Studio 180 AT HOME: Tell It Like It Is

Prior to the first public reading of 6x10 IN DEVELOPMENT, get a glimpse into the writing process and join RBC Emerging Playwright Rachel Mutombo alongside fellow writers Andrea Scott and Djanet Sears in an intimate dialogue about identity, representation and community. Kimberley Rampersad (Associate Artistic Director of The Shaw Festival) moderates a discussion that connects audiences with some of Canada's most provocative theatrical voices.

The session will be 75 minutes and an opportunity for audience questions will be provided.

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Learn about our Studio 180 AT HOME programming: http://studio180theatre.com/athome/

MEET THE PANELISTS:

Kimberley Rampersad As an actor Kimberley has appeared in various theatres across Canada including Mirvish, RMTC, Stratford and Shaw Festivals. Her work as a choreographer has been recognized with two Dora nominations for Passing Strange (Musical Stage/Obsidian) and Seussical – the Musical (YPT), respectively and an Evie Award for Matilda – The Musical (Royal MTC/ Citadel/ Arts Club). As a director, Kimberley was featured in the New York Times for directing a full- length production of Man and Superman at the Shaw Festival. Other directing credits include How Black Mothers Say I Love You (GCTC) (2018 Prix Rideau Award – Outstanding Production) and The Color Purple (Neptune and Citadel/ Royal MTC) which received Sterling and Merritt Awards for Outstanding Direction and Productions amongst others. In the community she contributes to the work of the Philp Akin – Black Shoulders Legacy Award, Gina’s Prize, and sits on the board of AFC. Kimberley is currently the Associate Artistic Director of the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario.

Rachel Mutombo is a Dora award-winning actor and writer. She is an acting graduate of John Abbott College’s Professional Theatre program as well as the National Theatre School of Canada. Some recent theatre performance credits include Antigone (Young People’s Theatre), School Girls; Or the African Mean Girls Play (Obsidian Theatre/Nightwood Theatre) and Selfie (YPT). Rachel is a member of the current Emerging Playwrights’ Unit at Factory Theatre, where she is actively developing a piece called Vierge. She is simultaneously developing another piece, called Better, through Nightwood Theatre’s Write From the Hip program. She is incredibly grateful to Studio 180, and all the theatre companies, who have supported her thus far in this new journey into playwriting.

Andrea Scott is writer and producer from London, Ontario originally. Her first play, Eating Pomegranates Naked, won the RBC Arts Professional Award, and was named Outstanding Ensemble and Outstanding Production at the 2013 SummerWorks Festival. Better Angels: A Parable won the SummerWorks Award for Production in August 2015 and was recognized as Outstanding New Play, Outstanding Ensemble, Outstanding Direction and Outstanding Production by NOW Magazine. It had its US debut at the Athena Festival in Chicago, was adapted for CBC’s PlayMe podcast series, and was published in 2018 (along with Eating Pomegranates Naked) by Scirocco Press. Don’t Talk to Me Like I’m Your Wife, won the Cayle Chernin Award for theatre and was followed by a successful run at SummerWorks (Outstanding Performance, NOW Magazine). Her last two productions have been Controlled Damage, about Viola Desmond, and Every Day She Rose, co-written with Nick Green and produced by Nightwood Theatre for Buddies in Bad Times in 2019. Recipient of the Magee Diverse Screenwriters Award (2019), Andrea wrote 13 episodes of My Paranormal Nightmare for Sharon Lewis at Our House Media in 2019. She was the Story Editor for the CBC/BET production The Porter debuting in late 2021. She is also the 2020/2021 Canada Council Playwright in Residence at Tarragon Theatre.

Djanet Sears is an award-winning playwright and director and has several acting nominations to her credit for both stage and screen. She is the recipient of the Stratford Festival’s 2004 Timothy Findley Award, as well as Canada’s highest literary honour for dramatic writing: the 1998 Governor General’s Literary Award. She is the playwright and director of the multiple Dora Award winning production of Harlem Duet (Scirocco Drama, 1997), which was workshopped at the Joseph Papp Public Theatre in NYC, where Djanet was the international artist-in-residence in 1996. Her other honours include: the 1998 Floyd S. Chalmers Canadian Play Award, the Martin Luther King Jr. Achievement Award, the Harry Jerome Award for Excellence in the Cultural Industries, and a Phenomenal Woman of the Arts Award. Her most recent work for the stage, The Adventures Of A Black Girl In Search Of God, (Playwrights Canada Press, 2003), shortlisted for a 2004 Trillium Book Award and enjoyed a six month run in the fall/winter of 2003/2004, as part of the Mirvish Productions Season. Her other plays include Afrika Solo, Who Killed Katie Ross and Double Trouble. Djanet is the driving force behind the AfriCanadian Playwrights’ Festival, and a founding member of the Obsidian Theatre Company. She is also the editor of Testifyin’: Contemporary African Canadian Drama, Vols. I & II, the first anthologies of plays by playwrights of African descent in Canada (Playwrights Canada Press, 2000 & 2003). She is currently an adjunct professor at the University of Toronto.