Western Ontario Drama League
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Newsletter September 2018
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- Festival 2019
- Maja Ardal - In-Festival Adjudicator, WODL Festival 2019
- Life Membership - Bev Dietrich
- News From Around the WODL Region
- September news from Brant/Haldimand/Norfolk/Oxford
- Learn the Skills of Stage Intimacy - Theatre Ontario
- Playwrights Guild og Canada - Canadian Play Outlet
- If you are producing Canadian Plays this Season - Check This Out
- ONstage Theatre Listings
- Is your WODL Membership Information Up-to-date?
- Dates for your Diary
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Festival 2019 will be a bit different from usual.
Festival has always been hosted by one of the WODL Member theatre groups. Volunteers from that theatre support festival shows, host receptions and adjudications, plan workshops and organize the gala. It’s a big commitment. Some years it has been difficult to find a theatre group that is prepared to make this commitment to host Festival.
Community theatre is about bringing people together to create, to learn, and to share the resources of different people to make good theatre. WODL has been about bringing together the community theatre groups of Western Ontario to create, to learn and to share resources to help us all make better theatre.
Community is the key. So this year, in the spirit of community, Festival is being hosted under a slightly different model. Elmira Theatre Company and Guelph Little Theatre are teaming up.
The Festival shows will be staged in Guelph, supported by volunteers from GLT. ETC is organizing the hotel side of the Festival – the opening reception, the workshops and the gala. Guelph is bringing the experience of hosting two festivals in recent years (in 2013 and in 2017); Elmira is providing eager volunteers, brimming with new ideas. Thus far, the collaboration has been an exciting one with everyone eager to share ideas and learn from those with experience.
This sense of community led to our choice of the Festival logo: the open hands ready to offer or accept whatever is offered as we come together in a Spotlight on Sharing.
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Maja Ardal - In-Festival Adjudicator, WODL Festival 2019
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Maja Ardal: Playwright, Director, Actor, Theatre Trainer
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Maja Ardal has been working in theatre for forty-eight years. Her play
The Hero of Hunter Street
was produced by 4thLine Theatre in 2016, and she is writing two new plays for 4thLIne.
She created
One Thing Leads to Another
, Theatre for Babies, produced by Young People’s Theatre, and toured Canada. It received 2 Dora Awards. She wrote and performs in the hit shows
You Fancy Yourself
(Dora Award for performance) and
The Cure for Everything
(Dora nomination.) She wrote
HER2
a play for 10 women, produced by Nightwood Theatre.
Copies of her plays can be found through Playwrights Canada Press.
Maja adapted and directed the play
Prisoner of Tehran
by Marina Nemat, produced by Theatre Passe Muraille. Maja was the artistic director of Young People's Theatre Toronto during the 1990s. Her production of
Whale
received the Dora award for outstanding production. She has directed across Canada including Alberta Theatre Projects, The Grand Theatre, London, Theatre NorthWest, Muskoka Summer Theatre, and The Shaw Festival.
As an actor she performed at Talk is Free Theatre and 4thLine Theatre in 2018.
She gives workshops in playwriting, vocal and physical theatre techniques in communities across Canada and teaches theatre creation/writing/directing to communities: Theatre Ontario Summer Intensive and Peel Region Community Council.
Maja has adjudicated community theatre festivals in Sault St Marie, London, (Theatre Ontario), (QUONTA) 2015, and London’s One Act play Festival in 2016.
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Life Membership - Bev Dietrich
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Some months ago Lawrie Bonanno, Chair of the Life Members Committee for a long time, asked me to take over this position - and I happily accepted. He gave me the name of someone who had been recommended to him to be awarded a Life Membership in WODL. I checked with all the other current Life Members, who agreed unanimously with this idea, as did I.
And so the Board of WODL has given an Honorary Life Membership to someone who has been on the board since 2011, who is well known to so many in WODL - she has attended WODL Festivals for a long time, and Theatre Ontario Festivals, networking with theatre people throughout the province.
She is heavily involved in her home group and can usually be found Stage Managing or Producing, especially if it is a Festival show. And she chaired our Minifest Committee for a number of years, then becoming an Area Vice President when Minifest faltered. She was awarded the Michael Spence Award in 2014. Her contributions to theatre in Western Ontario are considerable -
Congratulations
to Bev Dietrich on becoming an Honorary Life Member of WODL.
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News from Around the WODL Region
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And we head into the fall season! Some of our groups have been hard at work through the hot summer months to prepare the following productions for September!
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September News from Brant/Haldimand/Norfolk/Oxford
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By Linda Lloyd-McKenzie, WODL area VP for Brant/Haldimand/Norfolk/Oxford,
lindalm@wodl.on.ca
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Paris Performers' Theatre will be holding its Annual General Meeting at the Paris Fairgrounds on September 24th at 7:00 pm. Doors will open at 6:30 pm for pre-meeting social time - nibbles and refreshments will be served. All are welcome! For more information, please email
linda.mckenzie@gmail.com
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Theatre Tillsonburg: Mark Your Calendar: Costume Sale September 8th! Our basement costume room is bursting at the seams! The intrepid crew of Jane Brown, Pat Linn and Sheila Tripp have gone through and taken out a wide variety of costumes that will be available for sale on September 8th at the theatre. Looking for a vintage fur coat or wedding dress? These items and MANY more will be up for grabs- get there early for the best selection!
Theatre Tillsonburg will be holding its Annual General Meeting at the Otter Valley Playhouse in Tillsonburg on September 15th at 7:00 pm. For more information, please visit
www.theatretillsonburg.com
.
Simcoe Little Theatre's first production of their 2018-2019 season is
Nana's Naughty Knickers
by Katherine DiSavino, directed by Darlene Murphy. September 20th-30th Thursday to Saturday 8:00 pm performances, Sunday matinees at 2:00 pm. For ticket and location information, visit www.
simcoelittletheatre.org
.
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Learn the Skills to Stage Intimacy - Theatre Ontario
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Theatre Ontario is hosting our next
Intimacy for the Stage for Directors
workshop on Saturday, September 29 in Toronto.
Learn the techniques and the language to stage human sexuality in a way that is professional, dynamic and focused on storytelling.
Learn more and register at:
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Playwrights Guild of Canada - Canadian Play Outlet
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The
Canadian Play Outlet
has launched its new site with over 2000 Canadian Plays right at your fingertips. Looking for something specific? Check out the curated
Collections
.
Every month you can take a look at the newest unpublished and published plays available!
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If you are Producing Canadian Plays this Season - Check This Out
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The Playwrights Guild of Canada publicises productions of Canadian-written plays through its website,
www.playwrightsguild.ca
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Theatre Ontario publishes an online list of current and upcoming productions by its member groups. To see what is on
click here
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Is your WODL Menbership Information Up-to-date?
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Are you on the board of a theatre group that belongs to WODL? If your group has:
- A new President
- New WODL delegates
- A new Treasurer
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Deadline for submission of 2018/2019 Festival adjudication applications
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WODL Festival 2019, Guelph
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Theatre Ontario Festival 2019, Richmond Hill
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See what's happening on our social sites
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