and A Song of Ice and Fire (Game of Thrones).

    “It looks at these youth rising to power, and going against the traditional and ancient ways of how things normally happen,” he says. “The play begins with the birth of this new earl, and then everything starts to crumble.”

    jlaw@postmedia.com

    • WHAT: Gormenghast
    • WHERE: Marilyn I. Walker Theatre; 15 Artists’ Common; St. Catharines
    • WHEN: Nov. 11 to 19
    • TICKETS: $18 adults; $15 students/seniors. www.firstontariopac.ca or 905-688-0722

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    Categories: In the Media, News

  • Gormenghast: An interview with Director Mike Griffin, and actors Jonah McGrath, Candice Burn and Caroline Coon

    Tuesday, November 08, 2016 | By

    (Source: The Brock Press, Tuesday, November 8, 2016 | by Shannon Parr) 

    davidvivianBrock University’s Department of Dramatic Arts is putting on Gormenghast this week, a play deemed “haunting and hilarious” by its director, Professor M. Griffin. I was able to sit down with him and some other members of the cast to ask a few questions about the “grotesque” production.

    Q: You’ve commented that this play is haunting and hilarious — why?

    Mike Griffin; Director

    Griffin: One of the things that this play really brings together is a number of different styles. On one hand you’ve got comedy and some really over the top characters, but within the gothic nature of the play there are a lot of dark things that are happening. There’s a lot of murder and a lot of horrific events. So, we’ve really tried to embrace that, through the blending of these different styles. One of the things we have been researching on is the style of Grand Guignol, which is the theatre of horror. We’ve been looking at the moments of violence in the play and looking at how we can do that stylistically versus realistically, because the show is an elevated style.

    We’re looking at melodrama and physical theatre, and a collage of different styles of theatre. When I say something is elevated or heightened style, I mean that it is something larger than life and bigger than realism, different than how we interact normally today.

    Q: Physical theatre?

    Griffin: Most of my research as a professor is in styles of physical theatre and mask, and so a lot of the work that we’re doing is stemming from my research. There are elements of gesture and ritual, and looking at characters that have bigger physicalities. We’re not necessarily normal humans in this play. Everyone’s quirky and different, so when we started to explore the physical nature of this play we started looking through different inspirations so we can look at what motivates or where this character comes from in a physical basis. Everyone walks and stands in a different way.

    Q: How does this play explore physical theatre?

    Griffin: This play overall has a lot of challenges. It’s a very epic play and it all takes place in a castle, and there are towers and motes, and when we start to add things like cats and ravens then we’ve got to ask the question, ‘how do we do that?’

    Rather than making the choice of actors playing cats or ravens, we decided we wanted to do it with puppets. Our puppets are really fantastic, they’re created by a puppeteer in Calgary named Juanita Dawn and the Long Grass puppet studio.

    This is a distorted, grotesque and strange world. Things are distorted and there are a lot of connections to animals and humans. One of the explorations that we did to find the physical characterization is looking at what your character might be as an animal and evolving a physicalization out of that.

    Q: Why Gormenghast?

    Griffin: For me, it’s been a play that I’ve been interested in for a long time. I wanted to do something a bit darker, a bit stranger, and so when I was deciding on what show I wanted to do with these particular students, I wanted to do something that was going to push them out of their normal bodies, something that was big in characterization, big in physicalization, and so this sort of just came up as the play that I think would really challenge them. I felt it would also give them an opportunity to learn about techniques of physical theatre and different styles of theatre, too.

    It’s really rare to see this kind of a production on stage; professional theatre companies don’t often do this kind of thing. First of all, it’s a large cast. We’ve got a cast of 16 and a lot of theatre companies don’t necessarily have a mandate that would fit the fantasy of this kind of play. What better place to do it than in a university setting? Especially when we look at things like the popular TV — Game of Thrones and all these kind of fantasy worlds that are created. There’s such a huge interest in that. For me, I love Game of Thrones and I love Lord of the Rings, and I love the works of Tim Burton.

     Jonah McGrath as Steerpike

    Q: What is your role in Gormenghast?

    McGrath: I am playing the role of Steerpike. He begins his journey in Gormenghast as a lowly kitchen servant, but he has aspirations to become more. Through his Machiavellian way of approaching conversations and interactions with the various people of Gormenghast, he’s trying to claw his way up the social ladder.

    Q: What was your process like?

    McGrath: We began over the course of the summer. We wouldn’t take the more conventional way of memorizing something and just sitting and reading it; it was recommended that we do it while we’re doing everyday errands, activities like washing the dishes — just repeating lines and getting them into our body. We took a very physical approach in tackling this play. We began with a three day physical workshop; a rigorous experimentation where we played around with many different styles. We looked at our characters through the lenses of different animals and did some cast and ensemble-building exercises.

