Jul 30, 2024
Gabrielle Martin chats with David Hudgins and Kevin Kerr, co-founders of Vancouver’s Electric Company Theatre.
Show Notes
Gabrielle, David and Kevin discuss:
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The beginnings of Electric Company Theatre and its early collective model
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Why the fledgling theatre company had to “bite the bull by the horns”
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The function of interchangeable roles in the creative process
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The impetus behind early ECT shows at the PuSh Festival, such as Studies in Motion and Palace Grand
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The rich physical-visual landscape that plays a role from inception of piece, and in dialogue with the text
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How development of a company and its work corresponds to the process of aging
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What’s it like when opening night is the same as your baby’s due date?
About David Hudgins
David Hudgins is a founder of the internationally acclaimed Electric Company Theatre in Vancouver. After more than two decades with this innovative company he has won numerous Jessie Awards. David received his BA Honours in English Literature at McGill University, a diploma in Acting from Studio 58 and a PDP Diploma in Education from Simon Fraser University. He teaches acting at Studio 58 and has directed nine shows there, including two Ovation-Award winning productions: Guys & Dolls (2007) and Spring Awakening (2012). The homegrown musical The Park (2010) which he directed and helped to dramaturge, garnered it five nominations. His 5-year orchestral/physical-theatre hybrid experiment odyssey called Flee, with composer Peggy Lee, found its legs at the Fox Cabaret with Electric Company and Studio 58 in 2016. He has written song lyrics for a variety of Hollywood movies. David is also a father, musician and sailor.
About Kevin Kerr
Kevin Kerr is a playwright and founding member of Vancouver’s Electric Company Theatre with whom he’s collaborated on the creation of more than a dozen full-length productions, including Brilliant!, Studies in Motion and Tear the Curtain!
He received the 2002 Governor General’s Literary Award for his play Unity (1918), which has been produced more than 100 times across Canada and around the world. Other plays include Skydive, Spine (both for Realwheels Theatre), The Remittance Man (Sunshine Theatre), Secret World of Og (Carousel Theatre for Young People), and The Night’s Mare (Caravan Farm Theatre). He also co-wrote the feature film adaptation of The Score for CBC Television (Screen Siren Productions) and collaborated with Stan Douglas on his interactive immersive National Film Board installation Circa 1948. His latest project is a suite of virtual reality Installations that accompany Electric Company Theatre’s newest production, The Full Light of Day.
Kevin joined the University of Victoria’s Department of Writing in 2012. He currently teaches playwriting and screenwriting, with a creative focus on cinematic/theatre hybrids, collaborative creation, site-specific theatre and interactive narratives.
Land Acknowledgement
This conversation was recorded on the unceded, stolen and ancestral territories of the Coast Salish Peoples: the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish) and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh), colonially known as Vancouver.
It is our duty to establish right relations with the people on whose territories we live and work, and with the land itself.
Show Transcript
Gabrielle Martin 00:02
Hello and welcome to Push Play, a Push Festival podcast featuring
conversations with artists who are pushing boundaries and playing
with form. I'm Gabriel Martin, Push's Director of Programming, and
in this special series of Push Play, we're revisiting the legacy of
Push and talking to creators who've helped shape 20 years of
innovative, dynamic, and audacious festival programming.
Gabrielle Martin 00:21
Today's episode on the 2008 Push Festival highlights Electric
Company Theater in conversation with David Hudgens and Kevin Kerr.
Electric Company Theater was originally formed as a collective in
1996 by Kim Collier, David Hudgens, Jonathan Young, and Kevin Kerr,
who met while training at Vancouver Studio 58, and now includes
Carmen Aguirre as core artist with the founding members.
Gabrielle Martin 00:44
After more than two decades with this innovative company, David
Hudgens has won numerous Jesse Awards. He now teaches acting at
Studio 58 and has directed nine shows there, including two Ovation
Award -winning productions.
Gabrielle Martin 00:58
Kevin Kerr, a Governor General's literary award winner, has
collaborated on the creation of more than a dozen full -length
productions with Electric Company Theater. He currently teaches
playwriting at the University of Victoria's Department of Writing
while continuing to develop new work for the company.
Gabrielle Martin 01:13
Here's my conversation with David and Kevin.
