World Stage Toronto

Cold Night, Hot Theatre

It was -3 when I left Toronto yesterday morning and -24 when I arrived in Ottawa four hours later. But at the risk of plagiarizing myself, just like last year, the best way to fight a cold snap in Ottawa is with some red hot theatre. They're not kidding when they say the undercurrents festival has "Ottawa’s hottest plays at the coldest time of the year." Have you seen the line-up? (Seriously, have you? Click that link if you haven't!)

The festival started earlier this week and it's been really hard for me not to read some reviews and get spoilers on all 6 shows... I'm sorry did I say 6? Ooooooh! It seems the little undercurrents festival is growing and possibly taking a page out of the Next Stage Theatre Festival's book by hosting a show in the Great Canadian Theatre's Festival lobby.

With one of my favorite publicity photos ever by Andrew Alexander

Of course, this means I'm going to have to catch them all!

As for my viewing schedule, feel free to join me at the following: Friday, February 8 7:45 pm Little Iliad - a show that played at World Stage Toronto, and you all know how I feel about those guys! 8:30 pm BREAD - the lobby show with the awesome photo 9:00 pm Little Orange Man - saw it at the Calgary Fringe in 2010 when it was still called Gnomeward Bound. It was one of the most fringetastic things I had ever seen and I look forward to findin gout how the show has progressed.

Saturday, February 9 3:00 pm Ladies of the Lake - the brilliant Catriona Leger & Kate Smith premiere a new work at the festival. With pedigree this strong, you know you're in for something special. 7:00 pm SKIN - take everything I just said about Ladies of the Lake and add a few more lady chromosones. Deluxe Hot Sauces' new work has been getting a lot of buzz for shaking people up and I'm the type of gal who likes to be shook. 9:00 pm The Public Servant - a show from the incredibly talented folks behind Theatre Columbus in Toronto and featuring Ottawa's own Sarah McVie. The show is already selling out, which isn't much of a surprise in Ottawa.

Sunday, February 10 1:00 pm Hip-Hop Shakespeare - Shakepeare! Hip-Hop! There is no way this could go wrong! This is a show I missed at last year's Ottawa Fringe and I am thrilled for the opportunity to correct that mistake.

What will you be seeing?

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Theatre Marketing Done Right

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I've been trying all week to jot my thoughts down about an event I attended earlier in the week, but it's been hard. Honestly, it was just such an amazing, balls-out, forward-thinking kind of thing that I've been worried I wouldn't be able to do it justice. Well, here goes nothing: Last Monday evening, I had the privilege of being invited to a pseudo-theatre launch for World Stage, Harbourfront Centre's contemporary performance series in Toronto. Now, the invitation in and of itself is not unusual for me, but this was a pretty special one.

Here, read for yourself:

As a social media influencer we’d like to invite YOU to a private party!

WHAT: A twitter-kegger-party!

Come out from the web-world and schmooze in person with fellow social media’lites and meet the artistic director of World Stage, @tinarasmussen.  Get behind the scenes details and information about the programming of this year's season, which starts in February and runs until May, and raise a pint to cheers the 2013 season!

WHEN: Monday, January 28th 7pm, beer and pulled pork (veg option too) 8pm, season presentation

WHERE: Tina's place

This was a special party for a veritable who's who of Toronto Theatre Twitterati (say that 3 times fast). There was food and drink, but as you can see, this didn't take place at the Harbourfront Centre. Nope, we were invited to artistic director Tina Rasmussen's home for an informal get-together to eat, drink and talk theatre.  The personal touch did not go unnoticed by everyone in attendance.

 

Getting to know Tina on this personal  level made her passion and enthusiasm for her season that much more engaging. This event let me know about a very wicked upcoming season (and if I was the type of person who could plan ahead, I would buy tickets for every show right now), gave me a wonderful opportunity to catch up with some old pals, meet some online theatre media from Mooney on Theatre, Torontoist and Charlebois Post, and of course, make new like-minded social media friends.

Artistic Directors take note! From my perspective, this was a massive PR success for World Stage Toronto. Not only did it get an 'influencer' like myself who knew nothing about the company to see it (and talk about constantly) in a very positive light, we also managed to get both @WorldStageTO and the event hashtag #theatrekegger trending on Twitter in Toronto.

Since some  marketing team from the Canadian Stage where in attendance and saw what a success this type of event can be, I look forward to being invited to a season launch BBQ at Matthew Jocelyn's house in the very near future #fingerscrossed #agirlcandream

Some of my favorite Tweets from the evening - follow the whole discussion at #theatrekegger: