content

Patrick Keating

Maiko Bae Yamamoto

Andreas Kahre

Noah Drew

Adrienne Wong

Barbara Clayden

Alex Ferguson

Ilena Lee Cramer

Erin Wells

James Long

what we do

The Other Side of the Glass

Long ago and not so far away while on sabbatical under the Queen's bench, a friend who was on the other side of the glass, told me about working on a production of Curse of the Starving Class. He told me about this actor Norman whose thirsts and passions, as they pertained to theatre, were similar to mine. He said that since Norman and I were both on a path to learn as much as we could it would be wonderful if after the end of my 'sabbatical' we could meet and work together.

Even though living under the Queen's bench is usually a stifling existence I was somehow fortunate in the fact that it was there that I was able to see my first performance of a piece of theatre. I was amazed at what I had seen. I went to the performance to kill time... to break the monotony... I sat in the audience and was powerless to fight as the anger and bitterness that comes from that existence was replaced with a feeling of association. The sense that I was part of something. I was desperate to discover more. I was in the first stages of what I call my Loofah Period. I was trying to absorb... to soak up as much as was possible about what it takes to make Theatre. My friend and other friends sent me plays to read. They would sit on the other side of the glass and tell me about productions they were involved with or had seen and we would discuss the problems and the solutions that constituted their theatre making.

One night, years after my sabbatical had ended I was giving a ride to some Jessie committee members to White Rock to see The Mouse Trap. On the ride home we talked about what we had seen and the type of theatre we hoped to make. I found myself listening mostly to one person in particular. He talked of creating work with a group of people, work that illuminated the human condition, that showed the societal instincts and learned behavior and the barriers we erect around ourselves as a result. Hey, we were young-er. He and Chris Gerrard-Pinker were about to start rehearsals on a collective creation entitled Manipulations. They had just recently started a company called Rumble Theatre.

To me, the word Rumble used to mean, had always meant, a fight... but not just any fight, or scrap, or squabble, or scuffle, but an all out fucking brawl. A battle where everyone involved puts it all on the line. Every inch and ounce of their emotional mental and physical selves. I've since rethought my key meaning of the word. First of all, hey, I was young-er... and was living in a much different jungle with much different rules. Secondly, with the serendipitous meeting of Norman and Chris and my subsequent involvement with Rumble Theatre I learnt that an artist can use their back-story with honour, that it is in fact all fiction, and that I don't have to be combative to put it all on the line. So now Rumble to me is that slow growing tremor that tells me that something exciting is about to happen. It's the tension in the air just before a riot. It's the distant sound of batons banging in rhythm on shields. It's the moment after the silence... the signal that the murder of crows are about take-off in unison to go roost for the night. It's the feeling in that instant just as my hair stands on end because the person I've fallen in love with walks into the room. It's the sound that starts in the pit of your stomach and grows until it becomes too formidable to confine and it roars out exactly as... well... Rumble to me?