An Open Letter to The Honourable Leo Glavine, Andy Fillmore and Geoff Regan, Mayor Mike Savage, Ms. Lisa Roberts, Mr. Lindell Smith, Mr. Marcel McKeough, Ms. Elizabeth Taylor, Mr. David Burton and Ms. Patricia Arab,
I am writing to express my support for the Bus Stop Theatre Co-op’s plan to purchase their property, and to expand their space to better serve the artists and audiences here in Halifax.
My name is Amanda Campbell, I was born and raised in Halifax and I’m a proud graduate of the Theatre Studies Program at Dalhousie University (06). The first show I remember seeing at Neptune was Les Miserables in 1994, I began taking classes at Neptune Theatre School in 1996, and I made my Atlantic Fringe debut as an actor/co-creator in 1998. From 2006-2009 I had one of the best jobs of my life teaching four, five and six year olds at Neptune Theatre School’s summer camps. Since I was eleven years old I have felt deeply rooted to the theatre community here in Halifax. I have a Masters Degree in Drama Studies from The University of Toronto (09), and for over a decade I’ve worked as a theatre critic, both here and in Toronto, but for the last three years I have been exclusively based in Halifax. I have seen the birth of numerous theatre companies, the complete reworking of the Fringe Festival, the flourishing of local actors, playwrights, directors, and other artists who have taken their work across the country and around the world. So much of what grows, flourishes and succeeds in Halifax, including many local companies and the Halifax Fringe, does so because of The Bus Stop Theatre.
When I was thinking about what I wanted to say to you in support of The Bus Stop, I remembered these stories I used to write when I was in Junior High, which were often set in rehearsal halls for Broadway shows in New York. In my imagination, Broadway theatres were sprawling complexes, not unlike Neptune (my only frame of reference), with multiple rehearsal halls where plays could be written, rehearsed, and then performed all in one building. This isn’t at all the way theatre is typically developed, but I didn’t know that because I had never experienced it. It struck me that, perhaps, one of the challenges that we are facing in articulating our need for the Bus Stop Theatre is that very few people outside our industry are familiar with the journey that a new play typically takes from its earliest inception to a stage at a theatre like Neptune.
If you’ve ever been to the Bus Stop Theatre on Gottingen Street you may have been struck by how disparate it is in design from Toronto’s Royal Alex or Neptune’s Fountain Hall. You would not be faulted for looking at it and thinking that what the theatre community needs is a performance space that is bigger, newer or fancier, but in fact the Bus Stop is really quite ideal for us just the way it is.
Not only that, but theatres very much like The Bus Stop exist in every city that creates new plays. Toronto has Theatre Passe Muraille, The Factory Theatre, The Tarragon Theatre, and The Theatre Centre, among others, and there are many of these smaller theatres in larger theatrical hubs like New York and London, and the reason they exist in all these cities is largely the same.
Firstly, the Bus Stop is actually a different kind of theatre than Neptune is. Neptune is called a Proscenium Theatre- where the audience and stage are fixed in one place that doesn’t vary from production to production. This means the artists are limited in the way the play can be staged and the audience sees each production in the same way. The Bus Stop is a Black Box Theatre, which is more experimental. Here, the audience and playing space are fluid, so the director is free to configure the room in whatever way she wants to best suit that specific play. You could go to see three different plays at The Bus Stop and the whole theatre could be arranged completely differently every time. Many of Halifax’s extraordinary theatre artists need their work to be created, developed and performed in a Black Box Theatre. Many shows developed at the Bus Stop that tour to other cities are then booked into other Black Box Theatres, and in these cases it’s often not the goal to ever move into a Proscenium space. This is why it’s SO important that Halifax have both Proscenium Theatre Spaces and Black Box Theatres, so that Haligonians can continue to create a wide array of professional, dynamic, imaginative and innovative works of theatre.
Secondly, the Bus Stop can also function as a necessary stepping stone in the development of new Nova Scotian plays. If you look at The Drowsy Chaperone as an example, this musical started in Toronto and eventually ended up on Broadway. It began at the Toronto Fringe Festival, and it was clear that the show had potential, but it needed considerable re-writes and changes in staging. Theatre artists benefit from having an audience throughout the creation process, which means that in order to be a city that fosters new work, the city needs to offer places beyond Fringe where audiences have the chance to see shows that are still being workshopped- shows that, frankly, aren’t finished products yet. In Drowsy’s case their next stop was Theatre Passe Muraille. For a Haligonian show, the natural next step in redevelopment from Fringe would be to The Bus Stop. After the production at Theatre Passe Muraille received favourable reviews and responses from audiences, The Drowsy Chaperone was developed further and, when it was ready, it eventually opened at Toronto’s Winter Garden Theatre, which set the wheels in motion for its eventual Broadway run in 2006. In Halifax, the natural progression would be for a show to continue to develop after a run at The Bus Stop and then, once it was ready, it could then move on to be part of Neptune Theatre’s Fountain Hall or Scotiabank Studio season. From there, it could travel to other regional theatres across the country and beyond. Without The Bus Stop Theatre Halifax is missing an essential step in this process and is effectively crippling its ability to foster and develop new work.
I’ve been a theatre critic for over ten years, I lived in Toronto for three years and reviewed hundreds of shows there, and I’ve written about shows that I’ve seen in New York. As mentioned above, my roots to the Halifax Theatre Community run deep. I have never been as excited about the theatre artists working in Halifax as I have been over the last three years. I think the success of 2b theatre’s play Old Stock: A Refugee Love Story (nominated for New York’s Drama Desk Awards, winner of the 2018 Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia Masterworks Arts Award, and winner of a bucket full of Robert Merritt (Nova Scotia Theatre) Awards), is indicative of the direction that Halifax theatre is headed. Old Stock began in The Waiting Room, a Black Box theatre space very similar to The Bus Stop, that, sadly, no longer exists. I see the pride that shows like Drowsy and Come From Away bring to politicians and to Canadians across the country, there is absolutely no reason why a play from Halifax couldn’t reach that level of success and notoriety- especially at a time like this where every theatre company, from the smallest and youngest, to Neptune Theatre under the Artistic Directorship of Jeremy Webb, is performing with a level of energy, enthusiasm, optimism, and artistic prowess that is impressive and extraordinary.
It feels like a Golden Age of theatre in Halifax is just at its very beginning, but the Bus Stop is integral for this to continue. Please help us protect the space we so desperately need, and invest in a future of Halifax that truly fosters the creation of new Haligonian theatre and allows this beautiful, resilient and incredibly talented theatre community to flourish and to thrive.
Thank you so much.
Yours sincerely,
Amanda Campbell
