For over 35 years, Micheline has had the good fortune of working across Canada as director, dramaturge, teacher and artistic director. She has directed at such theatres as the Shaw Festival, the National Arts Centre, the Citadel Theatre, Alberta Theatre Projects, the Globe Theatre, Prairie Theatre Exchange, Canadian Stage, Théâtre français de Toronto, Young People’s Theatre, Centaur Theatre, Geordie Productions, Imago Theatre, Theatre New Brunswick and for BeMe Theatre (Munich and Barcelona) among others. In addition, she has been, over those same years, Associate Artistic Director at Theatre New Brunswick, Associate Dramaturge at Playwrights Workshop Montreal, Associate Artist at Canadian Stage in Toronto and, from 1995 to 2000, the Artistic Director of the Great Canadian Theatre Company in Ottawa. Since 2013, Micheline has been the Artistic Director of Montreal’s Imago Theatre. She has also directed and taught at the National Theatre School, Concordia University, McGill University, York University, Dalhousie University and the University of Alberta. 

Sarah is the National Arts Centre’s Associate Artistic Director of English Theatre, where she focuses on The Collaborations and The Cycle(s), and is the Interim Facilitator, Indigenous Theatre. She is Artistic Director and co-creator of SpiderWebShow.ca and is co-director for Selfconscious Theatre. She co-founded the Baby Grand in Kingston, co-created Women Making Scenes in Montreal, and Die in Debt Theatre in Toronto. Sarah is a former Artistic Director of Buddies in Bad Times, and over a 25-year award-winning career has enjoyed extended stays at the National Theatre School of Canada, Magnetic North Theatre Festival and Factory Theatre. She is the recipient of the Elliot Hayes Award for excellence in dramaturgy, is on the 2016-17 Season Advisory Panel for York University’s Theatre Arts performance season, as well as the Advisory Committee for the Dan School of Drama and Music at Queen’s University, chairs the Patrick Conner Awards, and is newly appointed to the board of the Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas. Sarah most recently directed Hannah Moscovitch’s Bunny at the Stratford Festival. 

Gideon Arthurs is the CEO of the National Theatre School of Canada (NTS), the only institution in the country entirely devoted to providing professional training in all of the theatre crafts, in both official languages. NTS’s conservatory programs in Acting, Directing, Playwriting, Production and Set and Costume Design help young artists become leaders in the industry.

Before joining NTS, Gideon Arthurs served as General Manager of Tarragon Theatre in Toronto for close to three years, where he led several important projects including improvements of the theatre’s equipment and facilities, as well as a major audience engagement program. Before that, he was the Executive Director of the Toronto Fringe Festival during a period that saw the development of a second festival presented by the organization, significant growth of the flagship festival, and the creation of a subsidized rehearsal space for independent artists.

He is past President of the Small Theatre Administrative Facility (STAF), the former Vice-President of the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts (TAPA) and was a member of the Labour Relations Committee at the Professional Association of Canadian Theatres (PACT). Previously, he served as President of the Paprika Festival, Treasurer of Public Recordings Performance, and Secretary of Pleiades Theatre. He is the founding Artistic Producer of the independent theatre company Groundwater Productions, and has worked extensively as a teacher and consultant in the field. Most importantly, he is the father of two amazing children and the husband of a genius playwright. 

Philip Akin is the Artistic Director of Obsidian Theatre Company in Toronto. As a director, actor and producer, Philip has been involved in the arts for over 40 years. 

His recent directing credits include: Blyth Festival: Wilberforce Hotel by Sean Dixon (2015), Harold Green Jewish Theatre: Driving Miss Daisy by Alfred Uhry (2015), Ryerson Theatre School: Balm in Gilead by Lanford Wilson (2015), Shaw Festival: The Mountaintop by Katori Hall (2014), Obsidian Theatre with Factory Theatre: The Gravitational Pull of Bernice Trimble by Beth Graham (2013), Obsidian Theatre with Harold Green Jewish Theatre: The Whipping Man by Matthew Lopez (2013), Obsidian Theatre with Theatre Passe Muraille and 3D Atomic: Shakespeare’s Nigga by Joseph Jomo Pierre (2013).

