Preview: Everyday Anthems at World Stage

Opening tomorrow evening down at the Harbourfront Centre is another World Stage piece that sounds and looks absolutely delicious. Look for buoyancy and grace abound c/o choreographer Heidi Strauss. For more info please read the description below and for tickets please CLICK HERE!

Show Description:

Choreographed by rising star Heidi Strauss, along with text from playwright Brendan Gall, this new dance work explores anthems as a metaphor for overcoming obstacles, for things unrequited, for personal strength and belonging. An impassioned performance that poses questions around power, pride and unity in the face of difference.

Strauss’s first creation for Toronto Dance Theatre draws on the embodied histories of her performers to create a richly physical ensemble work.

Suggested age: all ages.

WORLD PREMIERE
Everyday Anthems
Toronto Dance Theatre (Canada)
March 6-9

Fleck Dance Theatre

Harbourfront Centre

Preview: Dachshund UN

Dachshund UN, the live performance installation from Australian artist Bennett Miller, will be taking over the Enwave Theatre Feb. 28 – March 3, 2013. Seeman’s best friend hold a mirror up to the global community, offering a spirited critique of one of its most ambitious social institutions, the United Nations.

Dachshund UN is one of eleven groundbreaking international contemporary performance works in the World Stage 2013 season. This performance installation, which is proudly sponsored by PawsWay restages the UN Commission on Human Rights with the help of a life-sized model of the UN office in Geneva. Featuring dozens of specially recruited dachshunds from over 24 cities across Ontario, Quebec and New York, the show will demonstrate how world leaders play ball when stakes are high.

World Stage Artistic Director Tina Rasmussen comments: "It's a rare thing, a total cast of over 100 humans and 100 animals. This is work that redefines and repositions live action, inside of the theatre, but outside of its purview. The North American premiere of Dachshund UN is truly a maverick production where spectacle and ontology will collide. I'm excited and I might even adopt a Dachshund in the process."

Unique among breeds for their racial diversity, dachshund ambassadors underscore the trials and achievements of the international community by striving for unity and justice in a dog-eat-dog world. During the hour-long performance, opinions will be shared, fetching ideas communicated and strategic plans unleashed in a summit of delightful chaos and pert insight.


Dates / Times / Location

Duration: 50 minutes

Enwave Theatre – 231 Queens Quay West located between Queens Quay Terminal and York Quay Centre, adjacent to The Power Plant

Thu, Feb. 28 at 7 p.m.
Fri, March 1 at 7 p.m.
Sat, March 2 at 2 p.m.
Sun, March 3 at 2 p.m.

Admission is free on a first-come first-served basis.

Urgent: Production Cancelled!

Harbourfront Centre is disappointed to announce the cancellation of the much anticipated World Stage 2013 season opener Othello, c’est qui, scheduled to run Feb. 6-9.

After exhausting all avenues of appeal, lead actor Franck Edmond Yao remains grounded in Abidjan, Ivory Coast as his travel documents were not expedited in time for the production’s opening.

World Stage Artistic Director Tina Rasmussen comments: “This is especially heartbreaking for me because this work was uniquely situated in Black History month along with other Othello works in the city. The themes and ideas around Othello, c’est qui were urgent and timely. My team and I are doing all that we can to ensure that this performance is eventually restaged in Toronto.”

For over 27 years, Harbourfront Centre’s World Stage has welcomed artists, companies, and productions from over 40 countries around the world.  With its rich history of importing international contemporary performance, this unfortunate event is a rare occurrence and Harbourfront Centre extends its deepest apologies to patrons.

All ticket purchasers are advised to call the box office.


Phone: 416-973-4000, press 1
Fax: 416-954-0366
Email: tickets@harbourfrontcentre.com

Preview: Othello, c'est qui?

Harbourfront Centre’s World Stage season begins by shaking up Shakespeare with the North American premiere of Othello, c’est qui (Othello, who’s that) by German production company Gintersdorferand/Klaßen, Feb. 6-9, 2013.

Performed by Franck Edmond Yao (Ivory Coast) and Cornelia Dörr (Germany) in both English and French, the actors parody one of The Bard’s most controversial plays.  Together they pull apart themes of colonialism, migration, religion and politics in an urgent, seemingly improvised way.  Sharp, provocative and sensual, Othello, c’est qui? premieres during Black History Month at Harbourfront Centre’s Enwave Theatre.


Tickets: World Stage tickets are on sale now!  Regular ticket packages (three or more productions) offer discounts and exclusive partner offers, discounted parking and more and Single tickets are available anytime via our box office by calling 416-973-4000, Tuesday to Saturday, 1-6pm, or online here.

Opening Night Reception
Feb. 6 | FREE
Enwave Theatre
We invite you to join the World Stage team for nibblies, drinks and discussion at our opening night reception. Admission is free with the purchase of your ticket.

Talkshow
Feb. 7 | FREE
Have your voice heard! Engage with the artists and performers involved with the work. Please stay around after the performance for an informative and engaging talkshow. Admission is free with the purchase of your ticket.

