Northern Drama Festival 2012

My good friends and colleagues Richard Tulloch and Ursula Dubosarsky have recently been to New York to see works of theirs performed in theatres on Broadway. In the case of Richard it was his play adaptation of the Dutch children's book, The Book of Everything by Guus Kuijer. (Note: this was Richard's second Broadway production, the first being an adaptation of Eric Carle's works a couple of years ago.) Richard Tulloch is an actor, children's book writer, scriptwriter, travel writer, cyclist and the author of the hugely entertaining Life on the Road blog.

Ursula's New York triumph was the adaptation of her children's picture book, The Terrible Plop (No, it's not about what you're thinking.). The play, re-titled simply "Plop!" was adapted and presented by the Windmill Theater of Adelaide, South Australia.

But enough of my friends' accomplishments. If there was one place I would have loved to have been this year it wouldn't have been New York City and the Great White Way but Ile-a-la-Crosse, Saskatchewan, Canada. And I'd have been there to see the multi-award-winning, talented kids from the Charlebois Community School of Cumberland House (that's a town) in Northern Saskatchewan in their production of a play of mine called, "Waiting for Joe Doe". How these kids ended up putting on one of my plays is a story in itself.

It all started when Lana Patterson, the dedicated Drama Teacher at Charlebois Community School found a copy of the now-long-gone book of my funny plays, Comedies for Kids, and produced one of the plays ("Muck-up at Murder Mansion"---re-naming it "Mystery at Murder Mansion"). She and the cast and crew of Charlebois took it to Northern Drama Festival and won a stack of awards. Later, they did the same with another production of a play also from the same book, "The Perils of Prince Percy of Pomegranate", and again they won lots of plaudits. Cumberland House is a First Nations community and they retitled this play  "The Perils of Chief Cimagasiw of Ciciganihk" putting some of it in their first language, Cree.

The recent production, "Waiting for Joe Doe", was another comedy play from the same book and, once again, the kids did themselves and their school proud. I'm only sorry that I couldn't have been there to bask in their limelight.

The cast and crew showing signs of stress after too many rehearsals

And, finally, basking in  well-deserved glory

photos by Ken Reimer 2012

Kato Carriere played Bugsy

Leah Sewap played Mugs

Drew Thommes played Mona and Happy Harry 

Asagewin Carriere played Bombshell Betty and Blind Billy 

Devri Settee played Joe Doe and Weasel Willy 

Steven Crate played Jumpy Jack 

Brandon Carriere played the bodyguard

Ericka Chaboyer played Baby Calhoun 

Demi Carriere played the Nanny 

Kaelee Chaboyer was our Stage Manager 

Jordan Shaw and Jonah Nabess were Light and Sound

The envelope please---and the awards went to:

Certificate of Merit for Technical- Drew Thommes - (props¬ Machine Guns) 

Certificate of Merit for Technical - Jordan Shaw - (Lighting & Sound) 

Certificate of Merit for Acting - Drew Thommes - (Mona) 

Bob Hinitt Technical Award - Kaelee Chaboyer

Mary Ellen Burgess Acting Award - Kato Carriere

An Acting Award - Asagewin Carrier - Bombshell Betty 

Best Technical Crew Award - Charlebois Community School

Runner-Up to Best Technical Production - Charlebois Community School

And a special oscar to Lana Patterson, drama teacher and dramaturg extrordinaire and to her fellow director Ken Reimer! I only wish I had more plays for guys.