PANELS

​Across the Boards: A National Dialogue on Gender & Theatre

March 2, 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Online
What does it look like to create theatre from the Atlantic to the Pacific? Join Andrea Donaldson (Nightwood Theatre, Ontario), Amanda Goldberg (SkirtsAfire Festival, Alberta), Trina Moyan and Marianne Sawchuk (Women at Play Festival, Ontario), and Diane Brown (Advance Theatre Festival by Ruby Slippers Theatre, British Columbia) for a cross-country conversation. This panel bridges the geographical gaps in our industry to discuss how regional identities shape our stories and how a national network can better support gender-marginalized creators.

​Discussion: The First Spark

March 3, 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm
Second Space, LSPU Hall (3 Victoria St.)
Are you starting a new play? Are you writing a play for the first time? WWF Playwriting Unit alumni - Heather Rumbolt, Ijeoma Ezeike, Judith, Thiviya Kana, and Lydia Makaga get together for a lunchtime exploration of their creative process to inspire and spark new writing. 

play connect

March 4, 3:30 pm - 6:00 pm
UPDATE: The panel has been rescheduled to 4:00pm-6:30pm, to allow for safer travel after forecasted flurries. Stay safe, everyone!
Second Space, LSPU Hall (3 Victoria St.)
Join us on March 4th at 3:30pm to be inspired by excerpts of plays from featured festival playwrights Alicia Payne and Nancy Kenny and beloved local artist Bernardine Stapleton on this PlayConnect panel. Each playwright will read 15 minutes of their play, followed by an audience Q&A Session  moderated by Donna Butt (with snacks, coffee and tea, of course!).
D Cup
A one act comedy about a woman who abandon's her elderly mother in a lingerie shop.

Alicia Payne is a multidisciplinary storyteller who works in theatre, film, television, and radio. Professional memberships include, ACTRA, CAEA, Dramatists Guild of America, and Playwrights Guild of Canada where she served as president. Alicia’s work has been presented in festivals and conferences such as: Toronto Fringe Festival; WorldPlay (British Columbia); Atlanta Black Theatre Festival; Garland Lee Thompson, Sr. Readers’ Theatre of New Work at the International Black Theatre Festival (North Carolina); and Valdez Theatre Conference (Alaska). One of Alicia’s plays has been translated into Danish. Residencies include: Gros Morne Playwrights Residency; A Room of Her Own (AROHO) Retreat; and Tapestry Opera LIBLAB. Alicia's facilitation practice incorporates adaptive change and youth leadership workshops, as well as leadership training simulations. Alicia is the audiobook narrator of Flower Diary by Molly Peacock and a cofounder of Arbez Drama Projects. Alicia believes in the power of storytelling to build community.
Every Body Dies in December
Everybody Dies in December is a dark comedy set in the embalming room of a funeral home in small town New Brunswick. Claire, a third generation funeral director, is more at home with her "clients" in the basement than with the people upstairs. When her mother chooses to sell the family business, Claire must figure our if there truly is a place for her among the living.

A proud Acadian from New Brunswick, Nancy Kenny is a fluently bilingual (French/English) actor, writer, theatre and film producer, who lives in Kjipuktuk/Halifax. She is best known for the award-winning, critically acclaimed plays, Roller Derby Saved My Soul (Canadian Comedy Award nominee - Best One Person Show), and Everybody Dies in December. Nancy is also the executive producer of On the Fringe, a feature documentary about touring the Canadian Fringe Festival circuit. (Winner: Best Documentary Film, 2023 Screen Nova Scotia Awards). Currently, she is working on I Don’t Feel Pretty/Chu pas cute, an absurdist dark comedy set in the fractured mind of an alcoholic on a bender. Through her company, Broken Turtle Productions, her focus is in stories that explore the role of women, marginalized genders, and 2SLGBTQ+ people in society. She is particularly interested in new and multilingual works, as well as works that explore our humanity with a darkly comedic bent.
Hysterical Vadge
The world’s oldest living sales girl is about to be terminated. Life takes a turn when she begins to listen to a very unique inner voice. This one-woman play is sad, mad, and funny.

Bernardine Stapleton is a playwright, author, skit-artist, and actor. She’s spent her career making beautiful theatre in unexpected places. In 2024 she was a Siminovitch Playwright Prize finalist. In 2025 she was the inaugural playwright in residence with RCAT and invited a stunning array of senior talent to the LSPU mainstage to workshop her new work Dying at the Discotheque. Hysterical Vadge was also started during her residency. This year she and co-artistic director Nicole Smith are celebrating 25 years of Girl Power Inc, her feminist theatre company, empowering female driven stories with a special year of crafty research, process-based tinkering, and new works including Ophelia Swims, Taste, and more. Her plays include Offensive to Some, Woman in a Monkey Cage, and an audio play for the NAC English Theatre Woman of One Thousand Years. In the works are the novel adaptation of her play Brazil Square, and the upcoming podcast The Haunted Doorbell. Bernardine was writer-in-residence at Memorial University in 2019. She lives in St. John’s with rescue beagle Georgie Girl. 

Now and Then: Change and Challenges in the Theatre Sector

March 5, 3:30 pm - 5:00 pm
Second Space, LSPU Hall (3 Victoria St.)
Moderated by Jenn Brown (SJIWFF Executive Director), WWF Founders Ruth Lawrence, Amy House, Sara Tilley and Nicolle Rousseau explore the evolution, changes, and challenges within the theatre sector in NL over the last two decades.