HEDDA GABLER by Henrik Ibsen
Translated & adapted by Judith Thompson

Directed by Jane Carnwath

November 12 - 27, 2010

Ibsen's late 19th century Norwegian classic of feminist theatre is given an inspired contemporary re-imagining by Canada's Judith Thompson. A dangerous woman trapped in a loveless marriage sets off a powder keg of emotions and events.

Read the Press Release: Hedda Gabler Press Release

TICKETS

Performance Dates
Friday November 12 - 27, 2010
Talkback following matine, Sun Nov 21

Performance Times
Wednesday to Saturday: 8:00 pm
Sunday Matinée: 2:00 pm
Box Office opens one hour before performance time

Admission Prices
Wednesday: 2-for-1
Thursday, Friday & Saturday: $20
Sunday Matinée: PWYC
CASH ONLY! Box Office does not accept credit or debit cards

Reservations
Email: reservations@alumnaetheatre.com
Phone: 416-364-4170 (Box 1)

HEDDA GABLER: Cast Biographies

ANDREW BATTEN, Judge Brack
Like an irksome and persistent virus, Andrew occasionally and without explanation re-appears on the Alumnae stage, most recently in The Memory of Water (2008) and Lady Windermere's Fan (2007). Ancient Alumnae appearances include The Love of the Nightingale, Trojan Women and The Rivals. When not attempting to remember lines and stay off the other actors' feet, Andrew seeks to continue his own education by teaching for the Toronto District School Board. Andrew wishes to thank Debbie for putting up with him, T-Bone for all those late night discussions, and Sarah for just being Sarah. Thanks for coming; it's way more fun with an audience.

ILENE CUMMINGS, Berthe
Ilene is delighted to return to the Alumnae stage after a six-year hiatus. Ilene first joined the Alum in 1971 and has appeared in twenty-one productions here over the years, thirteen of them in the Studio. Some of her favourite roles include Cassandra in Timothy Findley's Can You See Me Yet?; Alice B. Toklas in Gertrude Stein and a Companion; and Angeline in Les Belles Soeurs. In recent years she was a lay chaplain for the First Unitarian Congregation of Toronto during which she officiated at weddings, memorial services and child dedications - theatre of a different sort.

SOCHI FRIED, Hedda Gabler
Recent acting credits include: Lady Anne in Richard III (Hart House, Jeremy Hutton); Dead Cat Bounce (Toronto Fringe 10); The Good Body (V-Day Toronto); Yichud (Seclusion) (Convergence Theatre); Palace of the End (Alumnae Theatre); 36 Little Plays About Hopeless Girls (Toronto Fringe '09); Angelika's Promise (AGO); Mother Courage and Her Children (Ryerson, Richard Greenblatt); Metamorphoses (Ryerson, Jordan Pettle). Sochi is a graduate of Ryerson Theatre School (2009) and of the American Musical and Dramatic Academy (2005) in New York City.

JAMES HARBECK, George Tesman
James is returning to theatre after a hiatus of more than a decade. He received his BFA in drama at the University of Calgary, followed by four years of working and acting in Edmonton, and thereafter he got his MA and PhD in drama at Tufts University. He has taught at Tufts and at Emerson College. For the past dozen years he has been a member of the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir. He is currently an editor and a student of linguistics, and he writes daily word tasting notes for his blog, Sesquiotica. His candid rehearsal photos of the Hedda Gabler cast can be seen on Alumnae Theatre's website.

LESLIE McBAY, Thea Elvsted
Leslie is delighted to work with Alumnae again (this time as a blonde!), after playing Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice. Recent credits include Driftwood's Trafalgar 24, and new works such as The Highwayman - A New Musical (ArtSake Theatre) and Those Girls (Royal Porcupine Productions). A graduate of the Sheridan/University of Toronto's Acting program, her favourite credits for Theatre Erindale include That Summer, David Copperfield, and The Maid's Tragedy. Other highlights have included As You Like It (Smashin' Bat Theatre - Western Canada Tour); Les Miserables (ADSB), and directing The Eros Trilogy for the Erindale Fringe.

