Professor,
Theatre Praxis
BA Mount Allison,
PhD Trinity College, Dublin
905 688 5550 x3584
dfancy@brocku.ca
Dr. David Fancy received his doctoral training at the Samuel Beckett Centre, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, thinking through questions around the ontology of stage presence and its intersection with decolonialism in the work of playwright Bernard-Marie Koltès and director Patrice Chéreau.
David has a long-term commitment to theatre, performance, and anti-supremacy. He co-organized national conferences on theatre training and diversities (race, class, gender, sexuality, ability, and anthropocentrism) beginning in 2009, has been collaborating with Indigenous colleagues professionally since 1999, and has published and created extensively in these and related areas. His website on acting training and diversities has been used in classrooms and studios across Canada, as well as in the US, UK, and New Zealand.
Recent co-edited volumes include David Fancy and Lillian Manzour (Eds) Teatro de Tres Americas: Antología Norte (Ediciones Sin Paredes, 2022); David Fancy and Conrad Alexandrowicz (Eds) Theatre Pedagogy in an Era of Climate Crisis (Routledge, 2021); and David Fancy and Hans Skott-Myhre (Eds) Immanence, Politics and the Aesthetic: Thinking Revolt in the 21st Century (McGill Queens University Press, 2019).
Fancy’s current research engages questions of performance and philosophy, with a specific interest in performance and ontology as it relates to performativity, performance training, technology, and the climate crisis. He is currently completing two monographs: Resonance: Biopolitics and Entrainment in Contemporary Technocapital (2025) and Posthumanism and Therapy (2026).
David has an extensive creative practice as a playwright and director.
Community-engaged artistic work in Niagara has involved David leading a three-year project collaborating with Mexican and Caribbean seasonal agricultural migrant workers leading to a large spectacle celebrating migrant work realities, and a long-term performance collaboration with Arab and Muslim citizens of Niagara. Further afield he collaborated with a group of researchers and artists on a multi-year project facilitating the creative expression of intellectually disabled adult survivors of institutional childhood abuse at the Huronia Regional Centre in Orillia.
Professional work includes authoring the award-winning Khalida and Our Lady of Delicias; touring his creation of GOYA: Techno-Opera, to Mexico City with the Auto-Repair Club Ensemble; and creating and touring professional/amateur productions around Ontario with his Zacada Circus Entertainment (with Zakarenko & Cadeau). David’s current project, a 24-hour performance installation entitled AnthrApology, is in development with the 4THOT Collective for presentation in Ontario and Saskatchewan.
He has received over $1.3 million of funding and investments for creative and research projects.
David has directed numerous mainstages for Department of Dramatic Arts Mainstages, including Timberlake Wertenbaker’s Our Country’s Good; Caryl Churchill’s The Skriker; Carel Kapek’s Rossum’s Universal Robots; Alfred Jarry’s King Ubu, Sarah Ruhl’s Orlando, Howard Barker’s Scenes from an Execution; as well as most recently his own creation, AnthropoScene.
Courses taught in the Department of Dramatic Arts include DART 1P99 Introduction to Performance; DART 1F01 Acting for Non-Majors; DART 4F56 Advanced Studies in Theatre; and DART 4F90 Critical Theory and Practice. He has also regularly taught courses in a range of graduate programs at Brock, including for the PhD in Interdisciplinary Humanities — HUMA 7P01 Interdisciplinary Research and Writing in the Humanities, and HUMA 7P34 Immanence, Ontology, Aesthetics; for the MA in Studies in Comparative Literatures and Arts — SCLA 5P02 Comparative Methodologies, SCLA 5P03 Critical Theory and the Arts, and SCLA 5P75 Advanced Studies in Aesthetics; and for the MA in Social Justice and Equity Studies —SJES 5P70 Social Justice and the Arts.
David directs research projects for graduate students at MA and PhD levels, primarily with SCLA, the MA in Studies in Comparative Literatures and Arts, and HUMA, the PhD in Interdisciplinary Humanities. His students have successfully completed theses, major research papers, and dissertations in the areas of theatre, performance, social justice, critical disabilities studies, aesthetics, philosophy, posthumanism, technology, and many intersections between these. He has been awarded a Brock Chancellor’s Chair for Excellence in Teaching (with Sue Spearey), as well as disABILITIES and Best Practices teaching awards.
