by Michael Wheeler

“The rich people have their lobbyists and the poor people have their feet.”

Nathalie Des Rosiers, General Counsel of Canadian Civil Liberties Association speaking at a post-show panel at after You Should Have Stayed Home at The 2011 SummerWorks Festival.

This summer I directed You Should Have Stayed Home, a play about theatre artist Tommy Taylor’s experience over 48 hours of the G20 weekend in Toronto presented at the 2011 SummerWorks Festival. While trying to return home from his first ever protest as a law-abiding citizen at the “Free Speech Zone” at Queen’s Park, Taylor was swept up in a mass arrest, caged with 40 other people in a 10ft by 20ft cage and denied drinking water until he passed out from dehydration.

Taylor contacted me in February to talk about collaborating on a piece of theatre adapted from his Facebook note, How I Got Arrested and Abused at G20 in Toronto. Having read the post, I knew the story presented an excellent opportunity to dramatize and address the deterioration of civil rights in Canada.

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The proceeds frorm these nation-wide readings will go to the recently de-funded Summerworks Festival

by Michael Wheeler

Today will see over 70 companies across the country join together in readings of the play Homegrown by Catherine Frid, in an impressive display of solidarity amongst Canadian theatre artists.

As one of these 70, it is a heartfelt honour for Praxis Theatre to join our peers from coast-to-coast in an action that supports the notion that art is created within an ecosystem, and that it is a slippery slope down the road towards censorship if a government only forms relationships with artists that support or reinforce its ideological agenda.

Here’s all of the key Homegrown info:

• Kelly Nestruck in the Globe and Mail on why The Heritage Minister’s answers on this question don’t add up
• Today’s new post on The Wrecking Ball Website on which companies are participating where: SEVENTY COMPANIES, TWELVE READINGS, ONE CAUSE
• Analysis of the situation in The National Post by Angela Hickman
• Analysis of the situation here on praxistheatre.com
• Michael Healey’s killer Globe and Mail blog post on why this action is important
• A selection of articles about readings going on in Halifax, Kitchener, Stratford, Edmonton, and Vancouver

As a final note, a tip of the hat to playwright Catherine Frid who didn’t ask for any of this but lends her play to the entire country tonight. And another to event organizer Michael Healey for showing leadership in pursuit of solidarity in a time when we needed both.

Image Courtesy of Natural Resources Canada

Momentum grows for nation-wide performances of Homegrown by all theatre organizations that receive federal funding in protest of Summerworks Festival being defunded by Federal Government

by Michael Wheeler

Last week saw freedom of speech and federal support for the arts come under unprecedented attack by the Harper Government when the Summerworks Festival had its Heritage Department funding pulled with no information given as to why.

This follows a series of co-ordinated attacks on the festival by SUN Media and even The Prime Minister himself, some of which I wrote about last August, when the performance of the play Homegrown by Catherine Frid, about a lawyer’s relationship with a man convicted of terrorism, was being used as a smokescreen to deflect attention from public outrage over the discontinuation of the long-form census.

Last week, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty followed up the Summerworks announcement with this statement:

“One thing I’d say, and maybe it’s different than it used to be, is we actually don’t believe in festivals and cultural institutions assuming that year after year after year they’ll receive government funding. They ought not assume entitlement to grants … no organization should assume in their budgeting that every year the government of Canada is going to give them grants because there’s lots of competition, lots of other festivals, and there are new ideas that come along. So it’s a good idea for everyone to stay on their toes and not make that assumption.”

While it may seem reasonable to suggest that arts organizations shouldn’t simply expect automatic renewal of funding, there is no argument to be made for this kind of  cut to an organization with a strong record of meeting and exceeding its mandate, announcing consecutive years of record-breaking attendance and growth.

The cumulative message behind the Summerworks axe and the statement by the Finance Minister could not be more clear:

If you create work that critiques the Harper Government – we will take away your funding.

So begins what will likely be a challenging era for cultural institutions that are committed to making groundbreaking work which may (gasp) challenge the dominant value system – or just aren’t interested in being propagandists for a mean-spirited regime designed to respond to the commands of a leader who cannot tolerate criticism. When L’Etat C’est Moi is the rule of the day – and Moi has a big problem with people putting on plays about ideas he doesn’t agree with – Houston We Have A Problem.

