Theatre - Mary's Wedding

 

A unique partnership between the Kelowna Museums and Shoreline Theatre arrives in Kelowna later this month.

Mary's Wedding will be performed at the Laurel Packing House from June 20th-July 1st. Tickets can be bought in person at the Okanagan Heritage Museum or by calling #250-763-2417.

The following is an interview I did over email with the Artistic Director of Shoreline Theatre, Jackie Faulkner.

RD: What motivated you to approach the Wine Museum with your concept to do a theatre production at the Laurel Packing house?

JF: I approached the Kelowna Museums about this project in December, the collaboration was a natural fit with this play fitting in with the Wedding Exhibit at the OHM and the WWI content fits in with the Military Museum. Collaborating like this is happening a lot in the arts, blurring line between disciplines and joining with new partners opens up stories to new audiences and makes the process more sustainable.

RD: This year the Actors Studio is celebrating their 10th anniversary, Bumbershoot Theatre recently moved into their new facility, and Kelowna will host its first outdoors theatre festival this summer. What factors do you see contributing to this resurgence of theatre in our community?

JF: We are actually coming out of a downturn in my opinion, this is the first professional locally produced theatre piece since Sunshine Theatre closed down a few years ago.

RD: Can you give us some information on Shoreline Theatre? Is it a local company? Do you foresee this production going on tour?

JF: Yes, shoreline is a new, professional, local company. We believe in collaborating with existing groups (like the Kelowna Museums) to share stories worth telling with performance worth seeing. This show won't go on tour.

RD: Obviously the Laurel Packing house hosts many weddings through the facility. Did you choose the show or the venue first?

JF: Both really, I went to meet with the Museum and this play and this venue came up in the meeting :)

RD: Anything else you'd like to share?
JF: Our facebook link at www.facebook.com/marywedding we only have tickets for sale in person and over the phone sales. Right now people can like our FB page for a chance to win tickets!

Full press release:

“A delicate exploration of the excitement, beauty, and purity of the first flush of romance… Massicotte is a gifted storyteller with an ear for detail and imagery” – Calgary

Herald

Boy meets girl, and the rest, they say, is history -- an adage that Shoreline Theatre in collaboration with the Kelowna Museums, is taking very literally with their upcoming production of Mary’s Wedding by Canadian playwright Stephen Massicotte. The show, which opens June 20th and runs till July 1st at the Laurel Packing House, revolves around the romance of Mary and a young soldier named Charlie. Set in 1914 Mary’s Wedding is a love letter to the power of memory and innocence, and to a generation of Canadians who were caught in the crucible of the First World War. The show is deeply moving, incorporating poetic works of Tennyson, gripping battles, and of course, young love.

The collaboration of the Kelowna Museums with Shoreline Theatre was a natural one as story is really what history is all about. The partnership began in late 2011 when actor and artistic director of Shoreline Theatre, Jackie Faulkner, approached the Museum with the idea. “To be honest I was both delighted and shocked the Museum was so willing to jump into this with me, this whole production, was the brain child of a meeting that I had with Patti Kilback, to use theatre to support the Museum and vice versa, it has taken off in leaps and bounds since then.” The show which takes place in the Laurel Packing House, is a compliment to the Wedding Exhibit “Something Borrowed, Something Blue” which is currently running at the Okanagan Heritage Museum. The play while fictional, is based on historical battles with Canadians from World War I making it also tie in with the Military Museum.

Faulkner who is originally from the Okanagan has spent nearly a decade in theatre and dance in Vancouver performing with companies like The Royal Canadian Theatre Company, Pacific Theatre, as well as cofounding LesPetitesTaquines Dance Theatre. Since returning to the Okanagan in the fall of 2011 she has had the opportunity to perform with Inner Fish Performance Co. in “The House at the End of the Road” which toured to Edmonton for the Canoe Festival as well as the local Fertility Festival. Mary’s Wedding is the fruition of a dream to bring her work back home, and be able to do the same for other professional theatre artists who have had to move away from the beautiful Okanagan valley in order to pursue their performance careers.

Mary’s Wedding boasts an impressive cast and crew, the set, lighting and costume designer Nicole Bach has worked in theatres across Western Canada and is the recipient of the prestigious Jessie Richardson award for her design work. She also has a local connection as her family runs a B&B in the South Okanagan. Joining Jackie Faulkner in the cast, is Mack Gordon a Kelowna-ite who after receiving his BFA in theatre from UVIC has worked professionally everywhere from Vancouver Island to the Interior of BC and was himself nominated for a Jessie Richardson for ‘Outstanding Performance’.

“Puts you in Mind of the grand passion of Catherine and Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights, the vastness of their love mirroring the wild tangle of nature” – Washington Times

Rife with haunting images and an epic story Mary’s Wedding is a show that will connect with its audience and leave a lasting impression. This is truly a show not to be missed.

 

 

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.