Live-In Basics




For Live-In 2013 click here! DaPoPo Theatre welcomes you to share in a celebration of living theatre! 

The Live-In is a month-long festival of performances, play readings, skill-share workshops and special events, aimed at bringing artists and community members together. Each day in October, we’ll come together to discover, experience and create theatre together.

This year, we’re “Telling (Our) Stories” and asking: How do we find stories, how do we shape them, and how do we share them? 

Check out our exciting line-up of events by clicking on the following:
Go to Performances 
Go to Workshops


Whether you are theatre loving, supporting, curious or making, your presence will help create the story of this year’s Live-In!


Click on the image below to check out the calendar, and plan your Live-In story!





REGISTRATION AND RESERVATIONS
The Living Room is an intimate space, perfect for bringing artists and community members together; reservation or registration is strongly recommended as noted.


For inquiries, or to reserve workshop or performance seats, please email dapopolivein@gmail.com

WHAT'S IT COST?  
DaPoPo is committed to making theatre accessible to all community members.  Therefore, most events are by donation and no one will be turned away.  However, we value our artists and their art, so we would like to fairly compensate them for their time and expertise. We suggest a minimum donation of $10 per event / workshop session from those who are able (cash only please).  Tax receipts may be available for donations of $10 or more.

Save time and money by booking a Festival Pass!  For $75, you get a punch card good for 10 events*.  (limited number available. Not valid for "Two Hours in a Madhouse" performances).


For more information about DaPoPo Theatre, click here.

Thank you to our many supporters and friends, visit them here.  

Thank Yous


The Live-In is supported by: 










Our sponsors include: 




and 

The European Pantry   



Chronological Events List


September 30, 7:00 pm
Performance: Prologue: Opening Night Cabaret
Come enjoy a cabaret of performances, personal anecdotes and readings that foreshadow the Live-In 2012 story. A taste of the Live-In, with workshop facilitators, special guests, playwrights and actors plus refreshments and socializing.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 1, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: The Best Brothers by Daniel MacIvor, read by Daniel MacIvor and John Beale
Ardith “Bunny” Best has just died in an accident, leaving her sons Hamilton and Kyle to mourn in their very different ways. As each struggles to understand the other, the brothers begin to see more deeply into themselves and the unconventional woman who gave them birth.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 2, 6:00 - 9:30 pm
Workshop: Physical Theatre - Grotowski Inspired
Facilitator: Gina Thornhill
Using rigorous physical training, this workshop will introduce you to a creation process based on Jerzy Grotowski's Theatre Laboratory work. The idea of the actor as the creator instead of the director as well as the connection of body and imagination are the concepts we will explore during this Training session. Come prepared to run and sweat.
(Min 4 / Max 12 participants).
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 3, 8:00 pm

Performance: Flight School
presented by Steph Berntson and YOU (yes, you...if you want)

Flight School is, at once, a creative approach to performance theorising and a critical approach to creativity – both a show and a show-and-tell.  After witnessing examples of ways to learn and teach, we will write in a series of short, timed bursts. Then, we read. In vivo and all together, we augment, extend, and revel in those stories and lessons you've been harbouring.  You need only share material if you feel so inclined -- or so inspired -- but let's see what magic intersects. We'll learn to fly by leaping.
**Attendees are asked to bring a picture of themselves in elementary school, a favourite song or nursery rhyme, and/or a personal credo or motto.** Admission: Suggested donation of $10. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 5 & 6 @ 8:00 pm, October 7 @ 2:00 pm
Performance: Two Hours in a Madhouse: An Evening with the Notorious Nellie Bly
Written and directed by Gary L. Blackwood, co-presented with Writers' Federation of Nova Scotia
The story of the pioneering reporter and feminist, told mostly in her own words.  Bly was an extraordinary woman who earned international recognition for her gritty exposes and daring escapades—especially her record-breaking solo journey around the globe.
Tickets: $20 regular / $15 artists / $10 students. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 6, 13, 20 & 27, 10 am - 1 pm 
Workshop: The Song Is You
Facilitator: Garry Williams
In a series of four sessions held over brunch each week, participants will write the songs they want to write. Working, playing, collaborating and sharing ideas, we will explore how songs function, and develop original songs to be performed at the end the Live-In. Based on interest, we'll have tutorials on metre, rhyme, chord finding, structural elements and analysis. Participants should bring a keyboard + stand or a guitar, if possible. (Max 12 participants). 
Admission: $10 suggested donation per session. Reservations strongly recommended. Participants are expected to attend all four sessions. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 6, 2:00 - 5:00 pm
Workshop: Laban Laboratory
Facilitator: Eric Benson
We will create a laboratory, of sorts, in which we will experiment with movements created by Rudolph Laban as they relate to character, and investigate how posture, body position, and internal movement can be used as a key for character and text. (Max 10 participants).
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 7, 9:30 am - 12:30 pm
Workshop: Kids' Creation Lab
Facilitators: Zach Faye & Kim Parkhill
Calling kids aged 5 - 9 for a few hours of adventuring in theatre! We'll be experimenting with theatrical storytelling in a playful way. You'll make sound and music, move your bodies and use your imagination!  Parents are invited for the last part of the session to see what you’ve been creating! (Min 4, Max 14 participants).
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 7, 5:00 pm
Special Event: Thanksgiving Potluck
Bring food and stories to share as we gather around a big table to be grateful for friends, food and art.

