Ensemble Theatre Company’s Summer Play Reading Festival brings monstrous stories to the Jericho Arts Centre, August 21 to 24

Titles include Jeff Ho’s antigone: 方, Hannah Moscovitch’s Little One, and Francis Dowlatabadi’s My Roommate Ahriman

Hannah Moscovitch. Photo by Alejandro Santiago

Ensemble Theatre Company presents MONSTROSITY: Summer Play Reading Festival at the Jericho Arts Centre from August 21 to 24

THREE NEW CANADIAN PLAYS that address family, identity, and all things monstrous will debut as readings at the Jericho Arts Centre this month.

Ensemble Theatre Company will present Jeff Ho’s antigone: 方, Hannah Moscovitch’s Little One, and Francis Dowlatabadi’s My Roommate Ahriman as part of MONSTROSITY: Summer Play Reading Festival, an annual event that both fosters emerging talent and uplifts established artists.

Little One will be onstage August 22 at 7:30 pm and August 24 at 2 pm. Directed by Keltie Forsyth, Moscovitch’s haunting new tragedy revolves around adopted siblings Aaron and Claire—one of whom is the definition of normal, while the other is deeply disturbed—as they interact with the people around them, including a man and his mail-order bride.

Moscovitch is an award-winning playwright known for her feminist stories. When Stir reviewed her sex-positive play Bunny (a Search Party production presented by the Anvil Theatre) last year, we called it a “compelling depiction of one woman’s innermost desire, loneliness, and self-denial,” noting that “the complex protagonist’s distinct allure grows more captivating and human as the play goes on.”

Readings of antigone: 方, directed by Kenneth Tynan, will take place on August 21 and 23 at 7:30 pm. Adapted from the classic Greek tragedy of the same name, the play tells the story of two brothers facing re-education, drawing on both Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement protests and the Tiananmen Square uprising. Playwright Ho is originally from Hong Kong and currently lives in Toronto.

Dowlatabadi’s My Roommate Ahriman, meanwhile, is about a young Iranian-Canadian man who is cohabitating with an ancient Persian spirit of chaos; while navigating that dynamic, he must come to terms with his sexuality. A reading supported by dramaturg Lois Anderson will happen on August 23 at 2 pm.

Tickets to each reading are available on a pay-what-you-can basis.

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Emily Lyth

Stir editorial assistant Emily Lyth is a Vancouver-based writer and editor who graduated from Langara College’s Journalism program. Her decade of dance training and passion for all things food-related are the foundation of her love for telling arts, culture, and community stories.

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