2:00pm – 5:00pm: Developing Your Story through Archive and Improv with Laura Di Cicco 

This workshop is designed as a starting point for anyone interested in beginning to archive their own story and build community through storytelling. A combination of Keng Sen Ong’s “The Unhappy Archives,” and Theatre of the Oppressed, this workshop will offer tools and ideas for telling “your story” through discussion, improvisations, and exercises. This session is open to anyone who is interested in creative exploration through a personal lens. 

Bring clothes you can move in and writing materials. 

6:30pm – 9:30pm: Lecoq Element Work and Shakespearean Monologues with Ming Hudson 

Do you have a Shakespeare monologue that you've been eager to dive into, but aren't exactly sure where to start? Or an old favourite speech that you'd love to access in a new way? This course is a great way to approach Shakespeare’s text through active imagination and embodied movement! Using the Lecoq Technique, you will explore physicalizing the four elements, and then translating that work into your chosen text. A workshop for those looking to discover Shakespeare's language through the body. 

Participants should arrive dressed to move and with a Shakespearean monologue. Water bottle and pencil are encouraged. 

6:30 – 9:30pm: Making Sense of Shakespeare with Mary Hartman  

Shakespeare’s text can provide actors with unparalleled opportunities for self-expression, but the complex language can be intimidating. Bard’s Director of Education Mary Hartman will share strategies all actors can use to actively explore the text and discover how it resonates for them in a welcoming environment free of judgment. 

Please wear clothes you can move in and bring a water bottle. No need to prepare any Shakespeare text.

2:00pm – 5:00pm: Beyond the Muppets! Three Person and Object Puppetry with Stephanie Elgersma  

This workshop will cover the basics of puppetry and the core skills needed to bring a puppet to life. This includes a brief introduction to different styles of puppetry, exploring the relationship between the puppeteer and the puppet (with special interest in object puppetry), learning the foundational principles of puppetry, and working with multiple puppeteers to bring a puppet to life. Participants will leave the workshop with a more comfortable relationship with the world of puppetry and a better understanding of how to approach a puppet for an audition or a performance. 

6:30pm – 9:30pm: Intro to The Fine Art of Physical Comedy & Clowning with Gordon White 

If you're called an "idiot" in this workshop‚ it's a compliment! Cultivate your funny bone while you eliminate the 4th Wall and connect with the audience. Through the exploration of character, physical comedy, and playing "in the moment", this seriously fun workshop will focus on expanding the actors' comfort zone and highlight the benefits of taking creative risks. 

12:00pm – 3:00pm: Character Movement Coaching with Cydney Uffindell-Phillips 

 As humans, we are storytelling machines. Our body language is constantly projecting a story. The story of who we are; how we control the world around us; who we want to be; and often a story that reveals our inner conflict, displaying our hidden fears and desires.
This workshop is designed for actors and performers to investigate personal boundaries and character physicality. Participants will explore how a character is shaped by their internal and external connections and discover new paths to inform and develop a character’s ARC of Motion. A character's ARC of Motion can be explored through their articulations, rhythms and co-ordinations.
How does your character approach obstacles? How do they connect with the world around them? How does their objective impact their movement? 

6:30pm – 9:30pm: Improvising Shakespeare with Zach Wolfman 

 Learn the basics of Improvising Shakespeare from a member of Vancouver's premier Improvised Shakespeare Company. Brush up on your iambic pentameter, poetry, and rhyme in a safe and inclusive learning environment that will equip you with tips, tools, and techniques used by professional theatre artists to improvise in the style of the bard. This workshop is intended for performers of all skill and experience levels.  

2:00pm – 5:00pm: Playing Monsters and Kings: Expanding Vocal Range with Victor Ayala 

How do actors project into the big stages of Bard on the Beach? How do they change their voices to play kings and monsters without hurting themselves? What does it feel like to be 'on' your voice?  

This workshop will explore these questions and more by combining concepts from disparate disciplines such as Viewpoints, clowning, singing, and 'the Method' in a playful setting, while at the same time providing useful technical information for further study.  

The instructor seeks to empower the actor to learn to teach themselves by listening to their bodies perhaps more intently than they have before. A strong, interesting voice should flow freely and be easy to generate, but it becomes harder the more stressed out a performer is. By embracing the concept of 'play', actors will be able to hear themselves in new ways and have the confidence to do it safely.  

In these three hours, actors will learn concepts that will help them create a voice for a character from Shakespeare and perform it in front of their peers at the end. The methods presented will help the actor understand how to reproduce the voice whenever they like.  

Participants should bring a water bottle. 

