Jesse returns to the cottage he grew up in with a photo and cardboard box. The land is just as he left it, and his grandmother is brash as ever, but why did it take him so long to come back?
This autobiographical dreamscape is Stong's love letter to his eccentric grandmother. A queer story, fast-paced and surprisingly hilarious, it offers a devastating insight into how we cope with grief.
Playwright | Jesse Stong
Director & Dramaturg | Olivia Woods
Producer | Kit Bromovsky
Dead Animals World Premier at Edinburgh Fringe
TheSpace @ Surgeons' Hall - Theatre 1
August 11th -24th
Dead Animals
TheSpace @ Surgeons' Hall - Theatre 1
The One
Freestanding Room Montreal, 2022
Emily has one week to find The One, for in a week she will be thirty. Can retracing her Grandmother's fairytale love story help Emily hack app dating before the hourglass runs out? ...or has her true love been right in front of her all along?
Performer & Playwright | Miriam Cummings
Director & Dramaturg | Olivia Woods
Sound Design | John Saigle
Lighting Design | Tiffanie Boffa
Stage Manager | Annalise Peterson-Perry
Community activist Masson Balough sheds light on the nuances of domestic relationships in South Asian communities by sharing her journey to leave one.
Performer & Playwright | Masoon Balouch
Director & Dramaturge | Olivia Woods
Does It Really Happen
For the International Institute for Critical Studies in Improvisation, 2022
Never Walk Alone
Festival Acces Asie, 2022
Exploring family dynamics, independence, legacy, isolation, burnout, and economics, the piece follows Honey and her trajectory from formerly-promising-child to bitter disappointment. This is an endurance pole dance piece that explores the relationship between physically holding oneself up on the pole and the necessity of holding truths and lies from our loved ones.
Performer & Playwright | Julie Phan
Director & Dramaturge | Olivia Woods
This larger-than-life project, never seen before in the Montréal or elsewhere, features musicians-beavers, a wacky boat crew, mythical sea creatures and giant puppets.
The 9km journey is sure to offer a feast of sensations to everyone aboard.
Director | Abi Stushnoff
Section 6 Director | Olivia Woods
Musical Director | Charley Hausknost
Dance Director | Caroline Namts
Point Saint Charles 2021
En Point
A socially-distanced episodic series of bilingual short plays. Physically distanced and yet immersed in the world of the play, audiences will enjoy a unique theatrical experience imaginatively adapted to the unprecedented realities and restrictions of our times.
Playwright & Director | Mathieu Murphy-Perron
Assistant Director | Olivia Woods
Production Manager | Andrew Scriver
Costume Designers | Sophie El-Assaad & Zoe Roux
Sound Design | Rob Denton
Videographer | AJ Korkidakis
A series of performance creation workshops designed for youth ages 16-24 in Point Saint Charles. My research looks at how the theatrical process can best further our collective fight for social justice by strengthening democratic skills, making the invisible visible and building local alliances. The project was selected for the Living Labs with Bâtiment 7 and was a recipient of SAF's Sustainability Research award.
Producer & Workshop Facilitator | Olivia Woods
Performing Together
Bâtiment 7 & Sustainable Action Fund, 2021
Young Creator's Showcase
Playwirghts' Workshop Montreal, 2019--2022
Artists from Playwrights' Workshop Montreal's Young Unit share excerpts of their work with an enthusiastic audience of peers, community leaders, and theatre lovers.
Project Leader | Jess Stong
Playwrights | Camille Mankumah,
Megan Hunt, Calder Lavine
Director & Dramaturge | Olivia Woods
Your task is to avert a potential riot before it explodes. As The Riot Ballet progresses, a narrative emerges in fragments: the government works hard to make citizens feel heard and represented… but do their polished messages mask corruption and authoritarian motives? Protestors emerge to challenge the government. The show culminates in a (safe but spectacular) burgeoning riot, where your actions in the moment determine just how intense the riot will become.
Co-creators | Noah Drew, Emer O’Toole, Catalina Medina, Martin Andrews and Shawn Ketchum Johnson
Collaborators | Olivia Woods, Naomi Cormier
Charles Johnson, Al Tom
Riot Ballet
John Molson School of Business, 2019
Mainline Theatre, 2019
Encore
While still in the throes of young love, a couple pledge to return to the site of their first meeting ever year in order to reenact word-for-word their faithful encounter. How do we love? Or rather, how don’t we love? Encore blends comedy, poetry and insight in a manner that is a far cry from the cynicism of our time. It dares to speak of true feelings, the ones that shake us to our core.
Directors | Liz Valdez
Playwright | Marc Prescott
Assistant Directors | Olivia Woods
Set Design | Jaclyn Turner
Lighting | Zoe Roux
Sound Design | Rehan Lalani
Set in the late Victorian era of 1896 at Cambridge University, Blue Stockings follows the story of four young women fighting for self-determination and the right to receive higher education against the larger backdrop of women's suffrage in Britain.
Director | Gabrielle Soskin
Assistant Director | Olivia Woods
Set, Props, Costume Designer | Alexa Gregory
Lighting Designer | Cate Clark
Sound Designer | Heather Ellen Strain
Conservatoire de Musique et d'Art Dramatique, 2019
Blue Stockings
Cosmonaut Number One
National Theatre School's Art Apart Broadcast, 2020
This solo bio-drama will take you on a journey with the first man in space. Experience his world view change as he goes from Soviet loyalist to global icon. This is the rise and fall of Yuri Gagarin.
Director | Olivia Woods
Performer and Playwright | Calder Lavigne
Lighting | Cate Clark
Politically charged, sci-fi immersive theatre following a married couple and their god during the end of the world. Audience members slowly take on the role of refugees within the narrative, highlighting the hypocrisy of settler nations.
Playwright & Director | Olivia Woods & Rahul Gandhi
Lighting & Costume | Amy White
