Black Theatre Canada

Last updated
Black Theatre Canada
Formation1973
Dissolved1988
TypeTheatre group
Location
Artistic director(s)
 Vera Cudjoe
Notable members
 ahdri zhina mandiela, Amah Harris, Arlene Duncan, Delroy Lindo, Denis Simpson, Diana Braithwaite, Jackie Richardson, Jeff Jones, Joe Sealy, Leon Bibb, Philip Akin, Tom Butler, Jeff Jones

Black Theatre Canada (BTC) was a Toronto-based theatre company founded in 1973 by Vera Cudjoe. The company sought to give expression to Black performance culture in Canada and to develop talent from the Black community. BTC was known for its critically acclaimed adaptations and original productions as well as educational programming, some of which extended into the metro Toronto school system. BTC cultivated a deep legacy of Black theatre and live performance artists in the 1970s and 1980s before folding in 1988 due to chronic funding shortages.

Contents

Early years

Black Theatre Canada was founded in 1973 in Toronto by Vera Cudjoe, who sought to give expression to Black performance culture in Canada and to train young talent from the Black community. [1]

In establishing the company, Cudjoe received help from Ed Smith, who had founded the Buffalo Black Drama Workshop and taught African-American studies at the University at Buffalo. Smith and his group travelled to Toronto to stage a play by Ron Milner titled Who's Got His Own, in order to "see if Toronto is ready for Black professional theatre". The cohort at the Underground Railroad, a popular Black restaurant in Toronto, assisted with accommodation and venue. The work was presented for a single night at the First Unitarian Congregation of Toronto to a full audience. The enthusiastic response encouraged Cudjoe to pursue the theatre group. [1] [2]

A number of early collaborators helped set up the company's administration, among them June Faulkner, former general manager of Toronto Workshop Productions and Young People's Theatre. The first Board included novelist Austin Clarke, choreographer Len Gibson, and City Councillor Ying Hope. [1] [2] For a short while in its beginning years, BTC operated in conjunction with Theatre Fountainhead (founded by Jeff Henry in 1974) as "Black Theatre Alliance", largely to fend off an attempt by the Canada Council for the Arts to fold the companies together. [3]

BTC's first full production was Roderick Walcott's Malfini (1974), the story of three superstitious men on trial in purgatory for the murder of a boy. [4] [5] The performances took place at Bathurst Street United Church, converted into a theatre with the help of Walcott and his technicians. The venue, now home to the Randolph Academy for the Performing Arts and the Bathurst Street Theatre, had never previously been used as a theatre. [6]

Productions

The company produced numerous well-received and well-attended works, including the first Canadian production of A Raisin in the Sun (1978) by Lorraine Hansberry and the Dora Mavor Moore Award-winning A Caribbean Midsummer Night's Dream (1983). [7] Leon Bibb's One More Stop on the Freedom Train (1984), a musical about the Underground Railroad in Ontario, toured Ontario in 1985 and played in the Canadian Pavilion at Vancouver Expo 86 as part of the Arts Against Apartheid Festival, which featured Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Harry Belafonte. [8] [9]

Original works

Original plays developed and presented include: [10]

Educational programming

Cudjoe has identified BTC with the momentum of community education-oriented projects in Toronto, including the Black Education Project (which prepared Black youth for higher education) and Kay Livingstone's Congress of Black Women. [11]

In addition to performance training, BTC encouraged people to write plays and held playwright competitions. [7] One playwright competition in particular—"Act Against Apartheid"—produced one-act plays and led to the creation of an umbrella group behind the Arts Against Apartheid Festival at Vancouver Expo 86. [12]

Amah Harris, who served as co-director of BTC in the 1970s, toured schools with plays for young people based on the Anansi folktales. [1] [13] These plays were some of the first multi-racial, cross-cultural "learning-plays" to enter the Metro Toronto school system. Their popularity was such that BTC was invited to participate in the 1979 Afro-American Ethnic Festival in Detroit, where they played to an additional 35,000 children. [1]

Closure

BTC was consistently denied reliable funding and folded in 1988. [1] [14] Lack of access to performance venues was also a frequent challenge, such that the award-winning A Caribbean Midsummer Night's Dream was produced in the auditorium of 999 Queen St W (former Centre for Addiction and Mental Health facility demolished in October 2008). [7] In regard to the funding issue, Cudjoe has commented: "We were interested in going to schools, we were interested in getting the little children oriented to Black history, and we had all these other, sort of... things to do. [The Council was] insensitive to that. They made us feel that we were too community-oriented." [6]

Arts journalist and collaborator Robin Breon has written: [1]

It is further to the everlasting credit of B.T.C. that these theatre productions, school tours, educational materials, numerous workshops and classes were produced with the most minimal amount of government and private support. Indeed, the organization has always been precariously financed and chronically underfunded by government agencies. However, in spite of this handicap their contributions have been steady, on-going and professional in quality.

