Kate Lushington | |
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Nationality | Canadian |
Alma mater | |
Occupations |
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Known for | Nightwood Theatre |
Children | 3 |
Website | www |
Kate Lushington is a Canadian theatre artist and teacher. From 1988 to 1993, Lushington was the artistic director of Nightwood Theatre. Lushington has worked with The Clichettes and is the writer of The Apocalypse Plays: A Legacy Project.
Lushington studied design at Concordia University and later design and production at York University. [1]
In the early seventies, Lushington taught at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in London. [2]
In 1987, Lushington's play Let's Go to Your Place, which she co-created with The Clichettes premiered at Nightwood Theatre's 3rd Groundswell Festival. Lushington's play Sex in a Box also premiered at the 1987 Groundswell Festival. [3] In 1988, Lushington's collaboration with The Clichettes, Up Against The Wallpaper premiered under the direction of Maureen White. [4] [5]
In 1988, Lushington was hired as Nightwood Theatre's artistic associate. At the time, the artistic associate position fulfilled the same responsibilities as an artistic director, but the difference in title reflected Nightwood's structure as a creative collective. In 1990, Lushington reverted the title of her position to artistic director. [6] Lushington was the first artistic director/coordinator of Nightwood that was not a founding member of the collective. [7] While working for Nightwood, Lushington directed several shows including Susan G. Cole's A Fertile Imagination (1991), Kelley Jo Burke's Charming and Rose: True Love (1993), and Lillian Allen's Love & Other Strange Things (1993). [8] [4] [9] Lushington also co-dramaturged Monique Mojica's Princess Pocahontas and the Blue Spots in 1989 with Djanet Sears. [10] In 1994, Alisa Palmer and Diane Roberts took over from Lushington as co-artistic directors of Nightwood Theatre. [11]
In 1999, Lushington's short film, "Subway Transfer" premiered at the On The Fly Festival in Toronto. The film was awarded the Mouche D'Or and the $4,000 cash prize associated with it. [12]
In 2007, Lushington directed the controversial play My Name Is Rachel Corrie for Theatre PANIK in Toronto. [13] In 2011, Lushington directed Morning Glory, Karen Bolette Sonne's play about female prisoners with special needs. [14] [15]
Lushington began teaching speaking skills at the Injured Workers Speakers School in Toronto in 2007. There, Lushington used traditional theatre techniques to teach the history of worker's compensation. [16] Lushington currently teaches Alexander Technique from her studio. [17]
Lushington was married to interdisciplinary theatre artist Richard Greenblatt. The two met in London while Lushington was teaching at RADA. [18] They have three children: Natasha, William, and Luke. [2]
Works co-created with The Clichettes
The Apocalypse Plays: A Legacy Project
Alisa Palmer is a Canadian theatre director and playwright. She was the artistic director of Nightwood Theatre from 1993 to 2001. Palmer is currently the artistic director of the English section of the National Theatre School of Canada.
Schuyler Lee (Sky) Gilbert Jr. is a Canadian writer, actor, academic and drag performer. Born in Norwich, Connecticut, he studied theatre at York University in Toronto, Ontario, and at the University of Toronto, before becoming the co-founder and artistic director of Buddies in Bad Times, a Toronto theatre company dedicated to LGBT drama. His drag name is Jane. Gilbert also teaches a course on playwrighting at the University of Guelph.
Richard Greenblatt is a Canadian playwright who currently lives in Toronto. He is best known for 2 Pianos, 4 Hands, which he wrote and performed with Ted Dykstra.
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.
Susan G. Cole is a Canadian feminist author, activist, editor, speaker and playwright. She has spoken out on a number of issues, including free speech, pornography, race and religion. As a lesbian activist and mother, she speaks out on sexuality and family issues and is a columnist.
This is For You, Anna is a 1983 play devised by The Anna Collective. Initially developed as a 20-minute production for the Women's Perspective Festival, This is For You, Anna was re-written into a longer piece that premiered in 1984. The show went on to tour Canada and Britain throughout the 1980s. The play was created collectively in response to the crimes of German woman Marianne Bachmeier, who walked into a courtroom and shot the man who killed her daughter. The feminist play explores themes of violence, revenge, domesticity, and questions the roles of western women at the end of the 20th century.
Mary Vingoe is a Canadian playwright, actor, and theatre director. Vingoe was one of the co-founders of Canadian feminist theatre company Nightwood Theatre and later co-founded Ship's Company Theatre in Parrsboro and Eastern Front Theatre in Halifax. From 2002 to 2007, Vingoe was artistic director of the Magnetic North Theatre Festival. Vingoe is an Officer of the Order of Canada and received the Portia White Prize. Her play Refuge was a shortlisted nominee for the Governor General's Award for English-language drama at the 2016 Governor General's Awards.
Kim Renders was a Canadian writer, director, actor and designer and a founding member of Nightwood Theatre, the oldest professional feminist theatre company in Canada.
Feminist theater grew out of the wider Political theater of the 1970s, and continues to the present. It can take on a variety of meanings, but the constant thread is the lived experience of women.
Kelly Thornton is a Canadian theatre director and dramaturge. She has served as artistic director of Nightwood Theatre and is the current artistic director of the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre. Thornton was the co-head of Equity in Canadian Theatre: the Women’s Initiative.
Svetlana Zylin (1948-2002) was a Belgian-born Canadian theatre director and playwright. She was also the founder of the Women's Theatre Collective in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Cynthia Grant is a Canadian theatre director. Grant was a founding member of Nightwood Theatre and served as the company's first artistic director. Grant later co-founded Company of Sirens.
Diane Roberts is an interdisciplinary theatre creator. Roberts was a founding member of Obsidian Theatre. Roberts was an artistic co-director of Nightwood Theatre, the artistic director of Urban Ink Productions, and a co-founder and artistic director of Boldskool Productions. She is the creator of the Arrivals Legacy Project.
Maureen White is a Canadian theatre actor, director, and playwright. She was a member of The Anna Project, which created the play This is for You, Anna. White was a founding member of Nightwood Theatre and served as its artistic coordinator from 1987 to 1988.
Company of Sirens is a Canadian feminist theatre company formed in 1986. Company of Sirens developed the feminist play The Working People's Picture Show.
Alex Bulmer is a Canadian playwright and theatre artist. Bulmer is the co-founder of the theatre companies SNIFF Inc. and Invisible Flash. She wrote the play Smudge and was a writer for the 2009 Channel 4 series Cast Offs.
Baņuta Rubess is a Canadian theatre director, playwright, and professor. She co-wrote This is For You, Anna as a member of the Anna Project. Rubess was a co-recipient of the 1988 Floyd S. Chalmers Canadian Play Award for children's theatre for her play Thin Ice.
Jennifer Brewin is a Canadian writer, director, and artistic director. She is known for co-creating The Attic, the Pearls and Three Fine Girls and her other work with Common Boots Theatre, formerly known as Theatre Columbus and the Caravan Farm Theatre. In 2020, she was appointed the artistic director of the Globe Theatre in Regina.
Aida Jordão is a Portuguese-Canadian playwright, theatre director, and academic. She is a co-founder of the feminist theatre group, Company of Sirens, and she co-created This is For You, Anna, a germinal Canadian feminist theatre play.
Lib Spry is a Canadian director, playwright, and academic. She is a co-founder of Company of Sirens and Straight Stitching Productions and served as the artistic director of Passionate Balance.