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Kidd Pivot Revisor February 7 + 8, 2020 • 7:30 pm • Royal Theatre Running time: 90 minutes (no intermission)
The Royal Theatre is located on the traditional lands of the Lekwungen peoples, also known as the Esquimalt and Songhees Nations. We extend our appreciation for the opportunity to live, create, and perform on this territory.
A Message from the Creators We began with an old, well-known story about mistaken identity. The story is based on an anecdote that surfaced in Russia in 1833, and quickly spread. It is now widely accepted as probably true. In 1836, the story took shape in a five-act play. The play premiered in St. Petersburg before the Czar, who according to reports, laughed and applauded, and is said to have remarked “Everybody gets it, and I most of all!” The play was in disguise as a comedy. Underneath the superficial subject of mistaken identity there were, of course, deeper subjects such as deceit, tyranny, greed and corruption. Willful blindness and complicity. Bureaucracy and officialdom. Human suffering. The coming storm. The promise of change. Imminent overthrow. Salvation on the horizon. Retribution just around the corner. Justice at the gate. There is evidence from the critical response that its arrival on stage was unwelcome; it was said to be unoriginal, improbable, coarse and vulgar. It turned on a stale anecdote everyone knew, it was a rank farce and the characters were mere caricatures. It didn’t matter: the rank farce about mistaken identity quickly took its place
as a national institution. Reports indicate that the Playwright of the rank farce raged against the “unctuous, cloying, farcical style” of the original production — a style that nonetheless became convention for decades. The Playwright insisted that he had been misread, and that his text contained an urgent moral indictment, a religious allegory, and a portrait of the universal soul in exile. (Incidentally, the play is called The Inspector General, or, in the original Russian, Revizor, and the playwright is Nikolai Gogol. Gogol repeatedly tried to revise Revizor to prevent further abuses of his underlying intentions, all in vain.) Since the 1830’s, the play has been translated and adapted countless times. We approached the original text as a matrix for both voice and body, and found it to be malleable and resonant. Our quest has been to locate and portray a glimpse of the soul within this most unlikely frame: a well-worn farce about corruption and deceit. We would like to thank all of our performers and collaborators for their essential contributions to the making of Revisor. They are the lifeblood of our creation; each of them masterful, generous, and truly inspiring. We are deeply grateful. – Jonathon and Crystal
About the Work World Premiere: February 20, 2019 Vancouver Playhouse, Vancouver, Canada Created by: Crystal Pite and Jonathon Young Written by: Jonathon Young Choreographed and Directed by: Crystal Pite Original Music and Sound Design: Owen Belton, Alessandro Juliani, Meg Roe Scenic Design & Reflective Light Concept: Jay Gower Taylor Costume Design: Nancy Bryant Lighting Design: Tom Visser Assistant to the Creators: Eric Beauchesne Cast and Characters: Doug Letheren: Director of the Complex Jermaine Spivey: Postmaster Wieland Gregory Lau: Misha Rena Narumi: Interrogator Klak Ella Rothschild: Minister Desouza David Raymond: Doctor Harlow Cindy Salgado: Anna (Wife of the Director) David Raymond: Osip (Assistant to the Revisor) Tiffany Tregarthen: The Revisor Renée Sigouin: Swing
Voices: Meg Roe: Narrator / Inspector Scott McNeil: Director of the Complex Alessandro Juliani: Postmaster Wieland Kathleen Barr: Interrogator Klak Nicola Lipman: Minister Desouza Gerard Plunkett: Doctor Harlow Amy Rutherford: Anna Ryan Beil: Osip Jonathon Young: The Revisor Voice Director: Meg Roe Technical Director: Jeff Harrison Stage Manager: Izzy Robinson Lighting and Sound Technician: Lukas McCormick Wig and Wardrobe Coordinator: Stevie Hale Jones Set and Prop Construction: Great Northern Way Scene Shop Cutter: Janet Dundas Costume Assistant: Alaia Hamer Stitchers: Megan Veaudry, Jen Reid, Christine Pampel Headpiece Sculptor: Heidi Wilkinson Company Manager on Tour: Brent Belsher Executive Producer: Jim Smith Producer: Francesca Piscopo Associate Producer: Sabine Rouques For full bios and photos of dancers, voice actors, and crew, please visit kiddpivot.org
About Kidd Pivot Integrating movement, original music, text, and rich visual design, Kidd Pivot’s performance work is assembled with recklessness and rigour, balancing sharp exactitude with irreverence and risk. Under the direction of internationally renowned Canadian choreographer Crystal Pite, the company’s distinct choreographic language — a breadth of movement fusing classical elements and the complexity and freedom of structured improvisation — is marked by a strong theatrical sensibility and a keen sense of wit and invention.
