From September 8-14, 2014 Nightwood Theatre will present our third incarnation of The New Groundswell Festival: A National Festival of Contemporary Women’s Theatre. This year there will be two workshop productions, Obeah Opera, by composer/librettist Nicole Brooks and directed by Weyni Mengesha, and With Individual Desire written by Susanna Fournier and directed by Kelli Fox.In tandem with the productions we’ll present our Industry Series, with the centrepiece being the National Play Reading Series featuring 6 plays from across the country. We will also host 3 provocative public conversations in a late night ‘Saloon Salon Series’ in our post show bar, a Young Innovators Lab, and a networking reception for the artists of the festival to meet with artistic directors and managers.The Festival will take place over one week at the Historic Distillery District, in the Dancemakers Studio Theatre and the Ernest Balmer Studio.

Festival ProductionsObeah Opera Libretto and Composition by Nicole BrooksDirected by Weyni MengeshaMusical Direction by Andrew CraigProduced by Nightwood Theatre & Culchahworks Arts Collective

Obeah Opera is a genre breaking 20-woman a cappella ‘folk opera,’ synthesizing the breadth of Black music into an unprecedented theatrical epic.Rooted in the 17th century world of the Salem Witch Trials, the piece revisits history by telling the story of a young Caribbean slave, Tituba. Despite her circumstances, Tituba is determined to remain true to her craft as an African healer and save the young women of Salem from beingdehumanized through puritanical teachings. Her efforts are foiled when Elizabeth Parris, the wife of the Reverend in town, who is both envious and fearful of Tituba’s power, sets out to eliminate her and ignites the greatest witch-hunt of all time.

With Individual DesireWritten by Susanna FournierFrom an original idea by Kelli Fox and Sarah KitzDirected by Kelli Fox

In the summer of 1922 famed “bad-girl” American poet, Edna St. Vincent Millay, left Paris with a secret. She spent the next two months with her mother, Cora, in a secluded farmhouse near Dorset. Filled with fantasy and humour, With Individual Desire, is a lush theatrical imagining of the complexities between a mother and daughter confronting their lives, loves, past, and the life-altering turning point they can no longer escape.

September 8 - 14, 2014

TICKETS ON SALE

NOW!

Nicole Brooks

Susanna Fournier

The New Groundswell Festival Performance ScheduleObeah Opera

- Workshop Production-

VENUE: Dancemakers Theatre, Studio #314, 15 Case Goods Lane, Distillery District

Thursday, September 11, 8pm

Friday, September 12, 8pm

Saturday, September 13, 2pm and 8pm

Sunday, September 14, 2pm

With Individual Desire- Workshop Production-

VENUE: Ernest Balmer Studio, Studio #315, 9 Trinity Street, Distillery District

*down the hall from Dancemakers

Wednesday, September 10, 8pm

Thursday, September 11, 8pm

Saturday, September 13, 2pm and 8pm

Sunday, September 14, 4pm

Industry SeriesTo compliment the mainstage workshop productions we will be offering a full Industry Series the week of The Groundswell Festival all with the intent of connecting female creators to their local and national theatre community!

The Young Innovators LabBuilding on the interest in our youth events of previous festivals we will now offer our emerging artistic community the opportunity to 'strut their stuff' in a collection of six, 10 minute performance slots. The focus of the Lab will be on nonconventional theatre practice. We want to give those artists a chance to experiment within nonconventional forms in front of an audience. >Friday, September 12, 8pm, Ernest Balmer Studio, PWYC

Saloon Salon SeriesA series of impromptu discussions will happen over the course of the week in our late night, post show bar, led by different special guests nightly.

Salon 1: Actors in the Drivers SeatThe only way for actors to be successful is to focus on nothing else and sit by the phone to ring, right? Wrong. We want to challenge the myths of what makes actors successful, and discuss how actors can drive their own career forward. We bring together a panel of actors who are highly successful performers that continue to climb the ladder of their acting career, and find a way to juggle writing, producing, directing, or a combination of all 3! >Thursday, September 11, 10pm, Small Dancemakers Studio, FREE EVENT

Salon 2: The Golden Ticket - Rise of the Indie ProducersAs a supplementary activity to our Young Innovators Lab we will be holding a ‘post show’ discussion that focuses on the difficulties and potential solutions to self-producing in the Indie theatre scene in Toronto. For emerging artists the ‘golden ticket’ is to produce their work under the umbrella of Fringe or SummerWorks, and we’ve heard more and more from youth that if they aren’t lucky enough to get their show into one of those festivals its very hard to generate enough funds to self produce. We want to look at all sides of this growing problem for young theatre.  >Friday, September 12, 10pm (following the Young Creators Lab performance), Small Dancemakers Studio, FREE EVENT