Legacy

Black Theatre Canada provided an artistic venue to numerous Black theatre and live performance artists active in Toronto between 1972 and 1985. [15] This legacy includes Delroy Lindo, Arlene Duncan, Leon Bibb, Jackie Richardson, ahdri zhina mandiela, Joe Sealy, Tom Butler, Philip Akin, Denis Simpson, Diana Braithwaite, and Jeff Jones. [16] [17]

Related Research Articles

<i>The Phantom of the Opera</i> (1986 musical) 1986 musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber

The Phantom of the Opera is a musical with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber, lyrics by Charles Hart, additional lyrics by Richard Stilgoe and a libretto by Lloyd Webber and Stilgoe. Based on the 1910 French novel of the same name by Gaston Leroux, it tells the story of a beautiful soprano, Christine Daaé, who becomes the obsession of a mysterious, masked musical genius living in the subterranean labyrinth beneath the Paris Opéra House.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christopher Plummer</span> Canadian actor (1929–2021)

Arthur Christopher Orme Plummer was a Canadian actor. His career spanned seven decades, gaining him recognition for his performances in film, stage, and television. He received multiple accolades, including an Academy Award, two Tony Awards, and two Primetime Emmy Awards, making him the only Canadian recipient of the "Triple Crown of Acting". He also received a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, and Screen Actors Guild Award as well as a nomination for a Grammy Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dub poetry</span> Form of performance poetry

Dub poetry is a form of performance poetry of Jamaican origin, which evolved out of dub music in Kingston, Jamaica, in the 1970s, as well as in London, England, and Toronto, Canada, cities which have large populations of Caribbean immigrants. The term "Dub Poetry" was coined by Dub artist Linton Kwesi Johnson in 1976, and further popularized by artist Oku Onoura, which consists of spoken word over reggae rhythms, originally found on the backing or "version" side of a 12 or 7 inch vinyl record.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Kani</span> South African actor and writer (born 1942)

Bonisile John Kani, OIS, is a South African actor, author, director and playwright. He is known for portraying T'Chaka in the Marvel Cinematic Universe films Captain America: Civil War (2016) and Black Panther (2018), Rafiki in the 2019 remake of The Lion King and Colonel Ulenga in the Netflix film Murder Mystery (2019).

Canadian Stage is a non-profit contemporary theater performance organization based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1988 through a merger of Centre Stage Company and Toronto Free Theatre.

Karen Hines is a Canadian actor, writer and director. She is the artistic director and producer of "Keep Frozen: Pochsy Productions." Born in Chicago, raised in Toronto, she now lives in Calgary where she was playwright in Residence at Alberta Theatre Projects from 2009 to 2012, has been a performer and collaborator with One Yellow Rabbit Performance Theatre, a National Magazine Award-winning contributor to Swerve magazine, and has created short films featuring the character Pochsy, which have screened internationally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Market Theatre (Johannesburg)</span> Theatre situated in Newtown, Johannesburg est. 1976

The Market Theatre, based in the downtown bohemian suburb of Newtown in Johannesburg, South Africa, was opened in 1976, operating as an independent, anti-racist theatre during the country's apartheid regime. It was named after a fruit and vegetable market that was previously located there. It was also known as the Old Indian Market or the Newtown Market, which closed after 60 years. The Market Theatre was renamed John Kani Theatre in 2014 after the renowned South African stage actor John Kani.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lillian Allen</span> Musical artist

Lillian Allen is a Canadian dub poet, reggae musician, writer and Juno Award winner.

Obsidian Theatre Company is a Canadian professional theatre company that specializes in works by Black Canadian artists. The company is located in Toronto, Ontario. The declared mandate of the company is a threefold mission: to produce plays, to develop playwrights and to train theatre professionals. Obsidian is dedicated to the exploration, development, and production of the Black voice. They produce plays from a world-wide canon focusing primarily, but not exclusively, on the works of highly acclaimed Black playwrights. Obsidian provides artistic support, promoting the development of work by Black theatre makers and offering training opportunities through mentoring and apprenticeship programs for emerging Black artists.

Arlene Duncan is a Canadian actress and singer from Oakville, Ontario. Her father is African Canadian, with ancestors from Nova Scotia. Duncan has appeared in more than 80 film and television roles, in addition to many theatrical productions. She is best known for her television role as Fatima, a diner owner in the CBC situation comedy Little Mosque on the Prairie.

Nightwood Theatre is Canada's oldest professional women's theatre and is based in Toronto. It was founded in 1979 by Cynthia Grant, Kim Renders, Mary Vingoe, and Maureen White and was originally a collective. Though it was not the founders' original intention, Nightwood Theatre has become known for producing feminist works. Some of Nightwood's most famous productions include This is For You, Anna (1983) and Good Night Desdemona (1988). Nightwood hosts several annual events including FemCab, the Hysteria Festival, and Groundswell Festival which features readings from participants of Nightwood's Write from the Hip playwright development program.