Kidd Pivot tours extensively around the world with productions such as Betroffenheit (2015), The Tempest Replica (2011), The You Show (2010), Dark Matters (2009), and Lost Action (2006). Since 2015, Kidd Pivot has measured its touring carbon footprint and offset over 400 tonnes of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent), enabling Kidd Pivot to be one of the first dance companies to tour carbon neutral.
Kidd Pivot Artistic Director: Crystal Pite Associate Artistic Director: Eric Beauchesne Writer-in-Residence: Jonathon Young Executive Director: Jim Smith Producer: Francesca Piscopo Associate Producer: Sabine Rouques Communications and Marketing Manager: Katherine Chan Accounts Manager: Ann Hepper Production Manager: Jeff Harrison Fundraising Associate: Brent Belsher Fundraising Coordinator: Lo McEwan Administration Coordinator: Kevin Locsin Agents for Kidd Pivot: Eponymous (Canada) Menno Plukker Theatre Agent Inc. (International) Assisted by: Magdalena Marszalek and Isaïe Richard Kidd Pivot Board of Directors: President: Guy Riecken Vice President: Barry McKinnon Treasurer: Ainslie Cyopik Secretary: Dory Dynna Directors: Fiona Hanington, Valerie Jerome, Derek Porter Producing Partners and Funders: Co-produced by Sadler’s Wells (London, UK), Théâtre de la Ville/La Villette (Paris, France), Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity (Banff, Canada), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (North Carolina, US), Canadian Stage (Toronto, Canada), Seattle Theatre Group (Seattle, US), and The Hamber Foundation (British Columbia, Canada).
Photo: Michael Slobodian
This is one of the 200 exceptional projects funded through the Canada Council for the Arts’ New Chapter Program. With this $35M investment, the Council supports the
creation and sharing of the arts in communities across Canada. Developed with support from the National Arts Centre’s National Creation Fund. Revisor is a co-production of The CanDance Network Creation Fund, Danse Danse, National Arts Centre, DanceHouse and Dance Victoria, and supported by the Canada Council for the Arts. Kidd Pivot benefits from the support of BNP Paribas Foundation for the development of its projects. Kidd Pivot gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Government of British Columbia, British Columbia Arts Council, City of Vancouver, and countless individual and business supporters. Eponymous gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts. Kidd Pivot would like to thank: John Murphy, Mark Chavez, Artemis Gordon, Arts Umbrella, The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, UBC Theatre, Michael Slobodian, Malcolm Dow, Offsetters, and the generous financial contributions from the Friends of Kidd Pivot.
Artist Biographies Crystal Pite is a former company member of Ballet British Columbia and William Forsythe’s Ballett Frankfurt. She has created over 50 works for companies including The Paris Opera Ballet, The Royal Ballet, Nederlands Dans Theater I, Ballett Frankfurt, National Ballet of Canada, and Ballet British Columbia. The recipient of numerous awards for artistic excellence, including three Olivier Awards and, most recently, the 2018 Grand Prix de la danse de Montréal, Pite is an Associate Choreographer of Nederlands Dans Theater, Associate Dance Artist of Canada’s National Arts Centre, and Associate Artist at Sadler’s Wells, London. She holds an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from Simon Fraser University. In 2002, she formed Kidd Pivot in Vancouver.
Jonathon Young – Co-Creator, Writer, Voice Actor Canadian theatre maker Jonathon Young is Playwright-in-Residence at Kidd Pivot and a co-founder of Electric Company Theatre, where he has created and performed in over 20 original productions: Tear the Curtain! (Arts Club Theatre, Canadian Stage), No Exit (American Conservatory Theatre), Betroffenheit (international tour). He has worked across Canada as a freelance actor on multiple projects: All But Gone (Necessary Angel, Toronto) The Waiting Room (Arts Club Theatre, Vancouver), The Great Gatsby (Theatre Calgary), Hamlet (Bard on the Beach, Vancouver), and wrote text for Crystal Pite on two productions for Nederlands Dans Theater (Parade and The Statement). Jonathon is the recipient of an Olivier Award, the UK National Dance Award and several Jessie Richardson Awards for writing and performance.
