Theatre Calgary has announced the lineup for its 2014 season which includes a world première by Calgary playwright David van Belle a collaboration with the Shaw Festival and a co-production of King Lear among others.
The company has also confirmed that Shakespeare in the Park will be back at Prince’s Island Park this summer — it was relocated following the June 2013 flood (pictured). A company of up-and-coming Alberta actors will present The Comedy of Errors in July and August 2013.
In September 2014 the new season starts with a Canadian première of the British comedy One Man Two Guvnors by Richard Bean which is based on The Servant of Two Masters by Carlo Goldini.
The second show in the lineup is van Belle’s Liberation Days which examines the Canadian and Dutch experience in the days after the Second World War. The play originated in early 2013 at Theatre Calgary’s Fuse: The Enbridge New Play Development Program.
And that brings us to the annual holiday presentation of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol with the essential Stephen Hair playing the role of Scrooge.
In January 2015 Theatre Calgary will present a co-production with Calgary’s One Yellow Rabbit as part of the annual High Performance Rodeo (details to be announced).
Later that month Theatre Calgary artistic director Dennis Garnhum will direct the Shaw Festival’s production of The Philadelphia Story by Philip Barry. The play will be presented in Niagara on the Lake this summer as part of the Shaw Festival before coming to Theatre Calgary.
Shakespeare fans can look forward to King Lear in March with Canadian actor Benedict Campbell in the title role. The play will be presented in collaboration with Vancouver’s Bard on the Beach Festival which will present the play in the summer of 2015.
The season will close with a play by another Calgarian. Singer-songwriter Ken Cameron’s Dear Johnny Deer is based on the songs and lyrics of Fred Eaglesmith with additional lyrics by David Archibald.