Ahdri Zhina Mandiela is a Toronto-based dub poet, theatre producer, and artistic director. She has gained worldwide acclaim for her books, music recordings, film, theatre and dance productions. Mandiela is the founder and artistic director of "b current", a not-for-profit performance arts company in Toronto.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tanya Moodie</span> Canadian-born British actress (born 1972)

Tanya Moodie is a Canadian-born British actress and producer, best known for her work on Motherland, The Clinic, and her many stage credits, which include productions with the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Royal Court Theatre, the National Theatre and the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord.

<i>Come from Away</i> Musical first produced in 2013

Come from Away is a musical, with book, music and lyrics by Irene Sankoff and David Hein. It is based on the events in the Newfoundland town of Gander during the week following the September 11 attacks, when 38 planes, carrying approximately 7,000 passengers, were ordered to land unexpectedly at Gander International Airport. The characters in the musical are based on actual Gander residents and stranded travelers they housed and fed. Audiences and critics have received the musical as a cathartic reminder of the capacity for human kindness in even the darkest of times and the triumph of humanity over hate.

Harlem Duet is a 1997 dramatic play by Canadian playwright Djanet Sears. Billie, a young graduate student in Harlem, deals with her husband Othello leaving her for a white woman named Mona. The play moves through time to show Billie and Othello's relationship being torn apart by racial tensions at a Southern US cotton plantation in 1860, and in Harlem in 1928 and the present. Though the characters draw inspiration from Shakespeare's play Othello, Billie and the story are original creations.

Sister Vision Press was a Canadian small press publisher that operated from 1985 to 2001, and was the first press in Canada whose mission was to publish writing by and for women of colour.

Vera Cudjoe is a Trinidadian-Canadian actress, producer, and educator. She founded Black Theatre Canada, a youth and community-oriented institution which helped train and launch the career of numerous Black performers and artists in North America. Among the Theatre's legacies are Delroy Lindo, Arlene Duncan, Leon Bibb, Jackie Richardson, Joe Sealy, Tom Butler, Philip Akin, and Ahdri Zhina Mandiela.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andrew Moodie</span>

Andrew Moodie is a Canadian actor and playwright. He is most noted for his plays Riot, which was a winner of the Floyd S. Chalmers Canadian Play Award in 1996, and Toronto the Good, which was a Dora Mavor Moore Award nominee for Best Original Play in 2009.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Breon, Robin (1988). "The Growth and Development of Black Theatre in Canada: A Starting Point". Theatre History in Canada / Histoire du théâtre au Canada. 9 (2): 216–228.
  2. 1 2 Moodie, Andrew (28 August 2012). "Vera Cudjoe on Black professional theatre (Part 3 of 7)". Theatre Museum Canada on Youtube. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  3. ↑ Knowles, Ric (2017). "Appendix I: Africanadian Theatre; Notes to Pages 200–201". Performing the Intercultural City. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. pp. 199–202, 242. ISBN   978-0-472-12306-3.
  4. ↑ "Vera Cudjoe on collaborators and BTC's inaugural production of Malfinis (Part 4 of 7)". Theatre Museum Canada on Youtube. 23 October 2013. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  5. ↑ "Film & Theatre: Theatre Companies". York University: African Canadian Online. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  6. 1 2 Moodie, Andrew (23 October 2013). "Vera Cudjoe on the history of Black Theatre Canada (Part 5 of 7)". Theatre Museum Canada on Youtube. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  7. 1 2 3 Moodie, Andrew (23 October 2013). "Vera Cudjoe on important collaborators and productions (Part 6 of 7)". Theatre Museum of Canada on Youtube. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  8. ↑ Lewis, Jules (11 January 2017). "Black Canadian Theatre". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Retrieved 7 February 2020.
  9. ↑ Hawthorn, Tom (1 November 2015). "Singer Leon Bibb was the Voice of Civil Rights". The Globe and Mail. Retrieved 7 February 2020.
  10. ↑ "Black Theatre Canada". Canadian Theatre Encyclopedia. 13 May 2020. Retrieved 26 February 2021.
  11. ↑ Moodie, Andrew (23 October 2013). "Vera Cudjoe on contemporary Black theatre (Part 7 of 7)". Theatre Museum Canada on Youtube. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  12. ↑ Siddiqui, Haroon (19 December 2013). "Recognizing Canadian Heroes of Mandela's Rainbow Coalition". Toronto Star.
  13. ↑ "Amah Harris". Government of the Commonwealth of Dominica, Division of Culture. Retrieved 26 February 2021.
  14. ↑ Boisvert, Nick (13 February 2019). "Toronto's first black theatre companies are gone, leaving a void that still hasn't been filled". CBC. Retrieved 7 February 2020.
  15. ↑ Gingell, Susan Alison (2006). "Jumping in Heart First: An Interview with ahdri zhina mandiela". Postcolonial Text. 2 (4): 11–12.
  16. ↑ Breon, Robin (1988). "The Growth and Development of Black Theatre in Canada: A Starting Point". Theatre History in Canada / Histoire du théâtre au Canada. 9 (2): 216–228.
  17. ↑ Moodie, Andrew (23 October 2013). "Vera Cudjoe on important collaborators and productions (Part 6 of 7)". Theatre Museum of Canada on Youtube. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.