David has twice served as Chair of the Department of Dramatic Arts (2009-12, 2020-21) and has also served as the Graduate Program Director of the MA in Studies in Comparative Literatures and Arts (2013-16). He is a founding faculty member with the PhD in Interdisciplinary Humanities. He has been the director of the Posthumanism Research Institute. He is a member of editorial board for the Journal of Ecohumanism, a member of the editorial collective for Interconnections: Journal of Posthumanism, and Member of the Board for the European Center for Posthumanism and Citizenship. He has served as an external evaluator for theatre programs across Ontario.
With respect to service at Brock and beyond, David organized a scholarship for the children of agricultural migrant workers to attend Brock (with Richard Mitchell) and was a key member of the Niagara committee who successfully developed a bid to bring the Canada Summer Games to the region. He is a co-founder of the Well Earth Collaborative, a group of specialist physicians, immunologists, and other practitioners who promote clinical and community environmental and planetary health. He has been working as an advocate since the early 2000s for those living with chronic complex conditions and environmental sensitivities. He is completing training as a registered psychotherapist to be able to continue to better support this population. David has raised significant funds for unhoused persons in this patient population and speaks out regularly about providing those living with these disabilities options other than medical assistance in dying (MAiD) to reduce their suffering.
Find out more about David Fancy at https://www.davidfancy.ca/site/home
Blaikie, Fiona & David Fancy. ‘Worlding Intensity/ies and energy/ies in a portrait of Ann. Journal of Posthumanism. 2024. 4 (1), 1-18.
Fancy, David. ‘Geomancy vs Technomancy: Resonance, Divination and Gilbert Simondon’s Thought’. In Symbiotic Posthumanist Ecologies in Western Literature, Philosophy and Art: Towards Theory and Practice. Eds Peggy Karpouzou and Nikoleta Zampaki. Berlin: Peter Lang, 2023.
Fancy, David, and Lillian Manzour. ‘Manifesto’ in Eds. Teatro de Tres Americas: Antología Norte. Ediciones Sin Paredes, 2022.
Fancy, David, and Lillian Manzour Eds. Teatro de Tres Americas: Antología Norte. Ediciones Sin Paredes, 2022.
Fancy, David. Our Lady of Delicias. in North American Drama. Mexico City: Ediciones Sin Paredes, 2022.
Fancy, David. ‘The Actor as Geoartist.’ In David Fancy and Conrad Alexandrowicz (eds). Theatre Pedagogy in an Era of Climate Crisis. Routledge, 2021.
Fancy, David, and Conrad Alexandrowicz (eds). ‘Introduction: In the midst of a pandemic and a reckoning on racial injustice.’ Theatre Pedagogy in an Era of Climate Crisis. Routledge, 2021.
Fancy, David, and Conrad Alexandrowicz (eds). ‘Epilogue: Theatre pedagogy and the climate crisis—a manifesto.’ Theatre Pedagogy in an Era of Climate Crisis. Routledge, 2021.
Fancy, David, and Conrad Alexandrowicz (eds). Theatre Pedagogy in an Era of Climate Crisis. Routledge, 2021.
Fancy, David. ‘Electrical Hypersensitivity (EHS) and the “Social Model” of Disability. ’ Bray, Riina and David Fancy. Clinical Practice Guidelines for EHS – Proceedings from a Symposium on the Impacts of Wireless Technology on Health. Women’s College Hospital Environmental Health Clinic. October, 2020. 108-114.
Fancy, David, and Hans Skott-Myhre, eds. Immanence, Politics and the Aesthetic: Thinking Revolt in the 21st Century. McGill Queens University Press, 2019.
Fancy, David. “Patrice Chéreau: Staging the European Crisis.” Contemporary European Theatre Directors. Second Edition. Ed. Marie Delgado and Dan Rebellato. New York: Routledge, 2020.
Fancy, David. ‘When Simulation Becomes Simulacrum: “Reversing Platonism” in Live Role Play.’ Immanence, Politics and the Aesthetic: Thinking Revolt in the 21st Century. Eds. David Fancy and Hans Skott-Myhre. McGill Queens University Press. 2019.