Eric Beauchesne – Associate Artistic Director Born in Québec, Eric has danced with Les Grands Ballets Canadiens, Les Ballets Jazz de Montréal, and with contemporary dance icons such as La Fondation Jean-Pierre Perrault, PaulAndré Fortier and Louise Lecavalier. Company member since 2004, Eric stages Pite’s work
worldwide and serves as guest teacher. He currently resides in Holland and devotes his spare time advocating for climate action.
Kathleen Barr – Voice Actor Kathleen is one of the voice-over industry’s busiest actors. She has voiced anything and everything from fruit to zombies. Favourite roles include: Dot in Reboot; Trixie in My Little Pony; Kat and Millie in Kid vs Kat; many Evil Queens in the Barbie movies; Kaiko in The Deep; Tricerachops and Sarah in Super Dinosaur; Glorb in Super Monsters; Grandma Llama in Llama Llama; Botila in Kong; Tina, Mavis and Dora in Corner Gas; Misako and Heavy Metal in Ninjago; loads of characters in Dinosaur Train and Chip and Potato; Blasto Woman in Mega Man; and ‘Lil Foxy in Rock Dog 2. Kathleen is very happy to be a part of the amazing cast and crew of Revisor!
Ryan Beil – Voice Actor Ryan Beil is an Actor, Comedian and Writer based out of Vancouver, BC. He holds a BFA in Acting from the University of British Columbia. You can catch him every Sunday performing Improv with the legendary troupe The Sunday Service, which he founded. He is also on TV from time to time when the powers that be allow it. He is incredibly proud to have played a small role in the creation of Revisor and is jealous of all of the dancers’ incredible abilities.
Owen Belton – Composer, Sound Designer Owen graduated with a degree in Fine and Performing Arts and studied acoustic and computer music composition. Since 1994, he has created scores for dance companies including Kidd Pivot, National Ballet of Canada, Nederlands Dans Theater, Ballet Jorgen, Cullberg Ballet in Stockholm, Ballet Nuremberg, Oregon Ballet Theatre and 420 People in Prague.
Photos © Michael Slobodian.
Crystal Pite – Co-creator, Choreographer, Director
Nancy Bryant – Costume Designer
Gregory Lau – Dancer
Nancy’s home is in Vancouver, BC. She has designed for dance, theatre, opera and film since the late 1980’s. Her design work has taken her across Canada, the USA, Europe and the UK. Collaborations with Crystal Pite and the design team include works for Netherlands Dans Theater, The Paris Opera Ballet, The Royal Ballet London and for Kidd Pivot.
Gregory Lau was born in Honolulu, Hawaii where he began his training at MidPacific Institute School of the Arts. After attending The Juilliard School, Gregory joined Nederlands Dans Theater 2 in 2013 and then went on to join Nederlands Dans Theater 1 in 2016. He has been a recipient of the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts 1st Level Scholarship in Modern Dance and Ballet. He has worked with choreographers such as Jiří Kylián, Crystal Pite, Ohad Naharin, Sharon Eyal, Marco Goecke, Paul Lightfoot & Sol Leon, Hans Van Manen, Johan Inger, Edward Clug, Medhi Walerski, Alexander Ekman, Camille A.Brown and more. He recently staged Postscript by Leon & Lightfoot for NDT2.
Alessandro Juliani and Meg Roe – Composers, Sound Designers Alessandro and Meg are Canadian multidisciplinary artists whose works have been seen and heard across Canada and internationally in conjunction with: The Shaw Festival, Stratford Festival, Canadian Stage, Crow’s Theatre, Factory Theatre, Centaur Theatre, Bard on the Beach, Electric Company Theatre, Blackbird Theatre, Arts Club, The Vancouver Playhouse, Pi Theatre, Rumble Theatre, The National Arts Centre, Theatre Calgary, Alberta Theatre Projects, Theatre Junction, Citadel Theatre, Belfry, Intrepid Theatre, Theatre SKAM, Theatre Aquarius, Manitoba Theatre Centre, Western Canada Theatre, Orlando Shakespeare Festival, American Conservatory Theatre (San Francisco), Center Theater Group (LA), and the Britten/Pears Festival (UK).
