MANIFESTO:
theatre is urgent. there is nothing casual about the theatre.
it both holds the mirror up to nature and takes you straight through the looking-glass.
wonderland is where our world can make even more non-sense.
theatre is poetry beyond words. the rules of grammar don’t apply. the syntax of interaction, image, and imagination are broken and twisted.
no clause is independent.
thinking does not preclude feeling. feeling does not preclude thinking. and there is no reason why we shouldn’t all be dancing.
the only bad reaction is boredom.
theatre is low art, is trash, is filth. theatre is at its best when it is most earnest about its desperation to please.
theatre is not a place of safety. nothing is certain. nothing ever goes exactly according to plan. the actor goes on against all odds.
in the theatre truth is misleading. art is a good lie, a facsimile. a lie is only untrue when it’s badly told.
HISTORY:
the red light district was founded in 2006 by ted witzel and catherine dunn when nobody else thought their planned production of titus andronicus! was worth funding. actors were found, a theatre was booked, and a set was pulled out of dumpsters, alleyways, and (ahem) borrowed from construction sites, while the new collective experimented and improvised their way through shakespeare’s gory farce, which was presented in 2007.
what was begun with little thought for longevity has turned into a long-term endeavour, and today, the red light district has produced six shows in toronto, and is planning its first full season.
over the years, witzel and dunn and their many collaborators have put their hands to classic texts, renowned and unknown alike. the follow-up to titus was 2008′s IVONA princess of burgundia, in which the sprawling violence of the former was focused and centralized around the inexplicably loathsome title character. characterized by a fluorescent baroque design, bad french accents, and ridiculous glittery dance, and staged at the gladstone hotel, IVONA was an in-depth and hilarious exploration of ostracism and hatred. 2009′s METHUSALEM or the eternal bourgeois followed, a third production on a shoe-string budget at the whippersnapper gallery, where dancing robots and sausage-wielding communists demonstrated the futility of ideological change and why one shouldn’t wear che t-shirts unless one has been to one of his concerts.
later in 2009, the red light district was joined by german director johanna schall, who staged a shrill, fast-paced, and critically acclaimed production of molière’s THE MISANTHROPE at the drake hotel. the production marked a turning point for the company, who were guided by schall’s expert hand to some of their best work yet. critics and audiences agreed, and THE MISANTHROPE was a huge success, playing to sold-out houses for most of its run. christopher hoile of eye weekly called the ensemble, “better than any cast of veteran actors i’ve seen” and in his end-of-year 2009 round-up jenny schall’s costumes were highlighted as a notable individual achievement.
in 2010, the red light district premiered two new pieces, WOYZECK at the lower ossington theatre, and the WITCH of edmonton in trinity bellwoods park—both pieces marked a change in development and direction for the red light district. WOYZECK was performed in a new translation created by witzel and schall, the first time the red light premiered a completely new text. the WITCH of edmonton furthered the red light ensemble’s exploration of their site-specific, athletic performance style.
both 2010 productions received a great deal of favourable attention. richard ouzounian called the WITCH of edmonton “incredibly inventive,” and both the production and witzel’s performance as the devil were listed in now magazine’s “best of summerworks” article. the company and many of its members have been featured in 2010 round-ups in the blogosphere. 2010 also represents the red light district’s first productions in toronto festivals; WOYZECK was presented as a staged reading in the canadian stage company’s festival of ideas and creation and the WITCH of edmonton was the company’s first year participating in the summerworks festival.
thematically, the red light district continues to examine many of the ideas it started out exploring—community, ostracism, mob mentality, and casual violence; how societies function and dysfunction, and what happens to those who fail to integrate themselves—and we do it with a characteristic blend of athletic, physical acting, improvisation, collective adaptation, and inventive, site-specific stagings.
but over the years, we have grown and matured. from our mostly reactionary beginnings, we have found a theatrical voice with which we are expressing our frustrations with our lives, our culture, and the world as we see it, a sincere anger with theatrical complacence, and our own experiences producing work in the face of often-adverse conditions. as young adults and artists, we are using what we have learned along the way to fuel a theatre that describes our understanding of how we fit into society, as creators of essentially useless work.