October 8, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: Kayak by Jordan Hall (Vancouver, BC)
Alone on a vast stretch of water, Annie Iversen recounts the strange chain of events that left her stranded in her son’s old kayak. A doting mother, Annie is blindsided when her son, Peter, falls in love with Julie, a passionate environmental activist, and finds herself struggling to keep Peter safe from the young woman’s dangerous world.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 9, 7:00 pm
Workshop: Blowhard! From Suck to Suck-cess: How to Tell a Story the Blowhard Way
Blowhard is an occasional night of story-telling and performance based on a theme, curated by Andrea Dorfman, Tara Doyle, Stephanie Domet and Jackie Torrens. Suck to Suck-cess is our story-telling workshop! With storytelling instruction and advice including How To Know If You Have A Story, How To Structure That Sucker and How To Get Up In Front Of A Group Of People And Tell It!
Admission: $5. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 10, 6:00 - 10:00 pm and October 14, 1:00 - 5:00 pm
Workshop: Stories Out of Stuff - An Introduction to Found-object Puppetry
Facilitator: Chris Little
Create fun, inventive theatre about things that are important to you. Found-Object Puppetry (FOP) is the art of manipulating everyday objects as characters in a play.  The story advances when the audience recognizes what each new object is as well as what it represents in the story. This ‘joy of recognition’ allows us to tell stories that explore values, culture, and topical issues. During this two-session workshop, participants will create their own short FOP shows that they will perform for multiple small audiences during a Found-object Cabaret to follow the final workshop. Participants are asked to bring three objects that they can throw in the pile for all to draw from. (Min 6/ Max 12 participants)
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 11, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: Shannon/Joanna by Andrea Dymond (Halifax, NS)
Raven and her best friend Shannon have always been inseparable… until something threatens their friendship.  Glenda thinks she knows what’s best for her daughter, Joanna.  The only problem is… Joanna doesn’t agree.  Shannon/Joanna explores the journey of two women whose lives intersect as each learns how to cope with the sudden death of a loved one.

October 13, 6:00 pm - Midnight
Performance: The Living Museum
An installation specially created by DaPoPo for Nocturne. Characters from theatre history will inhabit a cordoned-off exhibit to live out fourteen minutes of their daily life within the context of the emotional richness of their own timeless stories.  Visitors can simple observe, or act, potentially affecting the character's storyline.
Admission: Free. No reservations required

October 14, 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Performance: Found-Object Puppetry
A presentation of works-in-progress created during the Found Object Puppetry workshop. Come enjoy some table-top theatre! Admission by donation.

October 14, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: Madokht: Daughter of the Moon by Aisha Sommer Zaman (Halifax, NS)
This work, by one of DaPoPo's Acting Out! participants ("a fresh and formidable voice on the Halifax theatre scene” -The Coast: July 22, 2012), is about the tribulations a young woman living in Iran faces when she unintentionally outs herself to her strict father. She must confront her fears and decide whether or not breaking the sacred bond of a father and his daughter is worth the chance at a life with her soul-mate.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 15, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: All About Nothing by David Rimmington (Halifax, NS)
A physics professor at a university has made a profound discovery.  He has proved, through a brilliant mathematical calculation that the universe does not exist.  There follow many dramatic and comic twists as people are forced to re-evaluate their beliefs about the meaning of existence.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 16, 6:00 pm - 10:30 pm
Workshop: Let Me Sing You A Story: how to perform character-driven story songs from musical theatre and opera
Facilitator: Nina Scott-Stoddart
For singing actors of all levels and ages, this workshop combines a performing masterclass with discussion and questions. Discover how to make your sung story telling more vivid and focused through practical techniques that explore the intersection of singing and acting. Whether you're a singer who wants to act or an actor who wants to sing, get tons of suggestions for story song repertoire and build your skills in this fun and supportive workshop! Singers must bring a prepared story song (Max 9 singers plus 10 auditor spots)
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 17, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: Woyzcek by Georg Büchner, English translation by Eric Benson
An impoverished German soldier whose mental instability is pushed to a breaking point by the people around him, kills his common-law wife in a fit of jealousy and madness. Buchner’s 1837 script, unfinished at his death, is being interpreted and adapted for production by DaPoPo as a play with puppets. This early public reading will serve to introduce the text and help dramaturgically with the adaptation.

