UPDATE (November 21) : The final events of the festival, including mine, have been postponed due to the recent uptick in COVID cases within the Atlantic bubble. I will post information about new dates when I have them.
Theatre New Brunswick kicks off their virtual Fall Festival of New Plays tonight with an on-line reading of Norm Foster’s Wildly Romantic. Throughout October and November, TNB will present readings of new, freshly-workshopped plays by New Brunswick playwrights every Thursday evening and Sunday afternoon. Visit their website to explore the the full schedule and program.
The festivities officially began on Tuesday night, with a fun conversation between Natasha McLellan (TNB’s Artistic Director) and Vern Thiessen (Guest Playwright & Dramaturg) about what it means to workshop a new play. If you’ve ever wondered about how play creation works or what dramaturgy is, their conversation is still up on-line and is totally worth your time!
I’m very excited to be taking part in the festival. This weekend I’ll participate in the reading of Vern Thiessen’s new play, Bluebirds, which depicts the service of Canadian nurses in France during World War I. Then I’ll turn my attention to the workshop of my new solo show, Les filles du quoi?, which I’m honoured to have included in the festival. I have had the opportunity to workshop the piece before, which helped a great deal to refine the bilingual text, but with this workshop, I’ll have the chance to see the play up on its feet and, with the help of some amazing collaborators, find out how it can exist in a space. For me, collaboration is the best part of theater-making; it’s the part that helps me to learn and grow the most. I can’t wait to share what I learn with you! You can read more about the show and the process here.
I hope that you’ll tune in to experience the whole festival, and especially on Thursday, November 26, for our closing night, which will feature a reading and conversation about solo performance between me, Kirsten Alter, and Ann-Marie Kerr. Mark your calendar! See you then!
ABBY PAIGE 