Yvette Nolan

The two-part tale of King Henry IV, rewritten with new language for the twenty-first century. Shakespeare’s two Henry IV plays follow the exploits of King Henry IV after usurping the crown from his cousin Richard II. Featuring some of Shakespeare’s most recognizable characters such as Prince Hal and the roguish Sir John Falstaff, Henry IV, Part 1 delves into complicated questions of loyalty and kingship on and off the battlefield. Henry IV, Part 2 follows Prince Hal as he grapples with his eventual ascent to the throne and his increasingly strained relationship with Falstaff. As the king falls sick and Hal’s ascent appears imminent, Hal’s decisions hold significant implications for all those around him. Modernizing the language of the two plays, Yvette Nolan’s translation carefully works at the seeds sown by Shakespeare—bringing to new life the characters and dramatic arcs of the original. These translations of Henry IV were written as part of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s Play On! project, which commissioned new translations of thirty-nine Shakespeare plays. These translations present work from “The Bard” in language accessible to modern audiences while never losing the beauty of Shakespeare’s verse. Enlisting the talents of a diverse group of contemporary playwrights, screenwriters, and dramaturges from diverse backgrounds, this project reenvisions Shakespeare for the twenty-first century. These volumes make these works available for the first time in print—a new First Folio for a new era.

Considered a masterpiece of Canadian literature, Margaret Laurence's The Diviners is the compelling story of Morag Gunn, a woman who perseveres through challenge after challenge as she attempts to carve out an authentic life as a writer. The play moves backward and forward through time, taking us to Morag's impoverished childhood in rural Manitoba, her early struggles to establish herself as a female artist, and her present, as she works to finish a novel while navigating a thorny relationship with her teenage daughter, Pique. Inextricably bound with Morag's Scottish settler story is the Metis story of Jules Tonnerre, her friend, lover, and Pique's father. Adapted for the stage by Vern Thiessen with Yvette Nolan, The Diviners illuminates issues of identity, class, and reconciliation.

A significant moment in Canadian history is portrayed in this documentary musical about race relations between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people. Weaving hundreds of real interviews conducted with Saskatchewan residents and the court transcripts surrounding the killing of Colten Boushie and trial of Gerald Stanley, a kaleidoscopic picture is formed of the views of the incident, the province, and Indigenous people in Canada. Reasonable Doubt--with interviews by Joel Bernbaum, music by Lancelot Knight, and dramaturgy by Yvette Nolan--provides a space to honestly talk to each other about what has happened on this land and how we can live together.

The two-part tale of King Henry IV, rewritten with new language for the twenty-first century. Shakespeare’s two Henry IV plays follow the exploits of King Henry IV after usurping the crown from his cousin Richard II. Featuring some of Shakespeare’s most recognizable characters such as Prince Hal and the roguish Sir John Falstaff, Henry IV, Part 1 delves into complicated questions of loyalty and kingship on and off the battlefield. Henry IV, Part 2 follows Prince Hal as he grapples with his eventual ascent to the throne and his increasingly strained relationship with Falstaff. As the king falls sick and Hal’s ascent appears imminent, Hal’s decisions hold significant implications for all those around him. Modernizing the language of the two plays, Yvette Nolan’s translation carefully works at the seeds sown by Shakespeare—bringing to new life the characters and dramatic arcs of the original. These translations of Henry IV were written as part of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s Play On! project, which commissioned new translations of thirty-nine Shakespeare plays. These translations present work from “The Bard” in language accessible to modern audiences while never losing the beauty of Shakespeare’s verse. Enlisting the talents of a diverse group of contemporary playwrights, screenwriters, and dramaturges from diverse backgrounds, this project reenvisions Shakespeare for the twenty-first century. These volumes make these works available for the first time in print—a new First Folio for a new era.

Gabriel Dumont's Wild West Show is a flamboyant epic, constructed as a series of tableaux, about the struggles of the M tis in the Canadian West. It is a multilayered and entertaining saga with a rodeo vibe, loosely based on Buffalo Bill's legendary outdoor travelling show. In 1885, following the hanging of his friend Louis Riel, bison hunter Gabriel Dumont fled to the United States. There he was recruited by the legendary Buffalo Bill, founder of Buffalo Bill's Wild West, a gigantic outdoor travelling show that re-enacted life in the American West. It made a huge impression on Dumont, and he dreamed of putting together a similar show to tell the story of the struggle of Canada's M tis to reclaim their rights. The creative team behind Gabriel Dumont's Wild West Show - including ten authors, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, French- and English-speaking men and women - brings Dumont's dream to life in a captivating, joyously anachronistic saga. The theatrical version of Gabriel Dumont's Wild West Show presented by the National Arts Centre was one of a number of exceptional projects funded through the Canada Council for the Arts' New Chapter initiative. (Adapted from nac-cna.ca/en/wildwestshow.)

Medicine Shows traces Canadian Indigenous theater artists over the past thirty years, illuminating the connections, the artistic genealogy, and the development of a contemporary Indigenous theater practice. Neither a history nor a chronicle, Medicine Shows examines how theater has been used to make medicine: reconnecting individuals and communities, giving voice to the silenced and disappeared, staging ceremony and honoring ancestors.