JANE REYNOLDS, Aunt Juliana
Jane has a BFA from Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, and left graduate work in theatre at the University of Minnesota, anxious to head out to the big wide world of real theatre. But then she met an irresistible young man, and went for the adventure of living some of the lives she'd played. Now she's back for the adventure of playing some of the lives she's lived! Jane is delighted to be with the talented and hardworking Alumnae Theatre ladies again after a hiatus. Some of her favourite roles have been Estelle in Noël Coward's Waiting in the Wings with the Eastside Players, Mistress Page in Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor with the Scarborough Players, the Nurse in Timothy Findley's Can You See Me Yet? and Elizabeth in The Last Real Summer with the Alumnae Theatre.

MALCOLM TAYLOR, Eilert Lovborg
For Alumnae Theatre: Malcolm has appeared in two previous New Ideas Festivals and is excited to be making his Main Stage debut in the attic. Selected credits: Brakenbury/Norfolk in Richard III (Hart House Theatre), Prince George in Asleep at the Wheel (Alumnae Theatre, NIF), Alex in Corporate Rules and Thomas/Sawyer in The Case of the Wandering Corpse (Solar Stage & Edinburgh Fringe Festival), Mirabell in Way of the World, Lomov in The Proposal, Karsten Bernick in Pillars of Society, Alec Harvey in Brief Encounter and Angelo in Measure for Measure (East 15 Acting School), Gabriel in Mad Forest and Rev Baldbelly in Spring Awakening (U of Guelph). Malcolm has also appeared as a lead in two award-winning short films: Just a Matter of Time and Open.

HEDDA GABLER: Creative Team Biographies

JANE CARNWATH, Director
Jane's last directing assignment for Alumnae Theatre was Pride & Prejudice in 2009. Other productions for Alumnae include Daughter of the House (director and dramaturg), Homeward Bound, two plays by Dave Carley (After You and A View From the Roof), The Gut Girls, On the Verge, The Madwoman of Chaillot, Eleemosynary, Wild Honey and The Art of Dining. For the York University Drama Department she directed En Pièces Detachées and Jennie's Story. Among other productions she has directed are Not Wanted on the Voyage, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and You Can't Take It With You. Until recently, Jane taught acting in the Sheridan College Music Theatre program. In addition to her busy directing schedule, she adjudicates all over Canada, and conducts workshops on acting and directing. She is also a dramaturg for Alumnae Theatre's New Play Development Group.

ANDY FRASER, Producer
Hedda Gabler is Andy's fifth producing effort at the Alumnae Theatre and third with director Jane Carnwath. Other producer gigs include Orpheus Descending, After You, Wit, and Pride and Prejudice (Alumnae Theatre), as well as an Equity Co-op at the Tarragon Extra Space, in which she also acted, playing the part of God in Bonnie Anderson's The Uninvited Guest. Always thrilled with the chance to work with Jane, Andy is also grateful for the opportunity to work again with the fabulous design team of Ed, Michael, Margaret and Rick, as well as the delightful Margot Devlin and this terrifically talented cast. Happy to produce but excited to be back on the boards again in the Alumnae's January 2011 production of The Real Inspector Hound. Many thanks to Jack, the best kid in the world.

HENRIK IBSEN, Playwright, (1828 - 1906)
Generally acknowledged as the founder of modern prose drama, Henrik Ibsen was born in 1828 in a tiny coastal town in the south of Norway. His father was a prosperous merchant, but financial failure led to a radical change in the family's social position. As a child, Ibsen dreamed of becoming an artist, encouraged by his mother, who was an avid painter and loved the theatre. His education was interrupted by poverty, and he had to leave school at 15. He wrote his first plays in 1850 (at age 22), and the following year began working with a small theatre company, staging over 150 plays in 6 years. Later he moved away from the Romantic style, and brought the problems and people of the day onto the stage, focusing on characters and psychological conflicts rather than dramatic situations. His best-known works include Peer Gynt (1867), based on a figure from Norwegian folklore; A Doll's House (1879), a social drama about an unhappy wife; and Hedda Gabler (1890), the study of a neurotic woman. Ibsen continued to write until he had a stroke in 1900.

RICK JONES, Sound Design; Movement Coach
Rick is a regular contributor to sound design at the Alumnae, having designed for The Queens, Pride and Prejudice, Lady Windermere's Fan, and Daughter of the House, as well as composing music for his own NIF show The Meeting. He has appeared on the Alumnae stage in Wit and Pride and Prejudice, has participated in many NIF productions, and will be seen here in January as Birdboot in The Real Inspector Hound. He can also be seen next year in Rhombus Media's Politics Is Cruel - The Opera on the big screen, and in The History Channel's miniseries The Kennedys on the small screen. Thanks to Jane for challenging me to once again create a soundscape far outside my comfort zone, and to Sochi for working with me to make her dream come to life.

