Act 2 in the offing for Magnetic North Theatre Festival
Financial troubles forced the cancellation of the 14-year-old festival last March.
The Magnetic North Theatre Festival is hoping for a comeback after financial troubles forced the cancellation of the 2017 edition.
A new board of directors is working on a plan to revive the annual theatre festival, but is still shouldering a debt of about $240,000, according to Heather Redfern, the board's new chair and one of the festival's founders.
"We are the experts. And this is a problem that needs the experts thrown at it," Redfern told CBC Radio's All In A Day.
Other board members include Ken Gass, the artistic director of Canadian Rep Theatre, Vancouver arts programmer Amy Lynn Strilchuk, and Tammy Fox, the executive director of the Burlington Performing Arts Centre.
Festival showcased Canadian work
The first edition of Magnetic North was in 2003. A driving force behind it was Marti Maraden, who was at the time the artistic director of English theatre at the National Arts Centre.
The festival alternated between Ottawa and other Canadian cities, and featured locally-produced works along with shows from other parts of Canada. It was especially important to artists in smaller communities, Redfern said, for the exposure it gave them to both audiences as well as people who could help them take their work on tour.
"It's a very democratic gathering place, where everyone from theatre students to people running some of the largest arts organizations in the country, to audiences, to artists with projects that they want to pitch, can all kind of come together and talk," she said.
The festival also exposed people in smaller communities to Canadian theatre, which rarely happened before, said Redfern, who also serves as the executive director of the Vancouver East Cultural Centre.
Conversations happening with creditors
When the festival shut down last spring, the board said it had struggled over five years to reduce the accumulated deficit by half, but "the continued pressure of an accumulated deficit makes the festival untenable."
Then-chair Mike Hawkes suggested that alternating the festival between Ottawa and other cities contributed to the challenges. That model could be re-thought.
"We don't feel like we have to hang onto anything that went before," Redfern said.
The board has plans for fundraising, as well as meetings in cities across the country to discuss a way forward for the festival. It's also attempting to come to agreements with creditors.
"I think the conversations are quite healing, and I think it's very important for us to have them and look at how we can structure that debt," she said.
With files from CBC Radio