After selling out its world premiere in June, Nightwood Theatre, Amplified Opera, Theatre Gargantua and Canadian Opera Company are thrilled to bring back The Queen In Me by interdisciplinary artist Teiya Kasahara 笠原貞野 (they/them), accompanied by pianist David Eliakis (he/him). Combining comedy, drama, and opera, this electrifying show explores the many ways that race, gender, and sexuality are policed in the opera industry. Through the lens of The Magic Flute’s iconic Queen of the Night, the show reclaims space for the multitudes of women, trans, and non-binary individuals excluded from the stage, daring to imagine bold new possibilities for the future of the art form and beyond.

The Queen In Me features a range of dramatic arias from some of the world’s most well-loved operas: Puccini’s La Bohème, Madama Butterfly, Turandot and Manon Lescaut; Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor; Verdi’s Macbeth and Rigoletto; R. Strauss’ Salome; and Mozart’s The Magic Flute. Co-directing on the production are Dora-Award-winning director and dramaturg Andrea Donaldson (Artistic Director of Nightwood Theatre), and director and producer Aria Umezawa (Co-Founder of Amplified Opera).

Catch this stunning new work before it tours to the Belfast International Arts Festival, with shows on October 18 and 19! The Queen In Me runs for three performances on September 22, 24 and 25, 2022 at Greenwin Theatre in the Meridian Arts Centre at 5040 Yonge Street in North York.

Teiya Kasahara 笠原貞野 is a queer, trans non-binary, multi- and interdisciplinary creator-performer based in Tkarón:to (Toronto). Their background includes over a decade of singing both traditional and contemporary operatic roles across North America and Europe. They are also a co-founding member of Amplified Opera, an organization that aims to bring performers from equity-seeking groups to more opera stages, which was named COC’s Disruptor-in-Residence in January 2021.

“I was always taught to go deep into every character I was playing, to bring as much dimensionality to those characters on the stage,” says Kasahara. “But it always felt like, despite her power, the Queen of the Night was given so little room to grow. And so I started to dream: who is this character and what might she be saying off-stage? The Queen In Me is a place where the Queen can finally speak for the first time—and speak up not only for herself, but for characters in the canon, and various performers in this industry who may also feel like they are othered. I hope that people leave this show feeling challenged and feeling that their perspective on opera, and opera singers, can grow and expand, just as our perspectives of ourselves, within the industry, can—and should—evolve, too.”

TICKET INFORMATION

Single tickets for The Queen In Me are $45 (HST included) for regular tickets, $25 (HST included) for students, seniors and arts workers, and there will be a limited number of $10 Community Access tickets for every performance. Tickets can be purchased online at nightwoodtheatre.net or by calling the Meridian Arts Centre at 416-366-7723 (lines are open 1pm-6pm Monday-Friday).

Show runtime: approximately 75 minutes

COVID-19 POLICY

With the care and well-being of our artists and audiences in mind, Nightwood Theatre strongly encourages the use of masks by all patrons. Meridian Arts Centre is equipped with Poppy, a pathogen sensing and detection network that is an early warning system for invisible pathogens like Covid-19.