October 19, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: Galicia by Guillermo Verdecchia (Toronto, ON), read by the playwright  
A man falls down: A stand up lecture. Galicia is a work-in-progress about globalization and subjectivity, about eating one's way into the world, and the Centre for avant-garde geography.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 20, 8:00 pm
Performance: The Drinking Game
The return of DaPoPo's theatrical experiment. Part intimate dialogue, part interactive performance event, the Drinking Game is about asking questions and forging authentic human relationships. It combines elements of mediated conversation with technical interventions, as well as spontaneous dramatic and musical performances. As the actors ask each other difficult questions about their lives, work and everything in between, the audience is invited to participate, and join the party!
Tickets: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 20-21, 2:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Workshop: Embracing Your Inner Stereotype and Saying the Wrong Thing
Facilitator: Guillermo Verdecchia
An invitation for actors and writers (and actor-writers and other hybrid performance creatures) to take on micro-managed discourse, media, corporate, and political distortions of all kinds by speaking uncomfortable truth. Working physically and creating text, participants will explore their Fool / Jester / Goof. Not for the overly polite or hyper-sensitive. Bring your anger, your irony, your wits, your sense of humour (Two cumulative sessions. Max 12 participants).
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 21, 8:00 pm
PANEL DISCUSSION: Whose Story Is It Anyway?
Considering that theatre is a mode of representing identities other than our own, how do the choices we make in terms of what we create and present say about our culture? What responsibility do we have to embody others when creating theatre? A discussion with Guillermo Verdecchia, Mary-Colin Chisholm, Ken Schwartz, Lee-Anne Poole and others (tba), moderated by Clare Waque.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com for more info.

October 22, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: Black Dragon Mountain by Roy Ellis (Halifax, NS)
Funny, racy, poetic and brash, a tragicomic road story about a young Chinese scholar whose search for physical perfection lands him in the court of a brutal Chinese Emperor. He soon discovers that in the Forbidden City of Peking, the games of conquest that men play are more severe. As betrayal, lust, power and threat of war begin to exert their influence on events, Shentong must answer the age old questions that all of us ask: who am I, why am I here, what should I do and how should I be in the world.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com








October 23, 6:30 pm - 10:30 pm
Workshop: Of Projecting - Creating and Exploring the Digital Image on Stage
Facilitator: Nick Bottomley

Representation of images, textures and symbols through manipulation of light is an essential component of theatre and the digital projector is becoming an essential tool in the arsenal of the creator. We will creatively and collaboratively explore the essential elements, possibilities, and restraints of working with projection on stage. All levels of familiarity with projections welcome -- computer savvy or shy -- we'll be playing with tools everyone can use.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 25 - 27, 8:00 pm
Performance: MAKING IT by DaPoPo Theatre
Art. Love. Success. And everything that gets in the way. DaPoPo's latest ensemble creation tells our story – the story of working artists in Halifax. Using interviews, dialogue, monologue and song, artists share their struggles, their triumphs and their failures, as they dare to live and make art on the Nova Scotian peninsula. Work-in-progress presentation with Kristi Anderson, Andrew Chandler, Ann Doyle, Zach Faye, Kim Parkhill and Garry Williams.
Tickets: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 27, 2:00 - 5:00 pm
Workshop: Upstream Music’s Noisy Narratives Workshop
Facilitators: Arthur Bull and Paul Cram
Noisy Narratives playfully explores the arranging of improvisational sound textures with storytelling to create multi-layered sonic events . Your short stories are welcome as are sound sources with wide textural possibilities eg: guitar - plucked /strummed/ scraped, or two rocks. We will conclude with a recital featuring the participants. Max 10 participants
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 28, 1:00 - 5:00 pm
Special Event: The "It's All Fun and Games" Challenge
The gloves are coming off, the flip flops are going on. Run, skip, leap, trip, twist, laugh and jive at DaPoPo's finest games challenge (and we are not talking board games here, son). If "unhealthily competitive" SHOULD be on your resume, do not miss this!
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com for more info.