Doug Letheren – Dancer Doug is from New Hampshire USA and a graduate of The Juilliard School. He has worked with the Batsheva Dance Company, Sharon Eyal’s L-E-V, the GöteborgsOperans Danskompani, Aszure Barton, Adam Linder, Alan Lucien Øyen and is currently a member of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch. Doug is a recipient of the 2007 Movado Future Legends Award.
Nicola Lipman – Voice Actor
Photos © Michael Slobodian. Gregory Lau photo © Rahi Rezvani.
Alessandro Juliani – Voice Actor AJ currently makes his living as an actor, singer, composer and sound-designer. He has been working at these disciplines off and on for the last 30 years. He is frequently executed, maimed, disemboweled, dismembered, immolated, crucified and/or air-locked on your favourite locally-shot TV programs and films. He often lends his voice to the animated programs which your kids/grand-kids/greatgrand-kids/socially-awkward uncles currently binge. He is delighted to frequently collaborate with Kidd Pivot, most recently in his work co-scoring/sound-designing Betroffenheit. People have occasionally given him trophies for his work. Some of them are transparent, and others more opaque. He makes his home in Vancouver with his partner and frequent collaborator, Meg Roe, and their three children.
Selected theatre credits: Humans, Matchmaker, Les Miserables, Driving Miss Daisy (Arts Club), Corleone (Classic Chic), Grey Gardens (Acting Up), Other Desert Cities (Citadel Theatre), King Arthur’s Night (Neworld Theatre), Scorched, Humble Boy, simpl (Tarragon Theatre), All the Way Home (Electric Company), Death of a Salesman (Theatre Calgary), and various film and TV. Nicola is a graduate of the National Theatre School and UBC, and has received four Jessie Awards and the 2012 Queens’ Diamond Jubilee Medal.
Artist Biographies (cont’d) Scott McNeil – Voice Actor
Meg Roe – Voice Director, Voice Actor
Scott McNeil is an Australian-born Canadian actor and voice actor. He currently resides in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. One of the most wellknown Canadian voice actors of all time, McNeil has provided voices to many characters in animated shows, most notably The Wacky World of Tex Avery, ReBoot, Beast Wars: Transformers, Storm Hawks, Dragon Ball Z, Mobile Suit Gundam Wing, InuYasha, Ranma ½, Fullmetal Alchemist, X-Men: Evolution, League of Super Evil and Mega Man. He has done live action work as well.
With partner Alessandro Juliani, Meg has worked in sound design for a number of international theatre productions, including The Tempest Replica, Betroffenheit, and Revisor by Kidd Pivot. Her directing repertoire includes The Tempest and a radically “feminized” production of Timon of Athens, both for Bard on the Beach, and Middletown for Shaw Festival. She has won a Jessie Richardson Award for Sound Design for Betroffenheit, a Toronto Theatre Critics’ Award for Best Design; Betty Mitchell Awards for Actress in A Lead Role in Proof and The Syringa Tree, Jessie Awards for Lead Actress in The Penelopiad, All The Way Home, and Onegin; a Jessie Award for Supporting Actress in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, and a Ray Michal Award for Outstanding Work or Body of Work by an Emerging Director.
Rena was born in Tokyo, Japan. She has performed with ProArteDanza, Kidd Pivot, Hessischen Staatstheaters Wiesbaden, Royal Swedish Ballet (RSB), Nederlands Dans Theater 1 (NDT1). With RSB, she performed the main role of Juliet in Juliet and Romeo by Mats Ek. With NDT1, she traveled all over the world to perform.
Gerard Plunkett – Voice Actor Gerard Plunkett’s first role with Kidd Pivot was in The Statement in 2015. He is delighted to voice Dr. Harlow in Revisor. Gerard is a Jessie Richardson and Leo award winner. His theatre work includes Saint Joan, Glengarry Glen Ross, Helen Lawrence and Tear the Curtain! Among his extensive movie/TV credits are Travelers, Legends of Tomorrow, Eight Below, 2012, Sucker Punch, Intelligence, DaVinci’s Inquest, Nightwatching, Snakes on a Plane and Seventh Son.
