World Theatre Day Blog

Hello, my name is Scott Florence and I am the artistic director of a theatre company in Ottawa called A Company of Fools.

Every year (since 2002) we have hosted the OTTAWA THEATRE CHALLENGE on March 27 to celebrate World Theatre Day.

We invite theatre companies from across the region – professional, emerging, community, theatre training centres, French and English companies – to participate in a “contest of creation”. Each participating company has 48 hours to create and rehearse a new piece of theatre. Participating companies exchange “Inspiration items” to spark the creative effort (and ensure everyone is working on a new piece in the 48 hour period!) and then two days later the results of the creative frenzy are showcased at the National Arts Centre’s Fourth Stage. Proceeds are donated to charity; the charity is chosen by the winner of the previous year. That’s right, we pretend it’s a competitive format – but the competition is very tongue in cheek, and the judges are expected and encouraged to take bribes to sway their opinion.

Our url is http://www.fools.ca.  We can also be found on Facebook.

I just discovered your blog and am very excited by it – I look forward to reading on previous posts to find out what is happening elsewhere around World Theatre Day!

Cheers,
Scott Florence,
Big Fool