Author of Up to Low
Brian Doyle is an award-winning, local author and retired teacher.
The Doyle Family has lived in the Ottawa and Gatineau River Valleys since before Confederation.
Although the focus of his fiction and commentary has been right in his own backyard, his work has been translation into ten different languages worldwide.
Adaptor/Director
Janet Irwin has wanted to produce Up to Low for more than twenty years. Its
progress toward the stage, however, has been slowed down by other projects
that she has written, adapted and/or directed for theatres like Great Canadian Theatre Company, National Arts Centre, St. Lawrence Shakespeare Festival, Opera Lyra Ottawa, Odyssey Theatre, Deluxe Hot Sauce, Upper Canada Playhouse, CanPlay, The Gladstone, Ottawa School of Speech and Drama, Theatre School, Winnipeg and Ottawa Fringes and others. She will be directing Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet this summer for St. Lawrence
Shakespeare Festival, in Prescott, Ontario.
Creative Producer
Amanda combines careers as a writer, theatre director, calligrapher, book artist and instructor. Founder of the Ottawa Children’s Theatre, Amanda has taught and directed children, youth and adults in theatres and schools throughout Ontario. She has a special interest in creating theatre for youth with special needs and recently studied in England with Oily Cart Theatre, developing theatre for young people with complex learning disabilities. Amanda’s most recent book, SEPTEMBER 17: A NOVEL, is published by Red Deer Press. She has adapted her book Rosie Backstage (co-written with her husband Tim Wynne-Jones) for the stage and is currently working on a stage adaptation of “Little Comrades”, a memoir of a Communist childhood in Canada by Laurie Lewis.
Set Designer
Brian’s designs have been mounted across Canada and internationally for both English and French theatre. His credits include set and costume designs for NAC English Theatre; Théâtre Français de Toronto; The Great Canadian Theatre Company; Théâtre la Catapulte; Odyssey Theatre; Centaur Theatre; Tarragon Theatre; The Grand Theatre; Théâtre du Nouvel-Ontario; Le Théâtre du Trillium; Théâtre de l’Ile; Théâtre Omnibus; and Third Wall Theatre Company, amongst many others. Brian received the 2012 Council For the Arts Ottawa Mid-Career Artist Award. He has taught scenography at Bishop’s University, the University of Ottawa and the National Theatre School of Canada, from where he is also a graduate.
Composer/Musical Director
Since 1972, Ian Tamblyn has released 37 albums/cds, and produced dozens of artists’ music, created over one hundred theatrical soundtracks and written thirteen plays. Selected Awards and Tributes: Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographic Society (2012) for guiding and creative work in the Canadian Arctic; the Estelle Klein and Helen Verger Awards for his contributions to Canadian folk music, honourary doctorate (Lakehead University), Distinguished Alumni Award (Trent University), English Songwriter of the Year (Canadian Folk Music Awards, 2010), Ontario Folk Award (2013) for “Take the Mountain Down” and the Galaxie Grand prize, (Ontario Folk Conference, 2014) for “Away” (from The Labrador, final cd of the Four Coast Project.) A tribute album of his songs, Coastline of our Dreams, features covering artists Lynn Miles, Susan Crowe , Hart Rouge and Valdy. Writer in Residence at Carleton University (2014-15), Ian teaches song-writing to music students and will soon release Walking in the Footsteps, celebrating the Group of Seven (commissioned by the Art Gallery of Sudbury).
Costume Design
Sarah Waghorn is an Ottawa based designer with a decade of experience designing costumes and set for everything from Fringe performances to mainstage Opera. Raised and schooled in New Zealand she has made Ottawa home and enjoys the diversity of that theatres here have to offer.
She loves period pieces and is thrilled to be designing Up to Low.
Lighting Design
As a lighting designer Rebecca has worked with the National Arts Centre,
Third Wall Theatre Company, Great Canadian Theatre Company, Opera
Lyra Ottawa, Ottawa Shakespeare Company and other companies in
Ontario and the country. She has taught lighting masterclasses at Memorial
University of Newfoundland and been a coach at her alma mater the
National Theatre School of Canada. Also a stage manager, she has worked
across the country and is presently teaching at the University of
Lethbridge.
Dramaturg
Jen Boyes-Manseau studied Theatre at the University of Ottawa in directing,
movement-based acting, and dramaturgy of new plays. For the past 29 years,
Jen has participated in the creation and production of theatre as dramaturge,
director and actor with independent theatre artists and theatre companies
across the country from Moncton to Yellowknife, and with Dramamuse, the in-house theatre company at the Canadian Museum of Civilization. She assisted director Jan Irwin on the world premiere of Brian Doyle’s Angel Square (adapted by Alan Davis) at the National Arts Centre 28 years ago, so her recent work as dramaturge during Jan’s adaptation process of Doyle’s Up to Low completes the circle.
Physical Dramaturg
Laurie Steven is the founder and Artistic Director of Odyssey Theatre. She is an award-winning director, writer and dramaturge, with a love of comedy and social satire, and a passion for interpreting international myth and folktale for contemporary audiences. Laurie’s fascination with masks, dance-theatre and the arts of the fairground has driven her work at Odyssey.