French company earns eight Jessies
Théâtre la Seizième cleans up at annual ceremony
British Columbia’s only professional French language theatre company is the big winner at this year’s 33rd annual Jessie Richardson Theatre Awards.
Théâtre la Seizième, which was founded in 1974 with the goal of producing Canadian works, received eight awards altogether in the Large Theatre and Theatre for Young Audiences categories, including six for its 2014 production of À toi, pour toujours, ta Marie-Lou, written by French Canadian theatre legend Michel Tremblay.
The story of a pair of sisters looking back on their fraught relationship with their deceased parents earned nods for outstanding production in a large theatre and outstanding direction for the company’s artistic and managing director, Craig Holzschuh. Both Joey Lespérance and France Perras took awards for their lead performances, as well as Julie Trépanier for her supporting role and Drew Facey for set design.
This brings Facey, whose design has appeared recently in Stickboy for Vancouver Opera as well as Measure for Measure and Elizabeth Rex at last year’s Bard on the Beach, to a career total of 10 awards.
Although it had led the field in nominations, the Arts Club’s big, classic production of George Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan earned only two awards: one for Dean Paul Gibson’s masterful performance as the scheming Earl of Warwick and one for Alessandro Juliani’s haunting sound design.
In the Small Theatre categories, Ruby Slippers Theatre took home three awards: one for Mara Gottler’s glamorous costumes in The Duchess a.k.a. Wallis Simpson and two for outstanding lead performances by Scott Bellis and Jennifer Lines in After Me (Après Moi).
Pi Theatre took a couple of technical awards as well as outstanding direction for Richard Wolfe for its audacious production of Blasted, writer Sarah Kane’s dystopic exploration of violence on national and personal levels.
Outstanding script went to Hiro Kanagawa for Indian Arm, a harshly beautiful modern adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s emotional family drama Little Eyolf, set in the traditional territory of the Tsleil-Waututh Nation.
Actor Jerry Wasserman, who is also a UBC professor and theatre reviewer for The Province, received a GVPTA career achievement award, while Christine Quintana won the Sydney Risk Prize for outstanding original script by an emerging playwright. Quintana also wrote the post-modern office extravaganza Stationary: a recession-era musical, which won for best musical on a small stage.