Fancy, David. Our Lady of Delicias. North American Drama. Mexico: Teatro Sin Paredes Publishing, 2019.
Fancy, David. ‘Geoartistry: Invoking the Postanthropocene Via Other-Than-Human Art.’ Interrogating the Anthropocene, Ecology, Aesthetics, Pedagogy, and The Future in Question. Ed. Jan Jagodinski. Palgrave, 2018. 217-36.
Fancy, David. “Deleuze and Guattari’s ‘becoming-child’ in Zacada Circus.’ Richard Mitchell and Shannon Moore, eds. Special issue of World Futures: The Journal of New Paradigm Research entitled ‘Transdisciplinary Child & Youth Studies: Critical Praxis & Global Perspectives’. 2018.
Fancy, David. “Affirmative Freakery, Freaky Methodologies: Circus and its Bodies Without Organs in Disability Circus.” Performance Matters. 4.1-2 (2018) 151-163.
Davis, Nancy; David Fancy; Jen Rinaldi; Kate Rossiter; Alex Tigchelaar. “Recounting Huronia Faithfully: Attenuating our Methodology to the ‘Fabulation’ of Truths-Telling.” Cultural Studies, Critical Methodologies. 17:6 (2017).
Fancy, David. “Escaping “The Organism, Signifiance, and Subjectification” in the Recounting Huronia Project.” Canadian Journal of Disability Studies. 6:3 (2017): 184-210.
Fancy, David. “‘Affective Assemblages,’ in Migrant Worker Theatre.” Contemporary Theatre Review. 26:4 (2016): 457-467.
Fancy, David. “Sustainability, Immanence, and the Monstrous in Caryl Churchill’s The Skriker.” Sustainability and the Globalized Classroom. Ed. Shannon and Richard Moore. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers, 2015. 95-106.
Fancy, David. “Deleuze & Guattari, Architecturality and Performance.” Intensities and Lines of Flight: Deleuze, Guattari and the Arts. Ed. Antonio Calcagno, Jim Vernon, and Steve Lofts. London: Rowman and Littlefield, 2014. 67-82
Fancy, David. “’A Sacred Affirmation’: Immanent Performativity in Gilles Deleuze’s Difference and Repetition.” Performance Research. 19.2 (2014): 74-83.
Fancy, David. “Becoming Imperceptible: Affect in the Studio en trois temps.” Ed. Erin Hurley. The Theatre of Affect (Essays), Volume 4 in the New Essays on Canadian Theatre series, Gen. Ed. Ric Knowles. Toronto: Playwrights Canada Press, 2014. 62-75.
Fancy, David. “‘I Scream the Body Electric’: Performance, the Field Body, and Zombies in Societies of Entrainment.” Performance, Identity, and the Neo-Political Subject. Eds. Matthew Causey and Fintan Walsh. London: Routledge, 2013. 63-83.
Fancy, David. “St Nina and the Abstract Machine: Aesthetics, Ontology, Immanence.” TRANS(performing) Nina Arsenault. Ed Judith Rudakoff. Chicago: Intellect, 2012. 173-189.
Fancy, David. “Geoperformativity: Immanence, Performance, and the Earth.” Performance Research, 16.4 (2011): 62-72.
Fancy, David. “Difference, Bodies, Desire: The Collaborative Thought of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari.” Science Fiction Film and Television. 3.1 (2010), 93–106.
Fancy, David. “Patrice Chéreau: Staging the European Crisis.” Contemporary European Theatre Directors. Ed. Marie Delgado and Dan Rebellato. New York: Routledge, 2010. 49-68.
Fancy, David and Susan Spearey. “Mindfulness and Embodiment Practices as Teaching Pathways in the Humanities.” Power, Pedagogy, and Praxis: Social Justice in the Globalized Classroom. Ed. Shannon and Richard Moore. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers, 2008. 179-198.
Fancy, David. “L’Affaire Koltès: a Contextualization.” Contemporary Theatre Review. 18.4 (2008). 487-96.
Fancy, David. “The Gathering of the Gurus: Spiritual Capital and the Shambhala Authentic Leadership Program.” Theatre Research in Canada. 26.1-2 (2005): 84-101.
Fancy, David. Sallinger in Koltès Plays: Two. Ed. David Bradby and Maria Delgado. London: Methuen, 2004. 27-97.