    Q: For one of your exercises I hear you all had to bring in pictures that you felt related to your character. What did you bring in?

    McGrath: I brought in a picture of fog setting on a dead forest. I did that because I think Steerpike is a new presence in Gormenghast and is very otherworldly. He comes upon this old place that is bound by ritual and is so firmly held within tradition, and he completely changes the atmosphere.

    Q: Do you like your character?

    McGrath: I love my character. He’s so much fun to play. He’s a real challenge because I find there are so many different faces to Steerpike depending on who he’s talking to. He’s got a lot of layers to him. As much as we’re pushing the melodrama of it all, there’s also a very three-dimensional layer which we’re experimenting with in regards to everybody’s character. I’ve discovered a lot about him and I’ve really grown to love him. I’m sure for some people it would be more of a love-to-hate kind of thing, but I love Steerpike. I think he is so sharp and so quick, and ambitious, that it really is unparalleled. In this world I think he has such a way of working people. A master manipulator.

    Q: Why is this play seen as grotesque and haunting?

    McGrath: In a very goosebumps kind of way, there are a lot of unsettling moments. We’re trying to gross you out a little bit. It’s not completely different than horror film or imagery; we really draw on that in the show. We want people to, at times, feel uncomfortable.

    In regards to the physicality, everybody’s character is over the top and unrecognizable if we’re looking at them in regards to our world. In Gormenghast, everything is huge, everything is over the top and anything goes.

    Candice Burn and Caroline Coon as twins Cora and Clarice

    Q: What are your roles in the play?

    Burn: I play Cora and she’s one of the twins of Sepulchrave. She and her sister have been isolated from everyone. Our back story is that they were actually sick with a disease and they were separated so they would’t cause each other to become more sick. Then, when it seemed all hope was lost, they brought them together again and our characters eventually got better. That’s why we always stick together. We feel like we are one body. Our movement reflects that; our thought process allows us to move to one side and then the other, in synchronicity.

    Coon: I play Clarice. We are the younger twin sisters of Sepulchrave, who is the Earl of Gormenghast. They’ve been isolated and so they’ve always felt like they were on the outskirts of everything. In the play, you’re going to see them using Steerpike to try and climb to power, and regain the place they feel they should be. While they’re trying to use Steerpike, Steerpike is also trying to use them.

    Q: You move in unison – what was that process like?

    Coon: Every head move, every look and every step is choreographed. That was really difficult — it took a lot of going over to make sure we were on the same page for each movement we made. We can’t even turn our head without the other one doing it.

    Burn: It’s a very collaborative process. We went through our lines with what our intentions were, and how we found each other moving naturally when we said our lines. We fed off of each other and choreographed those movements. In perspective of who else is in the scene, it’s very heavily influenced by the blocking of other people. We follow Steerpike in many scenes, which really shows how he manipulates us and has that control over us.

    Coon: We practiced a lot in front of the mirror to get it right, and to make sure that we were walking symmetrically.

    Burn: It took us a while to figure out our walk. We used those intensive and research days on what kind of animal physicality we see in our characters, and we found a combination of bird and cat movements. We definitely use that in our head movements — the characters are even described as bird brains. People perceive them to be mad or not all there.

    Q: So, who is really using who? Do you feel that your characters are aware of what’s going on?

    Burn: I don’t think they feel like they’re using Steerpike. I think they actually trust him because he made such a large gesture towards them and no one else has. The characters are almost in shock — they’re surprised that someone wants to help them at all. He gains their trust and gives them all these promises, and they don’t have anyone else other than each other. The twins don’t manipulate Steerpike the way he does to them.

    Coon: I looked at the analogy of the frog in boiling water. Steerpike as a character is very good at manipulating people and I think they brought their walls down for him because no one has reached out to them in so long or shown them any type of respect. They really latch onto that. He uses their trust and molds them into what he needs them to be.

    Q: Why do you feel the play is seen as grotesque?

    Coon: There are physicalities and events that happen on stage that are unsettling. There is definitely some gore in this show. There are some props and moments that make even us uncomfortable.

    Burn: Even the soundtrack of the show. There are things that, every time in rehearsal, we just can’t listen to. It wakes up your senses and makes you go to an uncomfortable place. That’s what makes it grotesque, in a way.

    Coon: The world is so out of anything in this realm. We use the term “Gormenghasty”. The end result is stuff that you’ve never seen before, which is why we’re really excited about performing this.

    Gormenghast is being performed at the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre at the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, 15 Artists’ Common, St. Catharines. The performances take place on November 11, 12, 18 and 19 at 7:30 p.m., Nov. 13 at 2:00 p.m. and Nov. 18 at 11:30 p.m.

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