His numerous awards and nominations include the William Melbourne Award for the Celebration of Toronto’s Cultural Life (2014), Life Membership Award from Canadian Actors Equity Association for outstanding contributions to the performing arts within our jurisdiction (2014),The Grid’s #2 2013 Theatre MVP, Merritt Award Nomination (Halifax) for Outstanding Direction (2012), Dora Nominations for Best Director in the General Theatre Division 2008, 2011 and 2012 (winning in 2012), The Toronto Sun Performing Artist of the Year (2011), Playwright’s Guild of Canada Women’s Caucus Bra d’Or Award for supporting and promoting the work of Canadian women playwrights (2011), Mallory Gilbert Leadership Award (2011), and the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts Silver Ticket Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Arts (2010).

He is also proud to be the Chair of the Humber Theatre program’s Advisory Committee and the Vice Chair of the Board for the Canadian Contemporary Dance Theatre.

Prior to her career as a director, Kim studied acting at the University of Victoria, physical theatre at Mime Unlimited in Toronto and in 1994 graduated from the 3 year acting program at Studio 58 in Vancouver. A year later she co-founded Electric Company Theatre whose work quickly became recognized nationally as a driving force behind the resurgence of activity in Vancouver’s independent theatre scene. Under the direction of Collier, the company has created a dozen original works through an intensive collaborative process including three landmark site-specific productions. Kim also has a growing presence on major stages and festivals across Canada with productions at Theatre Calgary, Festival TransAmerique, National Arts Centre, the Citadel Theatre and Canadian Stage. In 2011 her live-cinematic interpretation of No Exit is being presented by the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco. Kim is the recipient of multiple awards including three Jessie Richardson awards for directing, a Betty Mitchell for Best Production and in 2009 the Vancouver Mayor’s Arts Award. 

Inspired by the wish to create impressionistic theatrical experiences, Geneviève L. Blais founded the Théâtre à corps perdus in 2003, with a group of like-minded artists whom she met while at the National Theatre School of Canada. Through this company, she explores contemporary writing that evokes things for which we cannot find the words, things for which we have no words. Her approach leaves a central place for the writing of the body, in dialogue with the architecture of the space.

Drawn to work in significant urban sites, she is now engaged in a work-in-progress of short, site-specificplays, the first of which will be created in collaboration with the writer Naïma Phillips, and titled Rendezvous No. 1: daycare class. She has orchestrated happenings in unusual places, including an urban ambulatory piece inspired by first-hand accounts, entitled Perdu/Trouvé (Festival l’Écho d’un fleuve, 2009) and two short sight-specific pieces: Chevreuil by Catherine Léger(Festival L’Écho d’un fleuve, 2010) and Portrait of a Dreamed Life by Dominick Parenteau-Lebeuf (Festival d’Innovationthéâtrale de l’Assomption, 2005).She is currently preparing the French-language premiere of Erin Shields’ disturbing contemporary tragedy, If We Were Birds, for the fall of 2015 at Théâtre Prospéro.

Last April, she was invited to Morocco to represent Québec in a kind of hothouse for artists, organised by la Commission internationale de théâtre de la francophone, which focused on writing for public spaces. There, she presented the sketch for a performance in the form of a walkabout through the streets of Marrakech, developed in collaboration with a trio of artists from Belgium, Cameroon and Canada. 

Ann-Marie Kerr is an award-winning theatre artist. Her work has been presented at prestigious theatres and festivals in New York, London, Mumbai, Edinburgh, Sydney, Melbourne, Memphis, Nashville, Cork, and across Canada. Select directing: One Discordant Violin (2b Theatre Co., Théâtre La Licorne (french version), 59E59 St. Theatre, Chester Playhouse, Bus Stop Theatre), #IAmTheCheese (Halifax Theatre for Young People, Eastern Front Theatre), Frequencies (Heist), Concord Floral (Dalhousie University), Secret Life of A Mother (Theatre Centre, Crow’s Theatre), One Discordant Violin (2b Theatre Co., 59E59 St. Theatre), Bed & Breakfast (Soulpepper Theatre), A Christmas Carol (Theatre New Brunswick), Daughter (Theatre Centre, SummerWorks Festival, PuSh Festival, Battersea Arts Festival, Edinburgh Festival), Snake in the Grass (Neptune Theatre), I, Claudia (Globe Theatre, Neptune Theatre), Stranger to Hard Work (Eastern Front Theatre), The Circle (Alberta Theatre Projects), The Debacle (Zuppa Theatre), Invisible Atom (2b Theatre). A graduate of École internationale de théâtre Jacques Lecoq and York University, Ann-Marie is also the former Artistic Associate of Magnetic North Theatre Festival.