October 28, 8:00 pm
Performance: Notes and Stories: Paul Cram/Arthur Bull Duo in Performance
co-presented with Upstream Music Association
Unexpected and inventive perspectives derived from a mix of storytelling, long-form melodic architecture and textural accompaniment. Upstream Music Association presents entertaining concerts of international artists featuring free improvisation, original compositions, and intensive performances.
Tickets: $10. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com



October 29, 7:30pm
Play Reading: The Tragedy of the Manic Pixie Dreamgirl by Kristin Slaney (Halifax, NS)
What happens when art imitates life... and vice versa. Daniel is dealing with a case of writer’s block, a deteriorating relationship, and an unruly muse in fairy wings who bears more than a little resemblance to his current partner. When he begins to write a play about love, the lines between fiction and reality begin to blur, until the idealism he utilizes when writing female characters starts to reveal itself in his real life.
In a double bill with...
Abettor by Malcolm Murray (Stratford, PEI)
A play about murder and corpse disposal – explores the ease in which normal people can so quickly fall from grace by mere inertia. A bit comedic, but a bit creepy, too.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 30, 7:30 pm
Performance: Showcase: The Live-In 2012 Story
co-presented with Local Tasting Tours
Featuring work-in-progress presentations of pieces created during Live-In workshops over the month, including the first public performances of songs from "The Song Is You" songwriting group. The evening will be interwoven with storytelling and tasty treats provided by Emily Forrest of Local Tasting Tours.
Tickets: $10 suggested donation. (Reserve early to guarantee you have a spoon for the tastings!) Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 31, 7:30 pm
Play Reading: Shadows on Oak Island by Garnet Hirst with Deborah Preeper
Shadows on Oak Island is a gripping, psychological thriller exploring the themes of guilt, love, betrayal and obsession.
Admission: $10 suggested donation. Reservations strongly recommended. Contact: dapopolivein@gmail.com

October 31, 9:30 pm
Special Event: Epilogue: Closing Night Party
Immediately following the reading of "Shadows on Oak Island" we'll close off the month with a last hurrah party, giving the Live-In story a very happy ending.  Costumes optional, good times guaranteed.  




Guillermo Verdecchia: Live at the Live-In


Guillermo Verdecchia

DaPoPo is thrilled to host writer, director and actor Guillermo Verdecchia at the Live-In, October 19-21nd for a play reading, a workshop and a panel discussion.

Guillermo Verdecchia is a writer of drama and fiction as well as a director and actor. He is the recipient of a Governor-General's Award for Drama for his play Fronteras Americanas and a four-time winner of the Chalmers Canadian Play Award. His work, which includes the Governor-General shortlisted Noam Chomsky Lectures (with Daniel Brooks), the Seattle Times' Footlight Award-winning Adventures of Ali & Ali (with Marcus Youssef and Camyar Chai), A Line in the Sand (with Marcus Youssef), bloom, and Another Country has been anthologized, translated into Spanish and Italian, produced in Europe and the US, and is studied in Latin America, Europe and North America. As a director and actor he has worked at theatres across the country, from the Stratford Festival, where he directed Sunil Kuruvilla's Rice Boy to Vancouver's East Cultural Centre.

An Associate Artist with Toronto's Soulpepper Theatre, Guillermo is also a theatre scholar, currently completing a PhD at the University of Toronto. He has published a number of articles and book chapters on aspects of intercultural theatre practice in Canada, and is a recipient of a Governor-General's Gold Medal for Academic Achievement.

Guillermo Verdecchia's reading and visit are made possible by support from the Playwrights Guild of Canada and the Canada Council for the Arts.
For more information on these events, follow the links below:


October 19, 7:30 pm
PLAY READING: 
Galicia by Guillermo Verdecchia, read by the playwright  



October 20-21, 2:00 pm - 5:30 pm
WORKSHOP:
Embracing Your Inner Stereotype and Saying the Wrong Thing
Max. 12 participants.
Note: this is a two-session workshop, reservations required



October 21, 8:00 pm
PANEL DISCUSSION: 
Whose Story Is It Anyway?