6:30pm – 9:30pm: Fights, Falls, and Friendship: Safe and Effective Stage Combat with Mike Kovac & Sylvie la Riviere 

A dive into the world of Stage Combat. Gain confidence and experience as you grow from using your own individual physicality into telling stories involving other people and their own unique abilities. If all storytelling involves conflict then there's a number of ways we can tell that - we can sing, talk, dance... but why not fight about it? 

Participants should bring runners or otherwise comfortable footwear, water and clothes they can move in. 

2:00pm – 5:00pm: Alexander Technique as an embodied approach to text with Gabriella Minnes-Brandes 

Alexander Technique provides tools to be present and in the moment.  These qualities enable us to grow, inspire, act, listen and learn from each other. The principles of the Alexander Technique allow us to meet everyone where they are and invite each one of us to go on a journey of learning about ourselves as artists.  We become aware of our habits, learn about efficiency of movement and how to make choices to move away from auto-pilot reactions to stimuli.  We will create opportunities to explore different choices available to us through observation of breath, movement and sound. 

In this three-hour workshop, we will review Alexander Technique concepts of awareness, choices, coordination and use in the context of working on text. We will analyze our reactions, naming when we critique, judge, or act with authenticity.  

Please bring a short text (1-2 minutes long) and be prepared to explore it in multiple ways. 

This experimental workshop will call on your imagination and choices you make in real time. Be prepared to perform alone and with others. The session may include hands-on work, individual work, pair work and group work. 

Come to the workshop with a text to work on, a yoga mat and a book to lie down on the floor if you are able.. 

6:30pm – 9:30pm: Critical Response Process: How to Give and Receive Effective Feedback with Brian Postalian & Joyce Rosario 

liz lerman's Critical Response Process (CRP) is a feedback system based on the principle that the best possible outcome of a response session is for the maker to want to go back to work. Whether you're laboring on a painting or designing a website, drafting a lecture or composing a score, CRP helps you get fresh and useful feedback from peers, laypeople, and experts alike, while giving you the tools to do the same for others' work. Through the supportive structure of its four core steps, CRP combines the power of questions with the focus and challenge of informed dialogue. In use for over 25 years, CRP has been embraced by art makers, educators, scientists, and theater companies, dance departments, orchestras, laboratories, conservatories, museums, universities, corporations, and kindergartens. With a focus on actual works in progress – a dance, a script, a lecture, visual art work, even a cake – this training will highlight participation, conversation, and the flexibility of the Process. 

Participants should bring a notebook and something to write with. 

2:00pm – 5:00 pm: Creative Movement with Mario Matias 

Mario's creative movement class is designed to help artists develop a foundation for story-telling through movement and music connection. Using elements from different dance techniques, this class is perfect for any actors who want to delve into dance to further their artistry and storytelling. 

Bring water and clothes you can move in. 

6:30pm – 8:30pm: Authentic Relating for Queer and Trans Artists with Jackson Wai Chung Tse 

Authentic Relating is a revolutionary, internationally recognized social practice that creates profound relationships in all interpersonal domains of life, from intimate partners to board executives, and everyone in between. In pairs and small groups, you will be led through a series of curated, tested, and invigorating games that give players a hands-on taste of both the joy and skills of these groundbreaking exercises. If you are tired of conversations that just skim the surface and looking to connect deeper with people at this event and beyond, this might be the toolkit you're looking for. Come experiment with us. 

2:00pm – 5:00pm: Theatre Show Control & Sound System Integration with Kyra Soko 

In this workshop, you’ll learn the basics of Qlab Show Control. Our focus will be on how to integrate, sync and control various tech departments while pulling off a very tech-heavy show with many moving pieces. If you’re a stage manager, technician, designer, or a multidisciplinary artist looking to branch out, this session is for you. Participants will need a Mac laptop with QLab 4.7 installed before the workshop. You can find a free download at this link. 

6:30pm – 8:30pm: Fringe Festivals 101 - Show Creation and Touring with Andrew Wade 

Have you ever thought about creating a theatre show for Fringe Festivals, but find getting started to be intimidating? This session is here to excite, inspire, and inform about the nuts and bolts of what it takes to take a show to Fringe Festivals. Andrew Wade will provide a practical and comprehensive breakdown on what it takes to put together a Fringe Festival production, whether that is just for here in Vancouver or to tour across the country and beyond. We will discuss the pros and cons of different kinds of Fringe theatre shows, build timelines to keep shows on track (through lottery draws, marketing, sending out press releases, and more), and examine the financial costs and rewards involved. Maybe even work through a few show pitches! 

Andrew Wade is a Fringe Festival veteran who has produced shows in 27 different Fringe and Fringe-ish festivals in eleven different cities across Canada. He would love to help you join the Fringe!