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2011/12 Season
Provocative Canadian Voices
Courageous Canadian Theatre

In partnership with our good friends at The Vancouver Playhouse Theatre Company, urban ink, and The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts,we have a Season that kicks ass. We hope you join us as we deepen our long-standing commitment to theatre that illuminates and furthers dissenting Canadian voices through provocative entertainment for critical thinkers.

Ruby Slippers Theatre was co-founded in 1989 by a collective of women artists from various disciplines who wanted to change the world. Our legacy includes over 70 projects, 3 national tours, and 8 full-length original works. Over the last seven years alone, Ruby Slippers Theatre has garnered 31 Jessie Richardson Theatre Award nominations including twice for Outstanding Direction and Outstanding Production, and 13 Awards.

Ruby Slippers Theatre's distinctiveness lies in our commitment to dissenting, courageous Canadian voices that dig below the surface to reveal controversial truths about ourselves and our community. This illumination allows diversity of perspectives to emerge, and thus true independent critical thought and dialogue inspired.

Diane Brown,
Artistic Director

Independent thinkers unite: Wear hot shoes, See cool theatre

Now in development, The Great Raymond is a portrait of Vancouver in the 1950s, inspired by the investigations of reporters Jack Webster and Ray Munro into police corruption. A collaboration between the Vancouver Playhouse Theatre Company, Ruby Slippers Theatre, and award-winning local writer Timothy Taylor, author of Stanley Park, the project will culminate in a world premiere production at the Vancouver Playhouse in 2013!

Join us on Sunday, October 2 from 2-4pm at an Open House at the Vancouver Playhouse, where we will unveil some of our research and development to date regarding this exciting project. The Great Raymond takes a look at the story behind the headlines that dominated the dailies in 1955 and resulted in the suicide of a senior officer and Vancouver's Chief Constable fleeing the country.

We would like to tip our hats to our friends at the Greater Vancouver Professional Theatre Alliance!

Join us for two days in which YOU design the program and set the discussion topics which matter to you. The annual Making a Scene Conference takes place this year at the Croatian Cultural Centre, 3250 Commercial Drive on Friday November 4 & Saturday November 5, 9:30 a.m. - 5:30 p.m.

This event is for anyone who cares about theatre and the performing arts! Whatever your connection to theatre - in the audience, on stage, back stage, or off stage - you are invited. Whether you are a patron, a thespian, a volunteer, a theatre student, an arts manager, an administrator, a critic, a technician, an artist of any shape, size or discipline, or simply a theatre lover, you are ALL invited. Nothing beats face-to-face time with people who share your passions!

Hotel Bethlehem
World Premiere Production by Drew McCreadie

Image Credit: John Murphy by Tim Matheson

This holiday season it's time to consider that the history we know may not be the real story. In Ruby Slippers Theatre's Hotel Bethlehem, we playfully invite the audience to consider another interpretation of what happened that fateful night. Farce meets satire meets holiday fare in this world premiere.

This raucous new play, produced in association with The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, will feature 11 of Vancouver's finest performers! As you remember, the incorrigible Drew McCreadie also penned Ruby Slippers Theatre's landmark production of The Cat Who Ate Her Husband which went on to be nominated for a record-setting 10 Jessie Richardson Theatre Awards including Outstanding Production!

Have you ever wondered why The Inn was full? Who would turn away a VERY pregnant woman? What kind of characters and shenanigans were they up to that this could happen? Surprisingly, no one has asked these questions UNTIL NOW. Award winning playwright Drew McCreadie takes an inside look at what was going on at the inn that infamous silent night.

From the shepherds who first saw the star, Sam (Scott Bellis) and Ezekial (Alex Diakun), to the Inns owner, Joshua (John Murphy), confusion abounds when the three Kings - Melchior (Dustin Freeland), Caspar (Stephen Beaver) and Balthazar (Noah Rosenbaum) - try to hide their true selves from the Roman soldiers Lewdious (Byron Noble) and Hepion (Sean McQuillan). Adding to the confusion are the blind census-taker Addius Miopicus (Bernard Cuffling) and the Inn's staff, Mary (Jennifer Mawhinney), not to be confused with THE Mary who is in the stables waiting for Joseph (Kris Novak) to give her birthing guidance.

Hotel Bethlehem is directed by Ruby Slippers Theatre's Artistic Director Diane Brown with set design by David Roberts, sound design by Jordan Watkins, lighting design by Jonathan Ryder and costume design by Drew Facey. Stage Manager Allison Spearin is joined by Apprentice Stage Manager Stephanie Elgersma.

Dates and Tickets Prices

December 7 - 10 at Studio 16, 1545 West 7th Avenue, Vancouver | Tickets: $15/22 at 604-629-8849 or www.vancouvertix.com

December 14 - 17 @ 8PM, Dec 17 & 18 @2PM at The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, 6450 Deer Lake Avenue | Tickets: $15/27/32 at 604 205-3000 or www.shadboltcentre.com

Artistic Director of Ruby Slippers Theatre Diane Brown appears on Shaw TV's Studio 4 with Fanny Kiefer. Brown discusses her work as Director of 'Hotel Bethlehem,' a new Christmas farce by playwright Drew McCreadie

Redefining Normal - March 8th

Showcasing dissenting voices which are critical of or outside of the status quo power structures is nothing new to us. In addition to our productions, we have given a forum, through our nine year old Femmes Fatales Series, to some of the most courageous dissenting voices in contemporary Canadian Theatre: Marie Brassard, Karen Hines, Denise Clark, Tara Cheyennne Friedenberg, Tracy Powers and more! Now, we are broadening the stage and hooking up with our friends at urban ink to bring you the Redefining Normal Symposium. Join us on March 8, International Women’s Day, as we hold a free public forum on issues of diversity on our stages and pages in the Canadian Performing Arts.

Redefining Normal ~ a forum for informed discussion on issues of diversity in the performing arts. A collaboration between Ruby Slippers Theatre and URBAN INK, March 8, 2012 at the Roundhouse Community Centre. Check the Ruby Slippers Website closer to the day for more details.