Fancy, David. “The ‘Darkness’ at the End of the Theatre: Chéreau, Koltès, Nanterre.” Contemporary Theatre Review. 14.4 (2004): 68-82.
Fancy, David, Alex Johnston and Joseph Long. Quay West in Koltès Plays: Two. Ed. David Bradby and Maria Delgado. London: Methuen, 2004. 99-185.
Fancy, David and Maria Delgado. “Bernard-Marie Koltès and the ‘Other’ Spaces of Translation.” New Theatre Quarterly. 17.6 (2001): 41-60.
Fancy, David and Maria Delgado. “Koltès et le monde anglo-saxon.” Koltès: la Question du lieu. Ed. André Petitjean. Metz: Cresef, 1999. 85-103.
PRODUCTIONS OF PLAYS:
Fancy, David. AnthrApology. DART Summer Research Institute creative explorations of this durational performance. 2024.
Fancy, David. AnthrApology. DART Summer Research Institute creative explorations of this durational performance. 2023.
Fancy, David. The Amazing Natural. Participation in curated workshop on performance and breath led by Lin Snelling, University of Alberta. 2023.
Fancy, David. AnthropoScene. Mainstage production with Department of Dramatic Arts (designed by David Vivian. 2022.
Fancy, David. AnthropoScene. Playtext for Dramatic Arts Departmental Mainstage. Completed August 2022.
Fancy, David. AnthrApology. Commission of 24-hour play by Teatro Sin Paredes Mexico City. 2021.
Fancy, David. DART Departmental Mainstage Production of Scenes From an Execution (Howard Barker). With scenography by and wardrobe by Kelly Wolf. Choreography Trevor Copp. Oct-Nov. 2020.
Fancy, David. DART Departmental Mainstage Production of Orlando (Virginia Woolf). With scenography by James Mccoy and wardrobe by Kelly Wolf. Choreography Trevor Copp. Oct-Nov. 2019.
Fancy, David. Our Lady of Delicias. Play commissioned by Monica Dufault and Essential Collective Theatre. Directed Monica Dufault. Robertson Theatre, First Ontario Centre for the Arts. 2018.
Fancy, David. Shotgun Wedding. Writer, Librettist, Co-Director. Greg Frewin Theatre, Niagara Falls, Ontario. 2017.
Fancy, David. Circus Labyrinth. Writer/director. Circus show for young audiences Oakville Centre for the Arts, Milton Centre for the Arts, Stocky Centre in Parry Sound. 2016.
Fancy, David. GOYA: Techno-Opera, for Auto Repair Club Ensemble. Librettist, stage director. Performed at Universidad del Claustro sor Juana, and Universidad Anahuac, Mexico City, Shubox Theatre, Regina. 2015-16.
Fancy, David. Major Predictions, Barbara. Writer. Funded collaboration between the Shaw Festival and the Department of Dramatic Arts. 2015.
Fancy, David. That Woman. Writer/director. Sullivan Mahoney Courthouse Theatre, St Catharines. 2011.
Fancy, David. Khalida. Writer. SummerWorks Festival. Director Sasha. 2008. Restaged as part of Director’s Lab at Lincoln Centre for the Arts. NYC, in 2009.
2009 – ‘Best Practices’ Teaching Award. Centre for Teaching, Learning and Educational Technologies. Brock University.
2009 – Annual ‘Making a Difference Award,’ Students with DisAbilities. Brock University.
2008 – Enbridge Alberta Theatre Projects playRITES Emerging Playwrights Prize
2005 – Chancellor’s Chair for Teaching Excellence, with Sue Spearey. (2005-2008)
Dr. Fancy has received extensive internal and external granting and contracts from a range of agencies, including SSHRC and the Canada Council for the Arts for a total of over $1 million of funding.
2022-23. Trauma-informed poetry committee. Nick Virgulto Haiku Association, Camden New Jersey.
2021-(present). Member of Board, European Center for Posthumanism and Citizenship.
2021-(present). Member of Editorial Board, Journal of Ecohumanism.
2021-23. Sole fundraiser: raised over $150,000 in cash and $1 million in-kind (in the form of real estate) for housing for unhoused person seeking medical assistance in dying (MAiD). With Well Earth Collaborative (not for profit) and Friends of the Healing Forest (charity).
