Stage Door News
Stage Door News
On Friday, March 7 Driftwood Theatre hosted its 11th annual Trafalgar 24 Festival and fundraising gala, where 250 attendees set out into a 19th century castle to experience six short plays created in 24 hours.
This year's Trafalgar 24 was one of the MOST SUCCESSFUL EVENTS TO DATE, raising nearly $20,000 for Driftwood’s annual Bard's Bus Tour, celebrating its 20th season in 2014.
As a creative staging ground for new Canadian plays, Trafalgar 24 welcomed 24 playwrights, directors and actors to Trafalgar Castle in Whitby, Ontario for a 24-hour period where they wrote, rehearsed and performed six new plays set among the rooms and halls of the castle.
Artistic Director D. Jeremy Smith and the guest panel of jurors including Joanne Williams (Artistic and Company Manager, Canadian Stage Company), Brendan Healy (Artistic Director, Buddies in Bad Times Theatre), Toby Malone (Dramaturge, Stratford Shakespeare Festival and Driftwood Theatre) and audience member Cheryl Ewing awarded one of the event’s six plays with an opportunity for further development as part of Driftwood’s Beyond the Castle program.
This year’s BEYOND THE CASTLE recipient is Toronto playwright JULIA LEDERER for her absurdist comedy Man in the Portrait.
Part Picture of Dorian Gray, part Don Quixote, Man in the Portrait tells the story of Arthur, a seemingly young-ish man who lets his everyman friend Bud in on a compelling secret in order to solicit advice on his unusual predicament. As the recipient of the Beyond the Castle Award, Ms. Lederer will receive a paid commission to develop the play beyond its current 10-minute scope, and the resulting piece will receive a workshop and public reading in Driftwood’s 2014/2015 season.
The evening’s Audience Choice Award went to Kat Sandler's Trial, a sharp treatise on the nature of faith, guilt and the responsibility of leadership.
The four additional plays created in 24 hours were Between Acts by Lucy Brennan, The History of Us by Kevin Craig, First World Heroes by Cameron Johnston, and Instructions Not Included by Adam Sikora.
Trafalgar 24 was generously supported by event sponsors Mason Bennett Johncox, Nice Bistro, Ontario Power Generation, Ultimate Cheer, Warren’s Printing Place, Whitby Hydro and The Writers’ Community of Durham Region.
Driftwood Theatre would like to thank all of the artists, volunteers, partners, Board of Directors and Trafalgar 24 committee members for ensuring another incredibly successful event.
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Photo: Julia Lederer and Kat Sandler. ©2014 David Spowart.
2014-03-19
Whitby: Driftwood Theatre Group's Trafalgar 24 was its most successful to date