CATHY McKIM, Blogger, Scenic Artist
Cathy has been kicking around Alumnae for the past eight years, working as an actor, playwright, bartender, scenic artist, props person/ASM, play reading committee member, newsletter columnist and blogger (alumnaetheatre.wordpress.com). Past painting work for Alum includes You Are Here, Hay Fever, Pride and Prejudice, Wit, The Memory of Water, The Real World?, After You, Orpheus Descending and Beautiful City. Hugs to the entire Hedda gang. Big shout out to Ed, the painting crew and Mom.

ED ROSING, Set Designer
Ed received his BA in Theatre/English at Western Reserve University in Cleveland and then went to Yale Drama School. He finished his formal education at Central School of Art and Design in London, England. He most recently designed Set and Lighting for Alumnae Theatre's production of Daniel MacIvor's You Are Here. Other selected credits: Private Lives (Alumnae Theatre - Director); My Darling Judith (Scarborough Theatre Guild - Director); Of Mice And Men (Scarborough Players - Set Design: ACT-Co Award nomination for Best Set Design); Pride And Prejudice (Alumnae Theatre - Lighting Design); Brighton Beach Memoirs (Teatron Theatre Group); Baby With Bathwater (Alumnae Theatre - Lighting Design). Upcoming: Set Design for the world premiere of Catherine Frid's GuineaPigging (Alumnae Theatre).

MARGARET SPENCE, Costume Designer
Margaret has taken many off-stage roles at the Alumnae Theatre over a forty-year association, but none exercise her creative bent as much as costume designing. Always up for period work, she created pretty frocks and stylish-dressed gentlemen for the 21-member cast of Pride And Prejudice (2009). Prior to that, her designs were seen in Noël Coward's Private Lives in 2008 and Oscar Wilde's Lady Windermere's Fan (2007).

MICHAEL SPENCE, Lighting Designer; Master Carpenter
Michael Spence obtained his early training in lighting design in the 1950's at Hart House Theatre. He has worked in both professional and community theatre over the succeeding years, principally with the London Little Theatre, the Company of Pilgrims, the Arts and Letters Club and the Alumnae Theatre. He has done freelance lighting design for commercial clients at the Royal Winter Fair, the Royal York Hotel, the Toronto Cricket, Skating and Curling Club and Massey College.

JUDITH THOMPSON, Translator/Adapter
Montreal-born Judith Thompson is a two-time winner of the Governor General's Award (White Biting Dog - 1985, and The Other Side of the Dark, a collection of her plays - 1989). She has also won the Floyd S. Chalmers Canadian Play Award for I Am Yours (1987) and Lion in the Streets (1991), and was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2005. Palace of the End (2008) won a Dora Mavor Moore Award as Outstanding New Play, and earned Thompson the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize in Texas - the first Canadian playwright to be honoured with this award. Palace of the End also won the 2009 Amnesty International Freedom of Expression Award. Her adaptation of Ibsen's Hedda Gabler, written for the Shaw Festival in 1991, was remounted by Volcano Theatre at Buddies In Bad Times in 2005.

LYNDA YEARWOOD, Assistant Director; Props
Since joining Alumnae, Lynda has had many great experiences backstage. Working her way up from ASM to SM in previous productions, Lynda is thrilled to be wearing the dual hats of Assistant Director and Props Mistress this time around. Working with Jane and this tremendous cast and creative team has been an amazing experience full of fun and educational opportunities (just the way she likes it). Lynda would like to thank Jane for sharing her amazing expertise and teaching her so much in the process, and everyone else involved for the positive and creative energy that began on day one.

Additional Team Members

MARGOT DEVLIN, Stage Manager

REBEKKA HAMMER, Portrait Painter

NAOMI PRIDDLE HUNTER, Fight Director

EILEEN LONERGAN, Sound Operator

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ALUMNAE THEATRE COMPANY
70 Berkeley Street
Toronto, Ontario • M5A 2W6
Phone: 416-364-4170
Email: contactus@alumnaetheatre.com