2020- (present). Member of editorial collective, Interconnections, Journal of Posthumanism. Regular screening and peer review of new research.
2019-(present). Co-founder of Well Earth Collaborative, a group of specialist physicians, naturopaths, immunologists working to support those with complex chronic conditions and environmental illness.
2019. Co-organizer of ‘Impacts of Wireless Technology on Health: A symposium for Ontario’s medical community.’ Sponsored and held at Women’s College Hospital. May.
2018. Conference Organizing Committee for ‘Taking flight: assembling, becoming, queering’ 10th International Deleuze Studies Conference and Camp, Toronto 2017
March 2017 – Opening Ceremony Sampler and cultural presentation (circus, dance, song) for Niagara Canada Summer Games 2021 Bid at Partridge Hall, FirstOntario Centre for the Performing Arts, St Catharines. 850 spectators. 30 minute program featuring indigenous presenters, youth performers, cirque acts form Montreal, rock and roll.
December 2016 – Co-writer, director, Dream of Christmas / Rève de Noël. Co-production between Niagara Symphony Orchestra and Zacada Circus at Partridge Hall, St Catharines Performing Arts Centre. 2000 spectators in three sold-out shows.
May 2016 – Producer, co-creator, co-director. Huronia Cabaret. Performance with survivors of institutional abuse at provincially run centres for those living with intellectual disabilities. Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, Toronto.
April 2016 – Tour of Circus Labyrinth (writer/director) children’s circus show to Stockey Centre for the Arts, Parry Sound, Ontario, for two performances.
July 2015 – Circus Revolution (writer/director) with Zacada Entertainment, Huntsville Theatre.
July 2015 – Theatre and social change workshops for migrant worker advocates. Quest Healthcare, St Catharines.
October 2014 – Circus Revolution (writer/director) with Zacada Entertainment, Milton Centre for the Arts.
July 2014 – Lundy’s 200. Large scale poetic and spatial re-creation of elements of the battle of Lundy’s Lane featuring 100 performers and 2000 spectators on the original site of battle. Commissioned by the City of Niagara Falls. (Writer/Producer)
May 2014 – Creation of Mystery Train (Writer/Director) for Zacada Entertainment, presented at Grand Hall, Fallsview Casino, Niagara Falls.
April 2014 – Creation of Circus Revolution (Writer/Director) with Zacada Entertainment, 10 Performances in Hamilton at Zacada Circus.
March 2013 – Producer and writing co-ordinator of Arab Spring Monologues, a community engaged performance on issues around Arab Canadian and Muslim identity in Niagara.
May to December 2012 – Director of Niagara Travelling Roadshow. Fifteen spontaneous moments of culture presented as part of the Cultural Capitals of Canada campaign.
August 2012 – Director and co-producer of the Opening Ceremonies of the World International Junior Swimming Championships at the Illuminaqua stage on the Welland Canal. Featuring 50 performing artists.
2011 – Growing Together: A Celebration of Niagara Migrant Workers. Wrote and directed piece about migrant worker issues for cast of 35. Sean O’Sullivan Theatre. Sept 18th, 2011. Based on a two year collaborative process with migrant agricultural workers and twenty four regional social service organizations.
March 2006 – Workshop leader and project co-ordinator, Kairon Project. A year-long series of expressive arts workshops designed for women living with and beyond breast cancer.
2002 to 2003 – Stage director, Untold Stories Project, Teesri Duniya Theatre. Montreal. Directed two large productions in this ongoing series of projects designed to give voice to untold stories from members of diverse cultural communities from various socio-economic strata.
2002 to 2003 – Artistic Director, Youthworks, Black Theatre Workshop. Trained actors aged 16-22 on a weekly basis. Secured $50,000 per annum Heritage Canada funding to begin three-year Afrocentric curriculum with Black Theatre Workshop’s Young Company.
MEMBERSHIPS
- Member of Board, European Center for Posthumanism and Citizenship.
- Member of Editorial Board, Journal of Ecohumanism.
- Member of editorial collective, Interconnections: Journal of Posthumanism.
- Deleuze and Guattari Studies
- Posthumanism Research Network
- Playwrights Guild of Canada