Hart House Theatre boasts the title of the University of Toronto’s official theatre since 1919. Professional actors and technicians come together with students and alumni to produce a four show season every year. Doug Floyd, the general manager, Andrea Wasserman, the marketing and publicity coordinator, and Gillian Lewis, the education and production coordinator, all spoke with The Varsity about the upcoming season, and how students can get involved.
The Varsity: So the first thing to talk about is the season — why did you choose the shows that you did?
Andrea Wasserman: So the season itself is The Importance of Being Earnest, The Tempest, Jesus Christ Superstar, and This Is For You, Anna.
Doug Floyd: The Tempest hasn’t been done since the 50’s… it was one of the biggies we hadn’t touched. Superstar has been on our radar for about 15 years, so when the rights became available we went right to that. Neither of these shows are very funny, and we wanted to start the season with a comedy, so that’s where The Importance of Being Earnest came from. This is For You, Anna has also been on our shortlist for a while, and then seeing the production last year at the UCDP, we really wanted to make it part of our season. I think we have three shows with a broad mass appeal, and a third show that deserves that audience.
TV: Can we talk more about This Is For You, Anna? Because I think that’s a really interesting show that students might not know about.
AW: A community of women wrote [it] a collective, so it doesn’t have a plot in a traditional sense — but the centre story that you keep getting snippets of is about a case that happened in Germany in the ’70s in which a seven-year-old girl was raped and killed. Her mother was a single mother and… walked into the court room with a gun, shot [the perpetrator] seven times and said “This is for you, Anna.”
DF: It’s the kind of play that you really need to have a conversation about after, so we’re going to have what we call a “discussion forum” after — it might be a key note speaker, or something along those lines.
TV: Is there anything you’d like students to know about the theatre?
DF: I would love for more students to audition for our shows — some students don’t think they can audition for us, but that’s absolutely not the case. One of our mandates is to have students in the audience, so if you get a student subscription it’s $40, so only $10 for a show.
TV: And how would a student go about volunteering with Hart House Theatre?
Gillian Lewis: So all the student positions at Hart House go through the education and production coordinator, who is me, so I interview, train and manage students.
TV: So what kind of roles are there?
GL: So, here at Hart House we say that no experience is necessary, but we are going to establish a hierarchy of positions. There are leadership roles, junior leadership roles, production roles, and entry-level positions. Entry-level positions are things like light runners, set painters and production assistants.
TV: Why should students come work for Hart House Theatre?
GL: Because it’s fun! Doug would always say that fun is a by-product of what we do. We put on some great shows, and it’s a really unique opportunity for students to mingle with theatrical professionals, regardless of [their] degree.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
