The Grand Theatre is thrilled to announce the North American premiere of Room, based on the award-winning novel by Emma Donoghue, in a first-time collaboration with Mirvish Productions and the UK's Covent Garden Productions. Room premieres on the Spriet Stage from March 10 to 28, 2020, as part of the Grand's 2019/20 season and the COMPASS New Play Development Program. 

Emma Donoghue’s bestselling novel has now been adapted as a new play with songs by Scottish songwriters Kathryn Joseph and Cora Bissett. With a cast of seven including Little Jack who is shadowed by narrator, Big Jack, Room explores the power of the imagination and a mother’s love. Previously adapted by Donoghue for the screen, the film won Academy Awards, Golden Globes, and BAFTAs.

Kidnapped as a teenage girl, Ma has been locked inside a purpose-built room in her captor’s garden for seven years. Her five-year-old son, Jack, has no concept of the world outside and happily exists inside Room with the help of Ma’s games and vivid imagination where objects like Rug, Lamp, and TV are his only friends. But for Ma the time has come to escape and face their biggest challenge to date: the world outside Room.

THE NORTH AMERICAN PREMIERE OF

ROOM

By EMMA DONOGHUE, based on her novel
Music & Lyrics by Cora Bissett and Kathryn Joseph
Directed by Cora Bissett
A co-production with Mirvish Productions and Covent Garden Productions 

PREMIERING 2019/20 SEASON

Room will available on subscription only beginning Tuesday, March 26, 2019

“I couldn’t be happier that my home city’s own Grand Theatre is going to be the launch pad for the theatre version of Room in North America. I know Dennis Garnhum and the whole Grand team will do an extraordinary job of further developing the show through their COMPASS workshop process. By March 2020 we should end up with an extraordinary, all-Canadian-cast for Room that we can all be very proud of.” - Emma Donoghue

“This new production of Room celebrates our mission at the Grand Theatre: World Curious and London Proud. We will be partnering with two companies of distinction, Covent Garden Productions in London, England, and Mirvish Productions in Toronto. We are creating this production with an innovative international collaboration, and of course, London, Ontario’s own renowned Emma Donoghue. I am certain that the North American premiere of Room, which will begin life at the Grand Theatre, will have a very bright future.” - Dennis Garnhum, Artistic Director.

Illustration: Room. © 2019 Scott McKowen.