Towards a national theatre

NEW TRANSLATION CANADA:
THE SIMINOVITCH PLAYWRIGHT PROJECT

Every three years, 5 Canadian playwrights in both official languages (French & English) are nominated for The Siminovitch Prize, Canada’s leading national theatre award. Each of these playwrights represents a leading voice in Canadian playwriting as nominated by their peers.

Jack Paterson (BC), Johanna Nutter (Quebec) and Yolanda Ferrato (Nova Scotia) formed the New Translation Canada Collective. We contacted each of the playwrights who shared our excitement for this vision. They each selected 1 piece from their body of work for translation. Working with a creative translation team drawn from leading theatre makers across Canada, we commissioned creative translation of the selected works.

Our success is measured in the success of orthers. We are thrilled the first text we developed will be presented at Theatre Action’s Feuilles Vives new works festival!

Feuilles vives

Discover the Franco Ontario new works and creations
6th edition | September 16 to September 18, 2022

A staged reading presented by the Théâtre français de Toronto

Crawlspace

By Karen Hines
Translation to french by Mishka Lavigne
September 16 at 8:15 p.m.
27 Larch Street
Greater Sudbury ON P3E1B7

Artistic team: Miriam Cusson, Karine Ricard and Elsa Simbagoye

Project Description
“A blistering commentary on our consumer culture. Pitch-black funny.” – Jo Ledingham, The Courier

Award-winning writer and performer Karen Hines explores the darker side of real estate in CRAWLSPACE, a comic, Kafka-esque monologue that snakes through the brutal battleground of real estate, decorative twig orbs and the state of the human soul.

This translation was commissioned and workshoped by New Translation Canada in association with Theatre Francais de Toronto.

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GALLERY

Meet the Playwright & Translator

Karen Hines (she, her)

Karen Hines’ multi-prize-winning plays offer keen musings on modern life, combining such disparate elements as magical realism, pink-brand feminism and environmental disarray. Her solo performances and ‘little’ films featuring her darkly comic character ‘Pochsy’ have traveled the globe. Hines has collaborated as a director and dramaturg with many fellow artists, and her productions, plays and performances have seen venues like One Yellow Rabbit, Joe’s Pub (Public Theatre), Astor Place Off-Broadway, Tarragon, Videofag, Canadian Stage, Soulpepper, NAC. For Festival du Jamais Lu 2022, Hines’ ‘Tous les petits animaux que j’ai dévouré’ was translated and staged (Mishka Lavigne; Lisa L’Heureux) and Hines’ real estate horror Crawlspace continues to micro-theatres across Canada in French and English. Crawlspace is being adapted as screenplay, and is now a CBC podcast (PlayMe; Radio One). Upcoming, Pochsy IV premieres January 2023.

Mishka Lavigne (she, her)

Mishka Lavigne (she, her) is a playwright and literary translator based in Ottawa/Gatineau. Her plays have been produced, read and developed in Canada, Switzerland, France, Germany and the United States. Her plays Havre and Copeau were awarded the Governor General’s Literary Prize for Drama (French). Her recent play Copeaux, a movement-based poetic creation piece with director É Perron premiered in Ottawa in March 2020. She is currently working on her new play Shorelines and her first opera libretto with composer Tim Brady. Mishka is a National New Play Network (USA) alumni playwright as well as a member of the PGC and CEAD.

About Théâtre Action

Théâtre Action is an active provincial organization essential to the development, entrenchment and impact of French-language theatre practice in Ontario.

Formed in 1972, TA is the first Franco-Ontarian arts service organization in the province, TA created the Francophone cultural magazine, Liaison, participated in the incorporation of Éditions L’Interligne, and facilitated the business plans for La Nouvelle Scène d’Ottawa and Sudbury’s Théâtre du Nouvel-Ontario, founded with the support of Réseau Ontario, participated in the creation, supported the creation of the Jets de théâtre and Connexion Théâtre du Conseil des arts de l’Ontario. Since 1972, TA’s programming events have included États généraux du théâtre franco-ontarien in 1991 and 2008, and more recently, the organization of many festivals and unifying events including Feuilles Vives, the Festival Théâtre Action en Milieu Scolaire, le Happening Théâtral Communautaire and the 24 heures de création pour les professionnels.