“I regard the theatre as the greatest art form, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be human.” ~ Oscar Wilde

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I have taken a great interest in theatre since 2006. Before that, my elementary school used to hold a yearly musical, but I never auditioned, so I was thrown in with the choir. I learned to move my lips with the music; I never paid any attention to what was happening on the stage.

But then, when I was in grade nine, our drama department staged Les Miserables, written and directed by Richard Peters (not the Broadway Musical) and starring a friend of mine, D. Hoving, as Jean Valjean. It was moving: the next year I eagerly joined the play.

It was then that my acting career started. In 2007's production of A School for Scandal, I was Charles Surface, a fairly major role. I don't have any pictures of myself on stage for that one, but here is my headshot from that production:

I loved acting, and apparently was good enough to continue. So I joined up in the following year, for 2008's The Diary of Anne Frank. It was a main-stage show, and over 1 000 people came out to see it. I was Peter, who is the male romantic lead. (Anne was played by one S. Bédard.) We both had a fantastic time, and my acting improved.

Some photos from that production:

After that came Upper Level Drama. I think my school has a pretty awesome drama program. The long and short of it is that the students choose and put on a play - act, direct, produce, backstage, market, budget, everything. It's all their work. We put on The Seagull in late 2008.

Besides dramaturging the play (researching and learning about it), writing a few short tunes for songs where old Anton Chekhov had put lyrics, and writing the official Drama Handbook for all the backstage roles, I acted as the idiotic schoolteacher, Medvedenko.

I tried as hard as I could to act confidently and without fear of failure: I made the character a clown, and every rehearsal I tried something new. Sometimes it got a laugh, sometimes it didn't, and I kept what worked. And I learned a valuable lesson: people didn't think less of me for trying something that didn't work. They think more of a person like that, who then tries again.

Some photos from that production:

During the summer between that and my senior year, I attended a drama camp called Broken Open. It was fantastic. We studied monologues, improvisation, swordfighting, and various acting methods; it was both very informative and very fun. Hey, why don't you go, if you live nearby?

In my last year, the main-stage show was a musical, Into the Woods, by Stephen Sondheim. I can't sing (though I did try out!), so I took the backstage role of Assistant Director. The play went on in February 2009 with a marvellous set, fantastic professional musicians, and a full singing cast that topped so many productions on Youtube. :) It was a huge hit.

For the Upper Level Drama production, my last time on stage so far, we put on the comedy Rumors by Neil Simon. I chose to be the dramaturg again (you'd be amazed how many difficult-to-pronounce names are in a classic New York show), and acted in the role of Ernie Cusack, a psychiatrist who could use some help himself. It went on in May 2009 and was well-received.

Some photos from that production:

Going into university, I made the hard choice to enter an academic, not a theatre, program. That said, I would love to be on stage again, and maybe one day I will. There are, after all, plenty of community theatre shows :)


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