Gabrielle Martin 01:19
First, I just want to acknowledge that we're on the stolen
ancestral and traditional territories of the Coast Salish peoples,
Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil -Wautu. And on that land, we're on
what is now known as Commercial Drive, here to have this
conversation today.
Gabrielle Martin 01:35
So, let's go back to the beginning. So, before Palestine in 2006,
which was the second official push festival, push presented
electric company theater Studies in Motion, Studies in Motion, the
hauntings of Edward Muybridge.
Gabrielle Martin 01:53
But I'd imagine that your relationship with the festival started
even before that. So, yeah, bring us back to the beginning of that
relationship.
Kevin Kerr 02:02
Well, I guess it would have started with just being in the
community with Norman. And, you know, when we started the company
in 1996, I think, you know, Norman was running Rumble Productions
and we got to know him fairly early on.
Kevin Kerr 02:20
I think our first ever profile, first ever interview, was a piece
for Transmissions magazine that Rumble produced. And it was Adrian
Wong interviewing us for their, yeah, their first issue. And we
were just a brand new company then in like 1998 or
something.
David Hudgins 02:44
I believe of that and the producer it was called transmissions.
Yeah. Yeah
Gabrielle Martin 02:49
But, do you remember what...
Kevin Kerr 02:52
We talked about the company, about creative process, there were
some really beautiful quotes from Kim in there that we got a lot of
mileage out over the years. She talked about starting a company and
making a go of it and Kim used the expression, sometimes you just
got to bite the bull by the horns.
Gabrielle Martin 03:13
Whatever it takes.
Kevin Kerr 03:14
every day. It was just a classic Kim sort of malapropism of fight
the bullet and grab the bull by the horns and merge together. So we
would laugh about that for years. So we knew Norman in the scene
and as he became more and more engaged with, you know, the
international performance community and I think the I guess we had
probably early conversations with him around that and we we were in
development for this project that was a partnership with UBC and
that was Studies in Motion and it was our yeah the timings were all
kind of aligned that our kind of track for production for that play
was looking like it would fit nicely with that festival that year
in January and and so yeah I don't know
Gabrielle Martin 04:20
You wrote that word, so do you want to check it out? Yeah, yeah.
And so even early on with your company, Peter, your roles were
interchangeable.
Kevin Kerr 04:31
Yeah, I think in the earliest days we kind of were just a classic
collective, we did everything at the same time, we wrote, we
directed, we performed together, and then we started to, and
projects kind of take specific roles, but those would trade around,
so in that case I wrote the script, Kim directed it, Jonathan was a
performer in it.
David Hudgins 04:56
that was starting to be one of our well I guess we've done it a
little bit but we were starting to separate from each other in the
sense artists not we're still collective but we were taking on
different roles and wearing different hats specifically so that was
that was like a venture yeah right yeah
Gabrielle Martin 05:15
And what was studies in motion, what was kind of the core of the
piece in terms of what it was talking about or in terms of the kind
of forms it was using, why was it a fit for push in the early, in
that second festival?
Kevin Kerr 05:30
Yeah, I think the exploration of that play was around kind of
perception and the notion of sort of I guess the influence of
technology on the way we see the world, the way we understand
truth, and also kind of a celebration of the human body in
motion.
Kevin Kerr 05:50
And it stemmed from kind of stumbling upon the works of this
photographer who was an obsessed character that documented human
and animal motion and kind of accidentally invented the motion
picture by doing that.
Kevin Kerr 06:07
And so I was, yeah, I became, I pitched the idea I guess to the
company of doing a show that was inspired by his life and work. He
also had a really crazy, his biography was kind of read like a
melodrama, involved betrayals and murder and abandonment and all
these things along with this obsession with trying to capture truth
in an image.
Kevin Kerr 06:33
And so we worked with Robert Gardner at UBC who was also kind of
obsessed at that time and was trying to, he was running a research
project where he was attempting to replace traditional theater
lighting with digital, just all digital projection as the light
source to create this sort of holistic sonography where light would
be not just a way to see the action on stage, but it would carry
meaning through text and image.
Kevin Kerr 07:01
And so it felt like his focus on that had an interesting kind of
mirror to Morbridge's own obsession with the technology that he had
at the time. And so those two things started to merge. And I think
the, it was our first collaboration with Crystal Pite as well, who
choreographed all these movement sequences in the piece, working
with Kim.
