Wednesday, November 1, 2006

Douglas Coupland's Fictional World Takes the Stage

Does the work of Canada's most famous zeitgeist writer, Douglas Coupland make for good theatre? I interviewed Katrina Dunn, Artistic Director of Touchstone Theatre and playwright, Michael Lewis MacLennan about the challenges of bringing Life After God to the stage.

"Scout lies naked in a warm pool holding hands in a circle with six of his closest friends. They are “pretending to be embryos” in a “life lived in paradise,” one without religion, love or politics. This poignant scene opens Douglas Coupland’s short story “1000 Years”in Life After God, and in that rare moment of intimacy and closenesss, a startling question is posed that seems to have emerged naturally from Coupland’s previous two books, Generation X and Shampoo Planet: Can we find meaning or connection in the madness of the modern world and in the absence of belief?" Read the full feature...

Monday, January 30, 2006

A Life in Pictures

The Winter/Spring 2006 issue of Trek Magazine features my profile of visionary lighting designer, Robert Gardiner and Governor General's Award-winning playwright, Kevin Kerr as they discuss their recent ground-breaking collaboration, Studies in Motion: The Hauntings of Eadweard Muybridge.

"On June 15, 1878, in Palo Alto, California, Eadweard Muybridge photographed the first fast motion serial images of a horse that captured a moment of suspension when no hooves touched the ground. The man who sponsored the experiment was the horse’s owner, railroad builder and former governor, Leland Stanford, who would later found Stanford University." Read the full feature...