2017 / 2018 SEASON
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October 2017Fortuitous Endings
What To Do When You Wake Up Drunk In A BBQ Cover In Your Neighbour's Backyard Returning to Edmonton audiences in October, the inaugural Jake W Hastey piece that launched Toy Guns Dance Theatre into existence will be re-envisioned and brought to life with our full professional company! Once compared to watching a car accident while riding a camel on a busy street in San Francisco but the chairs are more comfortable and there is no paper work required, Fortuitous Endings...first premiered at the Canoe Festival in January 2015, presented by our good friends at Workshop West (They also have a season of amazing shows!). |
This show is an exploration of the moment near the end of a relationship, when you stop telling your friends the whole truth. Humour and impressive physical theatre work by the "awe-inspiring" dancer/actors, combined with the "endlessly creative" mind of Artistic Director Jake W Hastey, will accompany you on a tragic and comedic journey to the demise of a once passionate love.
Featuring original music, performed live by Must Be Tuesday.
ATB Financial Arts Barns
Westbury Theatre
Performances: Preview Oct 4, Shows Oct 5,6, 7 @ 7:30 pm
Featuring original music, performed live by Must Be Tuesday.
ATB Financial Arts Barns
Westbury Theatre
Performances: Preview Oct 4, Shows Oct 5,6, 7 @ 7:30 pm
A Note From The Artistic Director
The condensed 2017 season concluded with Fortuitous Endings this past October. Initially there were plans to continue a run of self produced new works but a redirection of company resources was decided upon for 2018-2020. We love our audience, students, and artists and are so excited to share our best with you in the years to come. What follows is the story of how Toy Guns was built from a mission statement and a dream.
In early 2014 a couple of naive artists were incorporating a dance company and had a meeting with a mentor, writer, and teacher of business communication. Timothy Anderson took a collection of sentence fragments, a list of values, and a mind map of dreams and turned it into a mission statement. Toy Guns Artistic Director Jake W Hastey paid for dinner but the mission statement as penned by Timothy provided a map through the abyss of arts management.
The Mission
“To develop, produce, and champion engaging and challenging dance theatre/kinetic narrative art and extend its’ influence and audience internationally”
The mission contains three distinct actions to “develop, produce, and champion” and each of these actions were given a season of focus in the company’s first three years. In the 2014 season our primary focus was development, resulting in the company’s highest level of new work development to date. This included four full length stage productions (although one was first performed in early 2015), two short films, and three promotional videos. In 2015 the focus was on production with our efforts focused on producing and presenting the companies work resulting in over fifty live performances including touring to Ontario and throughout Alberta, with performances at multiple curated festival performances, and having our video work viewed on Air Canada flights and Telus Optik TV. in 2016 the focus was championing the company and artistic work, efforts were focused intensely on how we could engage Edmonton’s youth, emerging artists, professional artists, companies, and the diverse general population. This led to the formalizing of the School of Toy Guns Dance Theatre, the launch of our outdoor dance festival Dancing In The Park, A community performance and fundraiser The Ultimate Dance Battle, and remounting past productions with increasingly experienced professional performers. These season specific focuses allowed us to allocate a majority of resources to our primary focus each year while learning and refining the endeavours of the past season.
The 2017 year marked a transition year where the past programs were further refined and a new three year plan was developed. Going forward we will be focusing our energy on the second half of the mission statement. 2018-2020 will be an exciting time to refine the wonderful work already done by the team at Toy Guns while working to extend the influence and audience of our company’s work. Thank you to Timothy for the insightful words that have guided the last years of the company and thank you to all who have supported us on this journey of dance in Edmonton and beyond.
In early 2014 a couple of naive artists were incorporating a dance company and had a meeting with a mentor, writer, and teacher of business communication. Timothy Anderson took a collection of sentence fragments, a list of values, and a mind map of dreams and turned it into a mission statement. Toy Guns Artistic Director Jake W Hastey paid for dinner but the mission statement as penned by Timothy provided a map through the abyss of arts management.
The Mission
“To develop, produce, and champion engaging and challenging dance theatre/kinetic narrative art and extend its’ influence and audience internationally”
The mission contains three distinct actions to “develop, produce, and champion” and each of these actions were given a season of focus in the company’s first three years. In the 2014 season our primary focus was development, resulting in the company’s highest level of new work development to date. This included four full length stage productions (although one was first performed in early 2015), two short films, and three promotional videos. In 2015 the focus was on production with our efforts focused on producing and presenting the companies work resulting in over fifty live performances including touring to Ontario and throughout Alberta, with performances at multiple curated festival performances, and having our video work viewed on Air Canada flights and Telus Optik TV. in 2016 the focus was championing the company and artistic work, efforts were focused intensely on how we could engage Edmonton’s youth, emerging artists, professional artists, companies, and the diverse general population. This led to the formalizing of the School of Toy Guns Dance Theatre, the launch of our outdoor dance festival Dancing In The Park, A community performance and fundraiser The Ultimate Dance Battle, and remounting past productions with increasingly experienced professional performers. These season specific focuses allowed us to allocate a majority of resources to our primary focus each year while learning and refining the endeavours of the past season.
The 2017 year marked a transition year where the past programs were further refined and a new three year plan was developed. Going forward we will be focusing our energy on the second half of the mission statement. 2018-2020 will be an exciting time to refine the wonderful work already done by the team at Toy Guns while working to extend the influence and audience of our company’s work. Thank you to Timothy for the insightful words that have guided the last years of the company and thank you to all who have supported us on this journey of dance in Edmonton and beyond.