Kevin Kerr 07:26
And so the aesthetic of it was a real blend of movement, theater,
drama, and then this technological sort of layer on top of it. So I
think, yeah, I think it kind of felt like it fit or it appealed to
the sense of what the festival was up to at the time.
David Hudgins 07:49
to I think Kim's you know body of work well all of all of their
body of work but you know Kim I think that relationship with the
use of the projections the sort of cutting -edge aspect of the
technology that was used in that show and her direction created
this beautiful show that was
Gabrielle Martin 08:12
people can talk about it. And so after that was the conversation
with Push and Norman that okay whatever the next show is it's gonna
be in Push or did you start to work on how it's grand and then kind
of pitch it to him or how did that come about?
Gabrielle Martin 08:31
I think Norman
David Hudgins 08:32
Norman was very selective in a good way and I think he really cared
about the quality of the work and I think he didn't just, I don't
think he just green -lighted whatever we're going to do next. I
think he wanted to always enter into a conversation to make sure
that what we were doing was supporting Push or what Push was doing
was supporting us, would you agree with that?
Kevin Kerr 08:54
Yeah, I mean, I think that's right. It was very project specific,
each relationship. But what I loved about Norman's sort of vision
with Bush is he really wanted to have an opportunity for Vancouver
to receive works of really significant.
Kevin Kerr 09:08
And I think aesthetic kind of challenges to the community from
around the world. But I think he also really felt that what was
going on in the community was at that level as well. I wanted to
sort of showcase and celebrate that.
Kevin Kerr 09:26
I guess the funny thing about Pelskrand is that that show was an
earlier show than Studies in Motion.
David Hudgins 09:33
Oh, right. It was girly. It was always developed early and the
stars forgot that.
Kevin Kerr 09:38
After the initial kind of chapter of our company working largely
collectively on all the projects, we did this little experiment
where each artist sort of pitched an idea for a show that they
would lead.
Kevin Kerr 09:53
And I guess the first, no, the second one, the first one was the
fall that Kim led, which was a sort of site -specific horror. And
then Jonathan... A great northern wave.
David Hudgins 10:05
while that was being changed and sort of early development and
changing over between UBC and different and Emily Carr I think
right yeah that's where we performed it yeah
Kevin Kerr 10:17
of the fall was in the kind of abandoned massive warehouse that was
there, that pinning tractor abandoned. And so that kind of
developed a relationship with that space for us. And then Jonathan
had this idea for the show Palace Grand.
Kevin Kerr 10:39
So we developed it actually in that space, but for the, for the
cult originally. And it premiered in 2004 at the cult. Yeah, 2000.
Okay. And so David led the design of the projection design, which
is a major part of the show.
Kevin Kerr 10:55
I directed it and Jonathan performed and wrote it and also
essentially designed the set for it as well. And it was a really
extraordinary, beautiful piece that he, and it was very, very
Jonathan and it's kind of all of its aspects.
Gabrielle Martin 11:13
So what do you mean by that?
Kevin Kerr 11:15
Yeah, what do I mean by that?
David Hudgins 11:17
Well, I mean, I think that John, a lot of his shows deal with, and
I was thinking about sort of themes that unite electric company
shows, and I feel like a lot of them are about people on a quest
and trying to, you know, sort of a social quest, trying to find
something in society, but then also having a personal obstacles
that get in the way.
David Hudgins 11:44
And sometimes the quest takes you inside, and sometimes the quest
takes you in a labyrinth, and sometimes you are chasing your own
tail, and those kind of experiences are a big part of John's show,
where there's like things where you get lost in the show, and you
get lost within characters, and you get lost within story
lines.
David Hudgins 12:03
So I feel like John's influence in that way was really prominent in
starting, well, in all his work, but Pallas Brand, that was like a
big part of the show.
Kevin Kerr 12:13
yeah yeah a real distillation of that it was a one -person show and
essentially was a
Gabrielle Martin 12:21
Who is the actor? Jonathan Yellen. Yeah.
Kevin Kerr 12:24
Yeah, yeah. And a piece that where he performed essentially three
characters, there was this writer named Walker who had gotten lost
in sort of a gold rush era environment in the far north, pursuing
narrative, I guess, but kind of in the form of one of those old
minor prospectors.
