Rex's latest. Come and see it if you're in T.O.

Tickets on Sale Now!

Now's your chance to buy tickets to Mixed Company Theatre's upcoming new play Old Age Ain't for Sissies, playing at the Tarragon Theatre's Extra Space (30 Bridgman Avenue) Nov 27th-Dec 1st 2013.

Show Dates & Times
Nov 27 @ 8:00 PM - $20 per ticket
Nov 28 @ 8:00 PM - $20 per ticket
Nov 29 @ 8:00 PM - $25 per ticket
Nov 30 @ 8:00 PM - $25 per ticket
Dec 1 @ 2:30 PM - $20 per ticket

You can also join us for the preview performance on Nov 26th @ 8:00PM ($10 tickets).

How to buy?
Online: https://tickets.tarragontheatre.com/TheatreManager/1/tmEvent/tmEvent379.html
Phone: (416) 531-1827
In Person at the Tarragon Box Office: 30 Bridgman Ave, Toronto, ON, M5R 1X3

About the production
The Cline couple will experience all the pitfalls and frustrations which confront older adults in their retirement years. Will they negotiate the shoals and reefs successfully? Will their marriage survive? Will they survive?

Old Age Ain't for Sissies was written by Chalmers Award winner Rex Deverell and created in consultation with over 150 seniors across Toronto and the GTA. The play begins with a retirement party. For some the party heralds a glorious new era of freedom and adventure. For others it sounds a peal of doom. The drama is punctuated with songs resonating with the determination of seniors who want neither to be dismissed nor forgotten. The skillful facilitators of Mixed Company Theatre will engage with the audience to bring hope and light into what could otherwise be a crisis of despair.

The production stars older actors with an array of backgrounds and experiences. If you've never experienced a piece of forum theatre, this is your chance to see how it works. This interactive play invites the audience to come on stage, take on the role of one of the characters and explore possible options to the issues presented.

If you have any questions or would like to know more about our senior programming, please call (416) 515-8080 or email info@mixedcompanytheatre.com. You can also check us out online at www.mixedcompanytheatre.com

Reading of Rita’s new script at FemFest 2013, Winnipeg

Check out the whole schedule, Sept. 14-21: http://sarasvati.ca/fem-fest/fem13-schedule/

Sisters Inc

Sat. Sept. 21, 2:30, Asper Centre for Theatre and Film, University of Winnipeg
Written by Rita Shelton Deverell
Directed by Kayla Gordon
Featuring: Nan Fewchuk, Jennifer Freeman and Alix Sobler

Sisters Inc. is a girls road trip, only the girls, one Jewish, one Christian, one black Muslim, are all in their 60’s. The girls revisit some tense moments they experienced throughout the course of their long-time friendships.

Canadian Theatre Museum Posts Interviews with Rex Deverell

I had great fun chatting with playwright/actor Andrew Moody a few weeks ago.It was a real honour to have been included in this significant record of Canadian Theatre.. Of course you want to watch this, right? Well you can check it out at. 

http://vimeo.com/69901402

As of this week there are three parts of my interview on line.

While you're at it, go to the menu of interviews. You'll get to hear in depth conversations with some of your favorite theatre and screen artists - directors, actors and playwrights - fascinating.

Rex

Rita's Current Projects:

“Women, Contemporary Aboriginal Issues, and Resistance” best practices kit - 

for which Rita is the Principal Investigator

Kit to be released June 2013, Mount Saint Vincent University and will be available for groups and for educational programs.

*Rita is an Actor in….. 

The Hush Baby

A play about mothers, magic lost and found

by Dawna J. Wightman; directed by Winnie W. Wong

2013 Spring Works Festival, Stratford, Ontario

May 12 @ noon

May 14 @ 6 PM

May 15 @ 8 PM...tickets: www.springworksfestival.ca

Get your tickets now! Opens on Mothers Day 2013

Book - coming:

Fists Upon a Star, a memoir of Florence Bean James

Co-author Jean Freeman

Epilogue by Rita

To be published fall 2013 by University of Regina Press 

Jean Freeman of Regina describes this project:

The New University of Regina Press Pioneers World’s First Reality Publishing Show

It is not every day that Margaret Atwood and Alice Munro congratulate a university on the launch of its university press, but then, it is a rare occasion when a new university press comes into being. Jumping to the head of the class on the good wishes of these literary titans, on June 1, 2013, University of Regina Press (U of R Press) officially launched the World's First Reality Publishing Show online!

Beginning June 1st/13 viewers to www.uofrpress.ca will meet the people (including new U of R Press Director Bruce Walsh) who stick-handle a book from manuscript form through to finished-and-launched product.

I'm extremely fortunate to be involved (as co-author) in the first book to be published under the new Press' imprint -- "Fists Upon a Star: A Memoir of Love, Theatre, and Escape from McCarthyism" -- which will be followed on the Reality Publishing site from its inception back in the 1960s when North American Theatre Pioneer Florence Bean James set out to write the story of the life which she and her husband dedicated to Theatre Of the People, By the People, and For the People. At the time, Mrs. James was traveling throughout the province for the Saskatchewan Arts Board when we met and became close friends. I was honoured, in the years that followed, when she asked me to help her with her book ... first, to help organize some of the material, then to do some editing. I did, and she suggested that I might rewrite some things here and there, and finally, if I would write some portions of the book and pull it all together.

I was glad to help, honoured by her friendship and trust, and her confidence in my ability, and we worked on the manuscript regularly over the following years, until shortly before her death in 1988. The manuscript sat in limbo until a few years ago, when actress and admirer Rita Deverell, who had known Mrs. James at Globe Theatre, and had done a one-woman play about her life, told the U of R Press (then the Canadian Plains Research Centre) about this remarkable woman whose actions and accomplishments had had such a profound impact on the development of so many facets of theatre and culture in Saskatchewan, Canada and the U.S.A.

One thing led to another: the book is now deep in development, and the remarkable crew at U of R Press is aiming for an early fall launch! (That's Early Fall 2013!! Remarkable!)

So if you're interested in seeing how this truly awesome process progresses, take a look at the trailer now on www.uofrpress.ca, and keep visiting the site in the days and weeks ahead to follow the action! I know I'll be out here and there introducing and signing "Fists" so I'll try to keep you posted!

Best regards (and please forgive the Shameless Self Promotion!!) I think you'll enjoy the book!

Jean

Rex

Upcoming: "The Time of Trouble" 

An Opera with Composer Elizabeth Raum

Watch this blog for more news

January 2013
The developmental work of our August posting continues. Rex is working on a new opera based on a true story about the Halifax Sisters of Charity in the 19th century. He is also working with a group of seniors on a new Mixed Company play: performances begin March 5 in Toronto. mixedcompanytheatre.com
Rita is giving a public lecture in Orillia, February 12 for Lakehead University.
Rex will be discussing his play, Boiler Room Suite,  at Redeemer College in Ancaster, March 19.