Introducing Tarragon Theatre’s 2022-23 Season
Tarragon Theatre has announced its first full season back since the pandemic. This will be the theatre’s first full season programmed by Artistic Director Mike Payette since former AD Richard Rose’s departure in 2020.
The lineup includes seven world premieres and features a blend of emerging and established artists. Payette has placed an emphasis on pieces which showcase “interdisciplinary, intercultural, and intergenerational exchange.”
“It has been a wild time for our theatre and the sector as we move to embracing this new moment in meaningful artistic and community engagement,” said Payette in a press release.
“It’s also a moment that offers great opportunity for growth and connection with our artists and audiences.”
The 2022-23 season will include both digital and in-person offerings.
You can find out more about Tarragon Theatre and their upcoming season at their website.
Cockroach (World Premiere)
by Ho Ka Kei (Jeff Ho)
Directed by Mike Payette
Choreographed by Hanna Kiel
September 13 – October 9, 2022
A cockroach smoking catnip. A bard lamenting over immortality. A boy stuck in a sticky situation. Three splinters caught in a collision of language, longing, and lobsters (who sometimes burst, and who sometimes burp).
From award-winning playwright Ho Ka Kei (Jeff Ho), Cockroach is a coming-of-age play about the stories we tell ourselves to comfort, to survive, to resist, to overcome, and to be.
My Sister’s Rage (World Premiere)
In association with Studio 180 Theatre and TO Live
Written and Directed by Yolanda Bonnell
October 11 – November 6, 2022
When their Matriarch ends up in a coma, a ma’iingan-wolf clan family gathers together to work through their collective grief and begin to heal from an incident in the past. While the Aunties camp out in the hospital room, the younger cousins spend their time at the Grandmother’s house by the backyard firepit; all while being circled by a cackling crow jokester.
As the veil between the ancestral plane and the earthly realm becomes thinner, tensions and emotions are high and vulnerabilities are exposed, revealing the true strength and resilience of the ma’iingan kwe.
Yolanda Bonnell’s My Sister’s Rage is a story about the nuances of holding trauma and joy at the same time and how laughter is medicine.
Post-Democracy (World Premiere)
by Hannah Moscovitch
Directed by Mumbi Tindyebwa Otu
November 8 – December 4, 2022
Welcome to the world of the 1%, the corporate elite, the “C-suite” – the “king-makers” whose influence flows through every aspect of our lives virtually unnoticed. When a CEO and his top executives are on a business trip for a major deal, a damaging sex scandal at the company is unearthed back home. As the pressure to complete the deal mounts, more secrets come to the surface, endangering the CEO’s company, his family, and his legacy. What happens to morality when human beings have limitless power?
Biting and unabashedly oozing with the condition of greed, Post-Democracy asks what is the price of silence envisioned through the remarkable lens of Director Mumbi Tindyebwa Otu.
Redbone Coonhound (World Premiere)
An Arts Club Silver Commission as part of a rolling world premiere with Tarragon Theatre (Toronto) and Imago Theatre (Montreal)
Written by Amy Lee Lavoie and Omari Newton
Directed by Micheline Chevrier with Kwaku Okyere
February 7 – March 5, 2023
Out for a walk in their West End neighbourhood, Mike and Marissa—an interracial couple—meet a dog with an unfortunate breed name: Redbone Coonhound. This small detail unleashes a cascading debate between them about race and their relationship that manifests as a series of micro-plays, each satirizing contemporary perspectives on modern culture. Through hard-hitting comedic elements, Redbone Coonhound explores the intricacies of subtle and overt polemics of race, systemic power and privilege in remarkable, surprising and hilarious ways.
Behind the Moon (World Premiere)
Written by Anosh Irani
Directed by Richard Rose
February 21 – March 19, 2023
In a Mughlai restaurant in Toronto, a late-night visit from a mysterious stranger rattles the cage and shatters the peace. Now Ayub must face reality, the family he’s left behind, and the dreams he’s abandoned, all while keeping the restaurant clean to a mirror shine.
From award-winning playwright and author Anosh Irani, Behind the Moon is an achingly beautiful story of love and loss, freedom and faith, the meaning of brotherhood, and how we begin a new life.
The Hooves Belonged to the Deer (World Premiere)
In association with Buddies in Bad Times Theatre
Written by Makram Ayache
Directed by Peter Hinton-Davis
April 4 – April 23, 2023
When Izzy’s family immigrates to a small rural town, the young queer Muslim boy becomes the salvation pet project to the local Pastor Isaac. In his attempt to reconcile his sexuality and faith, Izzy imagines a Garden of Eden, where Adam and Hawa’s (Eve in Arabic) relationship is turned upside down by the arrival of Steve, a beautiful, blue-eyed, white-skinned northerner.
An emotionally-charged and ritualistic journey of two universes colliding, The Hooves Belonged to the Deer offers an epic story of life, discovery and belonging where small town Canada meets the Garden of Eden.
Paint Me This House of Love (World Premiere)
Written by Chelsea Woolley
Directed by Mike Payette
April 11 – May 7, 2023
“Why shouldn’t a dream be just as much a truth? A fantasy be just as deep a reality?”
After twenty-five years estranged, Cecelia and her father, Jules, are attempting reconciliation.
Unable to communicate past shames and shortcomings, the pair become dependent on increasingly dramatic fairy tales to explain away their pain.
Paint Me this House of Love is a rhythmic, yearning, experimentation of language, exploring the threads that stitch together our shared family narratives, and asks how we communicate, “I Love You,” when the words alone are not enough.
Greenhouse Festival
A festival of creation at Tarragon Theatre
January 2 – January 15, 2023
seeding new work
inspiring growth, risk, and innovation
a new incubator for theatrical experience
Audiences will be invited to experience 45-minute works from resident artists presented in rep, alongside staged-readings, workshops, installations and site activations, music, and community connection.
Paprika Festival
May 2023
Originally established in 2001 with then Artistic Director Urjo Kareda, the Paprika Festival showcases work entirely created by young artists. Paprika returns to its roots at Tarragon Theatre in Spring 2023.
Aisling Murphy
Aisling is Intermission's senior editor and an award-winning arts journalist with bylines including the Toronto Star, Globe & Mail, CBC Arts, CTV News Toronto, and Maclean's. She likes British playwright Sarah Kane, most songs by Taylor Swift, and her cats, Fig and June. She was a 2024 fellow at the National Critics Institute in Waterford, CT.
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