Kevin Kerr 12:48
And then a tracker that has been mysteriously commissioned to go
and find this lost soul. Goes on a pursuit into the tundra to
capture him. And then the third character is a character that was
known as the Operator, who was essentially a kind of, he operated
this steam driven vaudeville theater that the show was staged
in.
Kevin Kerr 13:13
And so the look of the show is essentially this kind of floor to
ceiling massive black wall, the scrim, with a eight by eight frame
in the middle of it that was this little miniature vaudeville
theater, little red curtain.
Kevin Kerr 13:28
And then it would fly up, revealing this tiny little stage that was
on a bit of a rake and had all the elements of a stage, of a
theater, little fly system inside it. And then these tunnels that
went off from the side but only up here when they were backlit
behind the scrim where the operator would crawl.
Kevin Kerr 13:48
And there was a stove that he would feed his script to, to burn, to
power the theater. And there was like a little projection booth
above that ran film. And there was a little sound system.
Gabrielle Martin 14:01
I didn't understand correctly that you designed this
thing.
David Hudgins 14:03
I designed the video projection for it, but that was a prominent
part of it because there was a scrim that was sort of covered the
entire playing space, so I'd allow it to project on top of the
human performer, and so you could have sort of images from the gold
rush with writing that was happening before your eyes, like the
actual writing of the diary of the character, so it was very, yeah,
it was so rich and beautiful to work with,
David Hudgins 14:35
and it was definitely, you know, things were developing daily, like
it was like a new idea would come and we would just try to put it
in the show, you know, so yeah.
Kevin Kerr 14:46
I just had an image of David working at the computer in this little
abandoned office space at Great Northern Way. It was like about 140
degrees in there, sweating.
David Hudgins 14:58
Yeah, down to like my shorts every day. It was 2004. I think it was
a six -week process. And the first three weeks was me learning how
to use After Effects, basically, which I didn't know. And so it was
sort of like those I was the first three weeks and then it was like
implementation time.
David Hudgins 15:13
So it was kind of a fantastic process, you know? Oh, yeah. And then
just a few, you know, just down in the other area was the set was
sort of set up was being built and created by Kevin and John. And
so it was kind of these two worlds and then they would run in and
say, we need this.
David Hudgins 15:30
Yeah, anyway, it was really creative and fun. Yeah.
Kevin Kerr 15:35
Yeah, very interactive sort of process with all elements kind of
going at the same time. And yeah, the way the story came to the
audience was the character of Walker didn't speak, he only wrote.
And so David was responsible for transmitting all of his text to
the audience in the form of projected script as handwritten notes
that the audience is essentially reading as the actions unfolding
on stage.
Kevin Kerr 16:02
And then the trackers spoke, but only as a recorded voiceover. And
then Jonathan as the tracker would lip sync to himself. And that
technique he kind of developed there was what he ended up further
refining and developing in Petruffinhite with Crystal Pied and then
Revivzer and so on with the shows she's done with Kid
Pivot.
Kevin Kerr 16:28
So it sort of started with that. And it was really a physical tour
de force as an actor and then it's actually really rich and
challenging. And yeah, I think an exploration of theater as a
meaning making machine and this sort of challenge to try to find
something that feels that it's living and authentic in a form that
is always in a way, you know, when you're writing a script, you're
almost, yeah,
Kevin Kerr 16:59
you're media, you're killing it as you write it. So this idea
between living and dead and the character that is somewhere between
those two worlds.
David Hudgins 17:07
And Jonathan's amazing physical ability and physical vocabulary
was, you know, it was really a showcase for him to show that off,
you know, because it was a solo work, it was just Jonathan creating
that experience.
Gabrielle Martin 17:24
And so that first premiere of the work, did Norman see it then, and
then you started the conversation about remounting.
Kevin Kerr 17:34
I think that's, yeah, Norman saw the original, and then we had a
partnership with Studies in Motion, which was great, it was a
really, I think a really rich partnership between the company and
Push. And then we had a desire to kind of go back to Palace Grand
because it was a really, again, rewarding show, but I think
Jonathan wasn't done with it, there was a lot left in terms of
trying to...
Gabrielle Martin 17:59
in terms of performance or did you also develop like yeah
significantly
Kevin Kerr 18:04
Yeah, like it seems to change a lot right sound design
David Hudgins 18:09
We rehearsed it at the Shadbolt, did we not? We did, yeah, for
push. With AJ and Meg Rowe. With AJ and Meg Rowe doing
sounds.