Dates / Times / Location
Duration: 70 minutes
Enwave Theatre – located between Queen's Quay Terminal and York Quay Centre, adjacent to The Power Plant
Wed, February 6 at 8pm
Thu, February 7 at 8pm
Fri, February 8 at 8pm
Sat, February 9 at 8pm

Preview: Grupo Corpo, Brazilian Dance on at World Stage

Harbourfront Centre’s World Stage presents Sem Mim & Ímã, from world-renowned Brazilian dance company, Grupo Corpo.  Together, they combine classical ballet technique with a contemporary rereading of Brazilian and world dance forms resulting in performances that are virtuosic, athletic, breathtaking and simply spectacular.


In Sem Mim, meaning “without me”, “tattooed” dancers merge the rhythm of the sea with the music of medieval Portuguese-Galician chants.  The original score composed by Carlos Núñez, of Vigo, and José Miguel Wisnik, of Brazil, is based on the celebrated “sea of Vigo song cycle”.  The movement mimics the ebb and flow of waves in constant flux of advances and retreats.  The set represents different landscapes and elements from the sea to the mountains.

The second work, Ímã, meaning “magnet,” takes inspiration from the law of magnetism where dancers passionately come together and separate through solos, duos and smaller groups forming in a game of union and dispersion.  Using seven-color LEDs, Paulo Pederneiras creates an explosion of color that is violent, radical, and exuberant.  The soundtrack composed by Brazilian band + 2, combines influences from bossa nova, ‘70s afro-music and contemporary Japanese music.

Tickets: World Stage tickets are on sale now! Regular ticket packages (three or more productions) offer discounts and exclusive partner offers, discounted parking and more and single tickets are available anytime via our box office by calling 416-973-4000, Tuesday to Saturday, 1-6pm, or online here.


Dates / Times / Location
Duration: 70 minutes
Fleck Dance Theatre - 3rd Floor, Queen's Quay Terminal, 207 Queens Quay West
Tue, February 19 at 8pm
Wed, February 20 at 8pm
Thu, February 21 at 8pm
Fri, February 22 at 8pm
Sat, February 23 at 8pm

World Stage is coming...

The 2013 season of Harbourfront Centre’s signature contemporary performance series, World Stage, is around the corner and the line up has already garnered critical acclaim.  The Toronto Star says it’s "...theatre that will challenge, astonish, and stimulate”.  From February 6 until May 24, the world’s performance leaders are in town for four to five show engagements, so take advantage of this chance to see select works from provocative and cutting-edge international and Canadian contemporary artists.

Tina Rasmussen, World Stage Artistic Director notes "I am proud of continuing the legacy of World Stage for Toronto audiences by programming another inquiring season of leading performance from Canada and around the world. I believe in certain tenants in programming work that asks the audience to evaluate their role as witness, as citizen, and as human. In the contemporary performance programmed in World Stage 2013 we can offer a renewal of  perception and seek new understandings, propose a new hierarchy, introduce chaos and even have a bit of fun."

This season welcomes productions and artists from Canada, Germany, Côte d’Ivoire, Brazil, Australia, China, Norway, Belgium, Portugal and the Netherlands, making it one of the most diverse seasons in its 27 year history.  The work proposes to redefine the act of witnessing, as it chronicles a day in the life in Auschwitz in KAMP (CAMP) and throws us to the dogs in Dachshund UN.

Shakespeare is turned on his head in a triptych of works that make the Bard relevant, immediate and moving with Toronto’s own LEAR, and two German works, She She Pop & Their Fathers: Testament and Othello c’est qui (Othello, who’s that).

Dance is always featured prominently in the series with last years presentation of Wayne McGregor | Random Dance ENTITY making it to number one in NOW Magazine’s Top 5 Dance Shows of 2012. This begs the question, which of the six knockout dance shows featured this season will top the lists in 2013!?  Get ready to rally around Norway’s A Dance Tribute to the Art of Football, witness the physical demands of friendship with Still Standing You, feel the power of contemporary expression from superpower China with TAO Dance Theater, and warmly welcome the return of Brazil’s dance heavyweights Grupo Corpo.

As a pioneering culture port, World Stage’s commitment to developing Toronto artists continues with bold new work from Ame Henderson/Public Recordings in what we are saying, and Heidi Strauss/Toronto Dance Theatre with Everyday Anthems.

World Stage tickets are on sale now! Save up to 50% with a World Stage Flex Pass, when you purchase four tickets to any World Stage shows for only $110 or eight tickets for $180, only until January 23, 2013. Regular ticket packages (three or more productions) offer discounts and exclusive partner offers, discounted parking and more. The CultureBreak programme, designed for 13-25 year-old arts and culture cravers and/or students of all ages offers $15 tickets to any show, any time.  Seniors, groups of 10 or more, arts workers and NextSteps ticket buyers save 20%. Single tickets available anytime via our box office by calling 416-973-4000, Tuesday to Saturday, 1-6pm, or online here.  Click here for information for the entire World Stage season.