Salon 3: A Debate - Be it Resolved: Disparity for Female Practitioners in Canadian Theatre is a MythJoin Artistic Director Kelly Thornton as she facilitates a lively mock debate between some of the playwrights and directors of the festival and a group of Artistic Directors as they discuss the opportunities and climate available for female practitioners working in Canada. >Saturday, September 13, 12noon, Small Dancemakers Studio, FREE EVENT

Pancake Breakfast Networking EventBefore our mock Debate ‘Be it Resolved’ we will be holding a Pancake Breakfast to chow down while chatting with ADs, playwrights and industry people from across the country. >Saturday, September 13, 10am, Small Dancemakers Studio

National Play Reading SeriesNightwood is thrilled to present 6 plays from female writers across the country as part of The National Play Reading Series. One play will be read each night Monday through Saturday in the Small Dancemakers Studio.

Well Born by Celeste Percy-Beauregard (Toronto, ON)Receiving inconclusive prenatal test results, an expectant mother sets out to make peace with her past in order to find the strength to embrace her future. What she uncovers about her birth mother however, does nothing to put her fears about her own pregnancy to rest.

A play about abandoning perfection and accepting our “otherness”.>Monday, September 8, 8pm, Small Dancemakers Studio

The Tashme Project by Julie Tamiko Manning and Matt Miwa (Montreal, QC & Ottawa, ON)The Tashme Project is a one-act verbatim theatre piece that traces the history and common experience of the Nisei (2nd Generation Japanese Canadians) through childhood, WW2 internment, repatriation and post-war resettlement east of the Rockies. The piece is made up of 20 interwoven interviews with Nisei from Toronto, Hamilton, Kingston, Vancouver and Montreal, punctuated by commentary by the two performers who, as younger generation Japanese Canadians, offer perspectives on how the internment experience still resonates both with the JC community at large,

and with them personally. >Tuesday, September 9, 8pm, Small Dancemakers Studio

Leaving Wonderland by Shelley Thompson (Dartmouth, NS)Two years ago, Jane, a respected poet, novelist, and university professor, lost her only son in a binge-drinking incident during his frosh week at a distant university. Joey’s death has taken its toll on Jane’s drive, talent and marriage, leaving her fragile and brittle. When an unlikely relationship develops with Rob, a gifted student, Jane's decisions propel her from the prolonged numbness of despair to a new, unimagined life. However, what rises in the wake of Jane’s decisions will change the lives of her colleagues, her husband, and the young man who's been the catalyst. >Wednesday, September 10, 5pm, Small Dancemakers Studio

Calpurnia by Audrey Dwyer (Toronto, ON)Calpurnia features Julie Fairbanks, a young Black Canadian writer who is in the middle stages of adapting Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird into a screenplay from the perspective of Calpurnia, the Finch family servant. Her brother informs her that she has no right to write about an African American maid because she isn’t Black enough. Julie decides to “do the work”. As Julie embodies Calpurnia, she discovers the explosive politics behind Mammy Culture. She tackles race, classism, and privilege while threatening the fabric that keeps her family intact. >Thursday, September 11, 5pm, Small Dancemakers Studio

The Mothers by Nicole Moeller (Edmonton, AB)A woman whose teenager has committed an unthinkable crime spends yet another sleepless night secluded in her son’s now vacant bedroom, confronting her demons and wondering what happened to the special boy she had loved so much. As she confesses her sins and reveals her secrets, the audience learns of her frayed marriage, her struggles with motherhood, her inability to extricate herself from the web of guilt and shame and move forward, as the rest of her family has. >Friday, September 12, 5pm, Small Dancemakers Studio

Centurions by Sally Stubbs (Vancouver, BC) Mark is held in a police station and interrogated about a violent crime. He holds his story close. Meanwhile, his secrets are unearthed and illuminated for the audience via Mark’s mind and his movies, and it becomes clear that the crime he’s accused of committing is inexorably intertwined with another violent act and his obsession with making films. Mark lives most comfortably behind the camera, watching, always watching, and recording. >Saturday, September 13, 5pm, Small Dancemakers Studio

For full festival details and to purchase tickets please visit the Groundswell page on our website: http://www.nightwoodtheatre.net/index.php/whats_on/groundswell_festival