Kevin Kerr 18:15
for that production and I think the video design evolved a lot
during that second production and the script evolved a lot too and
yeah big aspects of the show some really significant new elements
in terms of the narrative appeared in that so it was quite a
massive revision and and so as that was being I think tabled
internally in the company we and I'm when I say we I imagine it was
probably Kim approached Norman and said you know what this should
be in push and that's where that next conversation started and as I
say the relationship between the company and push was already quite
great so yeah he programmed it for that 2008 festival
Gabrielle Martin 19:03
in 2020, post -presented anywhere but here, and in 2023, and I've
developed sound. And I would love if you could talk about how you
see the evolution of the company from studies in motion to now, and
also your own practices within the company as it relates to the
company.
David Hudgins 19:29
Well, I mean, part of it is the evolution of us, I mean, from into
different roles. I mean, I'm the artistic director right now at
Studio 58 in Langara College, and I teach acting there, and I run
the program there, which is where we all met, actually, the
original.
David Hudgins 19:44
Well, actually, we met Carmen there, too. Yeah, so all five of the
artistic directors, or people who have been artistic directors,
were all at the studio at that time. So it's kind of a full circle
thing.
David Hudgins 19:56
And so, but in the process, you know, the company has evolved over
the last 30 years. Kevin, you might want to talk to her more about
that.
Kevin Kerr 20:07
Yeah, well I think we had a little shift in terms of a number of
shifts in terms of the structure of the company and we were looking
for a model that could allow the artists to focus on developing
their building work and also developing their craft and to find a
way to running a small independent company.
Kevin Kerr 20:29
A lot of it is administration, a lot of it is that work, that heavy
lifting of trying to make the organization go. So we were looking
for a way to have a strong, stable center of the company of
somebody that could run the organization and allow the artists to
be a bit more liberated from that.
Kevin Kerr 20:50
And so this sort of model of an artistic core with multiple artists
that are working in relationship to each other but not necessarily
always collaborating as a collective or anything would be supported
by a strong managing producer.
Kevin Kerr 21:08
And then that allowed for, I think, maybe just a kind of furthering
of where that was kind of going back in those days with more
individually driven or led artistic visions that would still
ultimately manifest in a pretty collaborative
environment.
Gabrielle Martin 21:31
But David, you've spoken to there being some through line in terms
of that quest internal or self in relation to society, but that
theme, would you say that that's still somewhat present?
David Hudgins 21:46
Yeah, I think so, because I was thinking about all the push shows
and they have that through line, including Carmen's show, I mean
Carmen is the writer of a show anywhere but here, you know, it's
very different maybe than some of the sort of bio -epics or things
that we've done where you're talking about someone who's on a quest
for knowledge or for social change, but it's still about people
questing and trying to find something and reaching and trying to
get,
David Hudgins 22:17
well, anywhere but here, right? It's really the theme of that show
and trying to, and it's with issues of, you know, displacement and
issues of, you know,
Kevin Kerr 22:29
Yeah, I think the aspects, too, that still remain really strong is
just that very, very ambitious, large -scale visual dramaturgy, the
design -based approach of thinking about work, which I think apply
to studies and to Paul Scrant and to Anywhere But Here and to
undeveloped sound, where there's a very rich, physical, visual
landscape that is playing a role from the inception of the piece,
that's in dialogue with the text that's being created.
Kevin Kerr 23:06
I think that's something that I feel is pretty consistent in all
those works. And despite, in some ways, the work being more
singular, like the artists at Carmen, Let Anywhere But Here, that
was her vision, her story, undeveloped sound.
Kevin Kerr 23:23
Again, Jonathan, he wrote and directed that, so kind of really sort
of an auteur sort of approach. But yet, I think, in a way, that
collaborative process, where the elements are all influencing each
other, performance, design, text, are all kind of in a dialogue,
that's consistent.
Kevin Kerr 23:53
And I think maybe the only thing that's changing is the reach into
the fellow collaborators, the artists that are being engaged, is
just growing wider and through the process of aging and the
contacts and the connections and the work that you're doing and the
folks you're meeting around the world.
Kevin Kerr 24:17
But yeah, I think there's still something kind of quite familiar in
all those processes that looks something the same.
