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Toronto, ON –
The Canadian Stage TD Dream in High Park
presents Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare’s
timeless tale of star-crossed lovers and feuding families
directed by Dora Award-winner
Vikki Anderson (The Doll House, Coyote Ugly). The
production runs June 25 to
September 5, 2010 (media
night: June 29) at the High Park amphitheatre. Performances run
Tuesday through Sunday at 8 p.m. Gate opens at 6 p.m. Admission
is PWYC at the gate (suggested minimum donation $20) and free
for children 14 and under. Family Day Sundays feature
free, all-ages, pre-show activities. For Dream information,
contact 416-367-1652 or canadianstage.com/dream.
Entering its 28th season, the Canadian Stage TD Dream
in High Park
is the oldest annual outdoor theatre event in Canada. Since its
inception in 1983, an estimated 1.3 million people have enjoyed
the tradition of theatre under the stars.
Family Day Sundays,
the popular, free, all-ages program for
children, parents and families return featuring fun-filled
activities including backstage tours, an opportunity to meet the
cast, Shakespearean games, workshops exploring the language of
the Bard and more. Held at the High Park amphitheatre on
Sundays, the program runs July 4 to September 5, from
5 - 6:30 p.m., weather permitting. Registration is required.
Registration requests will be accepted June through September.
Contact 416-367-1652 or
family@canadianstage.com
for more information.
Romeo and Juliet is one of William Shakespeare's
most popular plays and indisputably the world’s best-known love
story. In this adaptation, the tragic tale of the young lovers
destroyed by their feuding families is re-told by a group of
travelling performers delayed at the Verona train station. Weary
and irritable, tempers flare and tension ignites a spirited
confrontation. In an attempt to restore calm, some members of
the group challenge the others to a game. Play titles are thrown
into a hat and one is drawn: Romeo and Juliet. They all
agree to perform the play making do with the colourful palette
of costumes they are carrying in their suitcases. Under the
starry Italian sky, they transform the train station into the
medieval city of Verona and the story of the Montagues and
Capulets comes to life.
Vikki Anderson is an award-winning theatre director,
designer and producer. She is the founder and artistic director
of Toronto’s DVxT Theatre Company which has received 14 Dora
nominations and 9 Dora Awards. Anderson’s directorial credits
include the world première of Adam Pettle’s
Mosley and Me at Canadian Stage (2003),
Happy Days starring Martha Burns for Soulpepper
Theatre Company (2003), St. Christopher at Theatre Passe
Muraille (2005), the multi-award-winning productions of
The Doll House (7 Dora Awards including Outstanding
Production, Direction, Female Performance, Male Performance, Set
Design, Costume Design and Sound Design, 2001) and Coyote
Ugly (2 Dora Awards for Outstanding Female Performance and
Sound Design, 1998), and most recently The Last Five Years
at The Grand Theatre (2010) and The
Turn of the Screw at the Campbell House Museum
(2009). She was also Assistant Director for the Stratford
Shakespeare Festival productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream
and Hamlet in 2008.
Anderson is the successful candidate of Canadian Stage’s
Directors Development Initiative, selected from over 80
applicants across the country to direct the 2010 Canadian Stage
TD Dream in High Park. Part of the Company’s ongoing commitment
to support the professional development of artists, the
Directors Development Initiative was launched in 2009 to promote
the development of directors in their early and mid-careers.
Successful applicants have the opportunity to direct a
large-scale production before a large audience.
“We are thrilled to support director Vikki Anderson as she
progresses to the large stage. She brings a fresh interpretation
to this much-loved story,” states Artistic & General Director
Matthew Jocelyn. “Her vision for a meta-theatrical Romeo and
Juliet stood out as the ideal production to engage and
delight the thousands of families, stalwarts and first time
theatre-goers who attend the Dream each year.”
Nationally and internationally acclaimed, The Canadian Stage
Company is Canada’s leading not-for-profit contemporary
theatre company. Founded in 1987 with the merger of CentreStage
and Toronto Free Theatre, the Company is dedicated to
programming international contemporary theatre and to developing
and producing landmark Canadian works, which have been awarded
some of the country’s most prestigious literary and performing
arts honours, including the Governor General’s, Chalmers and
Dora Mavor Moore Awards. The Company presents the richest
variety of Canadian and international plays and musicals – from
provocative work at the Berkeley Street Theatre to productions
with popular appeal at the Bluma Appel Theatre and a summer of
Shakespeare at the TD Dream in High Park. Canadian Stage has a
long-standing commitment to education and enhancement programs
for the public, nurturing theatre professionals, and developing
new Canadian plays, while producing thought-provoking theatre
and high quality entertainment in Toronto, one of North
America’s largest theatre centres. For more information, refer
to canadianstage.com.
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CANADIAN STAGE TD DREAM IN
HIGH PARK presents 
