Stage Door News
Stage Door News
Toronto (September 4th, 2013) Praxis Theatre is thrilled to announce their upcoming presentations of You Should Have Stayed Home, the staged adaptation of Tommy Taylor’s viral Facebook note, How I Got Arrested and Abused at G20 in Toronto. This ambitious cross-Canada tour includes a two-week run in Toronto in October.
You Should Have Stayed Home is a play about Tommy Taylor's experience over 48 hours at the 2010 G20 in Toronto. While trying to return home from his first ever protest as a law-abiding citizen at the "Free Speech Zone" at Queen's Park, Taylor was swept up in a mass arrest, caged with 40 other people in a ten foot by twenty foot cage and denied drinking water until he passed out from dehydration.
Taylor’s Facebook note, How I Got Arrested and Abused at G20 in Toronto went viral in 2010 and has since been translated into seven languages and appeared in twenty-one countries – a detailed, frightening and often funny account of the largest mass arrest in Canadian history. Tommy’s story has been covered by national and international media, including a Gemini-nominated CBC documentary named after the production.
After winning the largest cash award at the 2011 SummerWorks Festival, and becoming one of the festival’s highest grossing shows, Praxis Theatre is about to embark on its largest project ever: a cross-Canada tour to Whitehorse, Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal, and Ottawa.
DETAINEES NEEDED!
You Should Have Stayed Home is a one-man piece of storytelling in the tradition of Spalding Gray, as Taylor recounts 48 hours in his life as a citizen on the streets and eventually caged in the detention centre. Part-way through the narrative, there is a scene that incorporates 15 to 30 participants that can be played by actors and non-actors when the action arrives at a cell in the Eastern Avenue Detention Centre.
In order to incorporate each community on every leg of the tour, Praxis is proud to be working with the support of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, Council of Canadians, and the Toronto office of Amnesty International, who are putting calls out for participants in each of the cities they visit. Interested individuals can email participate@praxistheatre.com for more information.
The tour comes during a prolific period for Praxis Theatre. Current and upcoming Praxis projects include guest-curating Harbourfront Centre’s HATCH performing arts residency series for 2014; collaborating with The National Arts Centre on The SpiderWeb Show, an online theatre experiment launching October 2014 @ spiderwebshow.ca; and a new adaptation of Brecht’s Senora Carrar’s Rifles by acclaimed Toronto playwright Nicolas Billon, to be presented at the Next Stage Festival in 2014.
Established in 2003, Praxis Theatre has created eleven original socio-politically themed works. In 2006, the company established praxistheatre.com, a quintessential independent theatre site, winner of #1 Blog Post and #1 Arts and Culture Blog in The Canadian Blog Awards. In 2012, Praxis Theatre’s Artistic Producer Aislinn Rose and Artistic Director Michael Wheeler were named “People to Watch” by Torontoist, and “Toronto Theatre MVPs” by The Grid.
The tour and Toronto production have been generously supported by the Toronto Arts Council, Ontario Arts Council, and Canada Council for the Arts, along with individual donations through an ongoing Indiegogo campaign here.
TOUR DATES AND VENUES:
YUKON ARTS CENTRE, Whitehorse
September 12 to 15, 2013
Click here for more info
FIREHALL ARTS CENTRE, Vancouver
September 24 to October 5, 2013
Click here for more info
REGENT PARK ARTS CENTRE – Aki Studio, Toronto
October 16 to 26, 2013
Click here for more info on the venue, ticket info to follow
MAINLINE THEATRE, Montreal
October 30 to November 2, 2013
Click here for more info on the venue, ticket info to follow
ARTS COURT THEATRE, Ottawa
November 13 to 16, 2013
Click here for more info on the venue, ticket info to follow
YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED HOME CREATIVE TEAM
Playwright & Performer: Tommy Taylor
Director: Michael Wheeler
Producer: Aislinn Rose
Sound Designer: Thomas Ryder Payne
Set Designer: Scott Penner
Lighting Designer: Kimberly Purtell
Projection Illustrator: Jody Hewston
Stage Manager: Rebecca Vandevelde
Participant Coordinator: Scott Durmody
Photo: Tommy Taylor (centre) and cast.
2013-09-04
Toronto: Praxis Theatre presents Tommy Taylor’s “You Should Have Stayed Home”