As the days grow dark and the cool air settles in, Yukoners begin to turn their attention from campfires to pumpkins, embracing the spirit of Halloween. The City of Whitehorse bristles with spooky events for all ages. One of the largest and most-sought-after Halloween fixtures is the annual MAD Haunted House, presented by the Music, …
It was the promise of bannock that first lured Melaina Sheldon into the orbit of Gwaandak Theatre in 2010. The show’s limited budget also allowed Sheldon to use some of the design skills she had developed in a one-year diploma course in fashion design in Vancouver. “I’m a Salvation Army thrift store shopper, for sure, …
School’s out for the summer, which means that summer camp is IN! An exciting new day camp is taking centre-stage this year in Whitehorse – specifically, it is taking the stage at the Frantic Follies Theatre, home to the Frantic Follies vaudeville revue. For almost 50 years, Frantic Follies has been delighting Whitehorse audiences with …
In Giovanni Boccaccio’s 14th century collection of novellas called The Decameron, seven young women and three young men entertain each other with stories for 10 days inside a secluded villa near Florence as they tried to escape the Black Death. More than 650 years later, Toronto playwright and multidisciplinary theatre maker Jordan Tannahill found himself …
Longtime Yukon teacher Mary Sloan and rapper Eminem have something in common. They both got their careers started in Detroit’s notorious 8-Mile district. However, Sloan’s teaching environment from the beginning to the end could not have been more different. Growing up in Michigan, Sloan was just 20 years old when she began her first teaching …
Curious Fact #1: stories about plucky orphan kids make wildly popular musical theatre fare. Witness Oliver!, Anne of Green Gables, and Annie. Curious Fact #2: two out of three musicals about plucky orphans involve adorable, authoritydefying redheads who find love in less-than-conventional families. “I don’t happen to be a tiny, adorable redhead, but I am …
Standing in front of the large crowd of Yukoners that had gathered earlier this month at Sport Yukon for an Olympic pep rally, Greig Bell made no effort to contain his excitement. Microphone in hand and donning a black and silver long sleeved shirt with “Yukon” splashed across the front, the long time Yukoner paced …
“Et tu, Brute?” A famous line uttered by even those who don’t know it is Shakespeare. It is spoken when one friend betrays another. Does this make Marcus Junius Brutus a bad guy? Anton Solomon is not sure. He plays Brutus in Moving Parts Theatre’s Julius Caesar Feb. 18 to 21 and Feb. 24 at …
Theatre isn’t just about the actors on stage. And while Moving Parts Theatre concentrates on methods and techniques for its players, it also provides community members with important roles behind the scenes. Balancing school work and rehearsals is Wren Hookey’s latest priority. The 17-year-old high school student just began her fourth year with the popular …
The Music Arts Drama students swirled in their dresses in the Wood Street Centre hallway and they laughed at the newness of it. Just a year ago, some of these same students laughed at the wild costumes from Seussical, which, really, is just another world that these actors created for the stage . This year, …
“It is so important for kids to be outside and to connect with nature,” says Karin Grenier. “And one way to do that is for them to interact with dogs and dog sledding.” Grenier and her partner Normand Casavant run Casaventures, a dog sledding operation with 39 dogs (and two cats) on the Annie Lake …
Dog Sledders Hope To Get Students Mushy About The Sport Read More »
Kindhearted pirates, timorous policemen, pretty maidens, star-crossed lovers and a thoroughly modern Major-General. All these are onstage this week at Wood Street School as the Music, Art, Drama, Dance program (MAD) program presents the Gilbert and Sullivan classic, The Pirates of Penzance. When director Mary Sloan and musical director Jeff Nordlund picked the comic operetta …
”Hello, everybody. Welcome to mayhem and madness.” It’s precisely 7 pm and Anton Solomon is just kicking off a rehearsal for the Moving Parts Theatre production of Noises Off, which is scheduled to open 15 days later. “We’ve got two weeks. Lots of time,” Solomon adds encouragingly. For the nine-member cast, this is the most …
It’s not always easy for a 19-year-old to decide what to do next; especially a 19-year-old like Graham Rudge. Should an award-winning year at art school be followed by a mechanical engineering degree, or a stint at circus school? Of course, that would have to be after a semester learning how to be a butcher. …
Peer Gynt tells the life story of an irresponsible young man who grows into an old man adventuring through the world. He returns home and makes an accounting of his life when faced with the prospect of death. We open on a scene with Peer’s mother, where he beguiles her with outrageous lies about his …
Are you worried about the state of our youth today? I have a cure for you. It is something that works for me every time: I attend a MAD performance at Wood Street Centre. Music Arts Drama is an experiential program advocated for, and now run by, Mary Sloan and Jeff Nordlund. Two semesters a …