David Hudgins 24:27
characteristic of those creators like I just felt like an
undeveloped sound was so Jonathan you know and it really reminded
me a lot of the Palace Grand it had you know four or five actors in
it but a lot of the same themes and a lot of the same sense of the
cyclical thing and uncertainty and not being sure exactly what
thread you're on all those ideas keep coming and resurfacing in
John's work and I really like that about his work yeah
yeah
Gabrielle Martin 24:59
And David, are you still designing projections? In my dreams, I am.
You're now focused on...
David Hudgins 25:08
I mean, I'm now focused on teaching, but I still have, you know,
there's a little artist inside me that thinks maybe someday, you
know, I... Are you direct? Yeah, I direct. I have them for a few
years, but yeah, I do, yeah, and I plan to do more of that,
yeah.
Gabrielle Martin 25:25
And Kevin, how would you reflect on the evolution of your practice
from writing study to motion?
Kevin Kerr 25:34
Yeah, I think that there are things still for me that are through
-line, I guess, in terms of thinking about the human body in
relationship to technology, you know. The last project I did with
Electric Company was, I was dramaturging a play that just was the
year before anywhere but here.
Kevin Kerr 25:59
But as part of it, I wrote a companion sort of suite of these sort
of virtual reality installation pieces that lived in the lobby of
the theater that related to the play thematically and with some
shared characters but were these immersive experiences for
audiences to kind of get inside these different worlds that were
suggested on the stage in the show and explore some different
themes that were sort of adjacent to the play.
Kevin Kerr 26:29
And right now I'm working on a piece that I think is maybe a
departure for me, thematically, but it's still, I think it's still
engaging with that intersection of the technological space with
just the human body and its presence and its music.
David Hudgins 26:51
I mean, Kevin has been so influential in terms of the creation of
the company, like many of the ideas, or impulses as to where to go,
and I would say our very first play, which was about Nikola Tesla,
the inventor of alternating current, was really driven from
Kevin's...
David Hudgins 27:12
We were kind of internet kids, right? Like, we were in our 20s when
the internet happened, and that show kind of came out of early kind
of dark corners of the internet where Kevin found the story about
Nikola Tesla and then we researched it more, and then created this
show called Brilliant, which was our sort of debut,
right?
David Hudgins 27:33
And that kind of story and that kind of impulse and investigation
was something that was in a lot of our particular earlier stuff,
you know, we would have an impulse and go after it. Like, Studies
in Motion, I would say, was similar in a way too.
David Hudgins 27:50
It was about a very intriguing, sort of somewhat unknown person,
but someone who had a vision and who really was, you know, driving
something, like the quest, trying to go somewhere. Obsession.
Obsession, yeah.
Kevin Kerr 28:09
Yeah, yeah, I think the definitely the The company's kind of core
was that chemistry though between the between the artists that we
ever do brought something kind of unique and special To it. I have
to say thinking about I think I have to share the story because you
reminded me of it Maybe you remember better than I do but on
opening night push for a palace grand I Had been living at Edmonton
at that time and I came back to direct Palace grand in the winter
in January but my partner was pregnant with our second child and
The due date was the opening night of Palace grand and so through
the whole process.
Kevin Kerr 28:54
I was sort of on stand by expecting to be you know called
out
Gabrielle Martin 29:00
Can you just say that David might remember this story better than
you?
Kevin Kerr 29:02
Well, there's a part of it. This is me long -winded, sort of
circuitous route into the story, which I'm all like preamble and
never into the actual narrative, but...
Gabrielle Martin 29:13
That is, that's a memorable moment.
Kevin Kerr 29:17
It was memorable, because I was constantly in that state of like,
I'm going to get pulled out of here. And Kim was on standby to jump
in as director. But the baby just decided to keep waiting, keep
waiting.
Kevin Kerr 29:30
And so opening night arrived. And I was in the audience, as were
you, as was my partner, like nine months pregnant. And we were just
watching the show. But before the play started, just as it was like
the initial cues were being called, and house lights were down and
the first sound was emanating from the stage, this very analog
system backstage of these little pulleys and strings and stuff that
ran all of the mechanisms in the piece snapped and disappeared into
the abyss of the set.
Kevin Kerr 30:19
And the first cue, which revealed Jonathan, didn't happen and
couldn't happen. And so the show stopped and there was this dead
sort of silence in the audience. And I was just like, I'm, I was in
kind of, I was just frazzled.
