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John Krizanc (born 1956) is a Canadian playwright who established an international reputation [1] with his non-linear work, Tamara . [2] Exploring the rise of Fascism in 1920s Italy, the play was one of the first non-linear, immersive theatre experiences. The audience followed different characters through an Italian villa, with several scenes playing simultaneously. Several real people are fictionalized in the work, including Italian war hero, journalist and poet General Gabriele D'Annuzio, Aélis Mazoyer, the mistress and housekeeper of D'Annuzio, and Polish artist Tamara de Lempicka. The New York Times called it "a shot of adrenaline for sedentary theatergoers," [3] and praised its "thunderstruck" dialogue. Director Steven Spielberg speaking at the DGA raised the play as a memorable influence on his own storytelling. [4] After its Toronto production (directed by Richard Rose) won Krizanc two Dora Mavor Moore Awards in 1982, the play toured the United States, Portugal, Poland, Argentina and Mexico. [5] Moses Znaimer produced the Hollywood production, [6] which ran for nine years from 1984 to 1994.
Krizanc was born in Lethbridge, Alberta in 1956. He is the son of Peggy and Rene Krizanc.
Tamara premiered at Strachan House in Trinity-Bellwoods Park, Toronto, Ontario, Canada on May 8, 1981, and was published as a book the same year.
Tamara was one of the first theatre productions with multi-story lines happening simultaneously where the audience's participation was key to the experience itself. As such it was the forerunner of later immersive experiences, such as those created by the British theatre company PunchDrunk, and New York's Then She Fell. [7] The concepts it explored became the inspiration for the academic journal Tamara: Journal of Critical Postmodern Organization Science, which later became Tamara: Journal for Critical Organization Inquiry, which focuses on plurivocal and postmodern interpretations of several academic disciplines, including critical management studies, postmodern organization theory, and social systems theory. [8]
Krizanc's plays are marked by his explorations not only with structure and space but also with the role of the artist. For his play Prague, Krizanc won the Chalmers Award in 1985, and the Governor General's Award in 1987. Set in 1983, the play focuses on a theatre company about to mount a "dangerous" work. Inspired by the one-act plays of Vaclav Havel, it deals with the challenges of creating art in a communist country, and the role of the artist within a system of censorship.
In 1990, Krizanc won the Chalmers award for his play The Half of It. It tells the story of idealistic thirty-something Jill Ashe, and the intersection of capitalism and environmentalist through the travails of one family. His friendship with Canadian writer Paul Quarrington became the subject of the play Dying is Easy.
In 1993 Krizanc began writing for the screen and television. His many writing credits include the movie Men with Brooms , the telefilms H2O , The Trojan Horse and The Summit , as well as writing for the television series Da Vinci's Inquest , Due South , ZOS: Zone of Separation , Rookie Blue , Saving Hope , Caught and Departure . [9]
Often, he has collaborated with actor and director Paul Gross.
Kim F. Coates is a Canadian-American actor who has worked in both Canadian and American films and television series. He has worked on Broadway portraying Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire and in the lead role of Macbeth performed at the Stratford Festival. He is best known for his role as Alexander "Tig" Trager in the FX series Sons of Anarchy and as Declan Gardiner in the Citytv series Bad Blood, as well as his recurring roles in Prison Break, Cold Case, CSI and CSI: Miami. He has also had film roles in The Last Boy Scout (1991), Bad Boys (1995), King of Sorrow (2006), and Goon (2011).
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Viola Léger was an American-born Canadian actress and politician who served in the Senate of Canada from 2001 to 2005.
Allan Stratton is a Canadian playwright and novelist.
Tamara is a 1981 play by John Krizanc about the painter Tamara de Lempicka. The play is based on the historical meeting of Gabriele d'Annunzio and Lempicka, who was hoping to be commissioned by d'Annunzio to paint his portrait. He had invited her to his villa at Gardone Riviera, on the southwest shore of Lake Garda, a villa now known as Vittoriale degli italiani.
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The Dora Mavor Moore Awards are awards presented annually by the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts (TAPA), honouring theatre, dance and opera productions in Toronto. Named after Dora Mavor Moore, who helped establish Canadian professional theatre, the awards program was established on December 13, 1978, with the first awards held in 1980. Each winner receives a bronze statue made from the original by John Romano.
Dave Carley is a Canadian playwright who has written for stage, radio and television. His plays have had over 450 productions across Canada and the United States, and in other countries. They have won, or been nominated for, a number of awards, including the Governor General's Award, The Chalmers Award, The Dora Award, The Arthur Miller Award and the New York International Radio Festival Award. He was a founder of Friends of Freddy, an association for the appreciation of the Freddy the Pig series of books of Walter Brooks. He was an editor of The Kawartha Sun, the founding editor of the Playwrights Guild of Canada magazine, CanPlay, and also editor of Scirocco Drama in the late 1990s.
Tony Nardi is a Canadian actor, playwright, and theatre director based in Toronto, who has performed on stage and in film and television.
The Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding New Play is an annual award celebrating achievements in Toronto theatre.
The Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding Direction of a Play/Musical is an annual award celebrating achievements in Toronto theatre.
The Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding Production of a Play is an annual award celebrating achievements in live Canadian theatre.
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Brendan Gall is a Canadian writer, actor and producer living in Toronto, Ontario.
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Sharon Corder is an American writer, producer, and educator based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. With her husband Jack Blum, she has written and produced more than fifty hours of television drama for both Canadian and American broadcasters. In 2005, Blum and Corder began Reel Canada, their non-profit organization dedicated to celebrating Canadian film.
Layne Coleman is a Canadian actor, playwright and theatre director, most noted as a former artistic director of Theatre Passe Muraille. Originally from North Battleford, Saskatchewan, he first became prominent as a cofounder and artistic director of the 25th Street Theatre in Saskatoon in the 1980s.
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.
Henry Tarvainen was a Canadian actor and theatre director from Toronto, Ontario, most noted as a Dora Mavor Moore Award nominee for Best Direction in a Play at the 1982 Dora Mavor Moore Awards for his production of Charles Tidler's Straight Ahead and Blind Dancers.