David Raymond – Dancer Born and raised in Penticton, BC, David co-founded Out Innerspace Dance Theatre and Modus Operandi, a platform to develop and share practice with young artists. David has performed with Company 605, Wen Wei Dance, Response Dance, Dana Gingras, Simone Orlando, Beijing Modern Dance, Vancouver Opera, and Move: The Company.
Ella Rothschild – Dancer Ella Rothschild was born in Israel and is a choreographer, multi-disciplinary artist and dancer. Since 2010, Ella has been creating her own works in collaboration with various artists, integrating dance, visual-art and music. Ella received the Rosenblum Performing-Arts Award from the city of TelAviv for Promising Creator of 2016 and the Ministry Cultural Award. From 2016 to 2019, Ella created and performed eight of her works in Israel, Europe, Japan, and the US. Ella created Feed, for Cia Eliane Fetzer de Danca Contemporanea (Brazil) and Timeline for Balletto Teatro di Torino Dance Company (Italy). Her latest production Futuristic Space premiered and opened the festival Dance, Dance, Dance Yokohama 2019 at the Red Brick Theater in Yokohama, Japan. Ella was recently named an Artist-in-Residence for the Suzanne Dellal Centre’s inaugural residency program.
Photos © Michael Slobodian.
Rena Narumi – Dancer
Amy Rutherford – Voice Actor Amy was classically trained at both the National Theatre School and Stratford Festival of Canada’s Conservatory. She’s worked for close to 20 years in TV, film and theatre with many of Canada’s leading directors and writers. She’s been nominated for several Dora Mavor Moore Awards, one Calgary Critter and was named one of Toronto’s Top Ten Theatre Artists by Now Magazine. Amy has played some of Shakespeare’s most celebrated characters, including Viola in Twelfth Night and Rosalind in As You Like it. Amy will be reprising her role of Carmen in Hannah Moscovitch’s award-winning play Infinity later this year.
Cindy Salgado – Dancer Since graduating from the Juilliard School with the Princess Grace Award in 2005, Cindy has performed with Aszure Barton and Artists, chuthis., and on various projects for Mia Michaels and Andy Blankenbuehler. Cindy is a faculty member for New York City Dance Alliance and the cofounder of Artists Striving To End Poverty (ASTEP).
Renée Sigouin – Dancer Renée was born in Saskatchewan and moved to Vancouver in 2008. Since graduating from the Modus Operandi program in 2012, she has performed with Out Innerspace Dance Theatre, Company 605, Wen Wei Dance, Mascall Dance, Kinesis Dance Somatheatro, EDAM, Constance Cooke and Emmalena Fredriksson. Photos © Michael Slobodian. Tom Visser’s photo © Laurens Bouvrie.
Jermaine Spivey – Dancer Kidd Pivot member since 2008, is a graduate of Baltimore School for the Arts and The Juilliard School. Jermaine has performed with Ballet Gulbenkian, Cullberg Ballet, American Repertory Theater, Robyn Live 2016 and The Forsythe Company. Jermaine instructs dance internationally, choreographs, creates and performs interdisciplinary works with partner Spenser Theberge.
Jay Gower Taylor – Scenic And Reflective Light Concept Designer For the last decade, Jay has created onstage environments in collaboration with Crystal Pite for Nederlands Dans Theater, the National Ballet of Canada, Sadler’s Wells, and the last three major works of Kidd Pivot, including Betroffenheit. Recently, Jay designed The Seasons’ Canon for The Paris Opera Ballet and Flight Pattern for The Royal Ballet, London.
Tiffany Tregarthen – Dancer Born in Prince George, BC, Tiffany’s career began in New York, Seoul and Antwerp before co-founding Out Innerspace Dance Theatre and postsecondary program Modus Operandi in Vancouver. She has danced with Radix Theatre, Beijing Modern Dance Company, Vancouver Opera, Company 605, Wen Wei Dance, and Justine Chambers among others.
Tom Visser – Lighting Designer Tom Visser grew up in the countryside of west Ireland. At the age of 18 he started working in music theatre through his theatrical family and in dance through the Nederlands Dans Theater. Since 2005 he has created original designs for choreographers including Crystal Pite, Alexander Ekman, Johan Inger, Stijn Celis, Lukas Timulak, Sharon Eyal, Hofesh Shechter, and more.
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