Kevin Kerr 30:32
I was thinking that, you know, my partner was going to suddenly go
into labor in the audience that I was, I was just sort of
paralyzed. And Kim, being Kim, just jumped up, ran to the booth to
check in to find out what was going on from our stage manager,
wonderful Jan Hodgson, who reported, you know, we've got a little
bit of a backstage catastrophe.
Kevin Kerr 30:55
We're going to sort it out. So Kim pulled back and just addressed
the audience, said, well, everybody. She would. And then engaged in
this dialogue across the theater with Norman. He's like, hey,
Norman.
Kevin Kerr 31:06
Norman goes, hey, Kim. And they have this back and forth where he
starts plugging other shows in the festival and they're, they're
bantering, filling in air space. And they had such a chemistry
those two.
Kevin Kerr 31:21
They, they, you know, they like to spar. They like to talk and
party and all these things and stuff. So it was really, it just
released attention out of the room, fun, funny. And then eventually
things were solved and the show happened and it was
great.
Kevin Kerr 31:35
But that moment was just like such a, yeah, but then it kind of
humanizing moment for sure. Yeah.
David Hudgins 31:44
And I think, you know, the influence of Kim and Norman, you know,
on the community, have both been huge. I mean, I think from
everybody, you know, and I know you're interviewing theater
replacement before, and they were, of course, and that was Boca de
Lupo from our period of time, and that, and Rumble, and all those
people that were doing theater in those early days.
David Hudgins 32:04
One of the things that I remember is Hive, I know it's not related
to Push, but so much, maybe. But, you know, that was something that
really came out of. I think that feeling, that sort of collective
spirit that was really strong in those days.
David Hudgins 32:18
And Norman was definitely part of that, and Kim was also part of
that. And, you know, we had, we would have like parties and stuff
with all the theater people and have, you know, kind of like forums
about what should we do, how can we make this community better,
what can we do to work together, and I mean, that was the impulse
for Progress Lab as well, which was this hub of all the different
theater companies.
David Hudgins 32:39
So a lot of that, that spirit, I think, was part of the electric
company of the people who ran it, but also I still think, I think
Norman really hooked into that as well.
Gabrielle Martin 32:50
Well, that really ties into my final question, which is about how
you perceive the cultural context of PUSH and its significance for
elected purpose theater.
David Hudgins 33:01
and for Vancouver, too. I mean, I think it's the fact that it
brought the world of international performance to Vancouver, which
was something that we were already feeling like we were part of,
but it really brought the focus to this place.
Kevin Kerr 33:20
Yeah, well I think that spirit that was kind of present in that
time with all these independent companies that kind of emerged in
the 90s that had this focus on creating new work and building work
in ways that were maybe not kind of the traditional models with
focuses on physicality and focuses on collaborative processes and
site specific work of course is huge.
Kevin Kerr 33:55
And Norman was right in the middle of that as a kind of leader.
Rumble was a little bit ahead of a lot of these companies that kind
of came up in the mid 90s but had that instinct around you know I
guess instigation you know how can we create a spark that you know
where all this energy gets kind of sort of pushed together and then
feeds off itself.
Kevin Kerr 34:25
And so bringing in work from around the world to just feed that but
also to showcase and say you know like I said before that the work
being done here was at that caliber and needed to be celebrated as
well as to be inspired by the work being done elsewhere.
David Hudgins 34:43
And I mean, I'm a teacher of post -secondary students, and I think
that it was an inspiration also, which has been an inspiration for
younger people to do theater, to create their own stories, to think
outside conventional type of theater.
David Hudgins 35:01
So that's been a huge boon to what we do.
Ben Charland 35:08
That was a special episode of Push Play, in honor of our 20th Push
International Performing Arts Festival, which will run from January
23rd to February 9th, 2025. Push Play is produced by myself, Ben
Charland, and Tricia Knowles.
Ben Charland 35:24
A new episode of our 20th Festival series with Gabriel Martin will
be released every Tuesday, wherever you get your podcasts. To stay
up to date on Push 20 and the 2025 Festival, visit pushfestival .ca
and follow us on social media at Push Festival.
Ben Charland 35:43
And if you've enjoyed this episode, please spread the word and take
a moment to leave a review.