Of course the argument is being presented that this is freeing up funds to support new ideas – but anyone who knows anything about the way the cultural ecosystem functions knows this is complete hogwash: Stripping Summerworks of $43,000 in funding to free up $500,000 for The Walk of Fame Festival is like declaring yourself pro-Rain, but anti-Cloud.

Even if we accept for a moment that promoting already famous people like Alex Trebek is a good idea that needs support from taxpayer dollars, how on earth do they imagine artists on very rare occasions become famous? They struggle to hone their craft in festivals devoted to groundbreaking work just like Summerworks, which has an extraordinary record as the birthplace for a number of the most exciting new works in Canadian performance. Last year’s Summerworks hit, Ride The Cyclone, recently announced an off-Broadway deal as a direct result of participating in Summerworks.

After traveling from Victoria BC to Toronto to participate in the National Series at Summerworks, Atomic Vaudeville's 'Ride The Cyclone' get a chance to take their show to NYC.

Almost none of the artists involved in Summerworks will be paid a living wage. Practically everyone doing a Summerworks show is working a second/third job and knows the best they can hope for financially is a small honorarium and that the show will go on to have a greater life after the festival. Everyone participating does it anyhow – because they know that Summerworks is an important place for new contemporary performance in Canada.

All of this is to say giving Summerworks the axe is an extremely poor approach to public policy and the cultural equivalent of poisoning the well.

The immediate impact of this politically motivated intervention in cultural policy is that ticket prices will go up and the marketing budget will go down. All tickets, including for the Praxis Theatre/The Original Norwegian Co-Pro, You Should Have Stayed Home, are now going up by 50% to $15. ($10 + $5 FST*) *Free Speech Tax. Summerworks is also in the midst of a grassroots fundraising campaign you can participate in here.

Canadian Actors Equity Association’s Executive Director Arden R. Ryshpan was the first member of the theatre community to respond to the situation with a statement released by CAEA last week:

“It is hard to interpret the Minister’s statement as anything but a threat and a potential ideological attack on the arts. I don’t recall seeing similar statements made about long-term government support to other industries such as forestry, fisheries or mining. Given that our industry is larger than all three of these sectors combined, we deserve better from our Government including meaningful consultation leading to thoughtful program change and development, if required. An off-the-cuff remark by a Minister alluding to substantial change of practice is shocking and imprudent.”

Artists across the country have also independently begun to respond positively and pro-actively to the situation. The Globe and Mail reports Western Edge Theatre in Nanaimo, B.C. will perform a public reading of Homegrown on July 15 with all proceeds going to The Summerworks Festival.

Multi Dora-winning Shaw and Tarragon playwright Michael Healey has sent out a call to action to all Artistic Directors of organizations that receive Federal arts funding to join Western Edge Theatre in performing a reading of the play, whether or not they participate in the fundraising initiative. Healey has offered to provide scripts and keep a list of participating companies so that the initiative can continue to gain momentum.

This is not the type of storm theat can be weathered by hoping they won’t come for you. Or if they do survive it that way – lets talk about how relevant the work those theatres end up putting on will be. Will Stephen Harper’s vision of Canada be the only art that forms partnerships with the government? The final sentence of Michael Healey’s message to AD’s of Canadian Theatres urging them to participate in a nationwide reading of Homegrown expresses best the necessity of a national response to this attack on Canadian culture:

“If you find yourself anxious about the potential ramifications for your own company’s federal funding as a consequence of taking part in this demonstration, I can think of no better reason for participating in it.”

Photo by Rob Huntley

You might not know it reading this space lately, but Toronto is not the only municipality having a municipal election in Ontario on October 25th. In fact they all are!

To celebrate their civic conundrum, The Wrecking Ball crew in Ottawa has put together an event for the occasion with new political works by Pierre Brault, Todd Duckworth, Kris Joseph, Catriona Leger, Kevin Loring, Glenn Nuotio, Alix Sideris and Dennis Van Staalduinen. All proceeds are split between Actor’s Fund of Canada and Médecins Sans Frontières / Doctors Without Borders (MSF).

Meanwhile here in Toronto, political heads are spinning following the release of a new ICAN-Reid Poll that shows Pantalone solidly in first place with Ford and Smitherman tied a distant second. It remains unclear what effect this will have on other electoral conversations going on in the theatrosphere in places like here and here.

OCAD's lobby became the overflow room to the overflow room. Photo: Sarah Mulholland

by Michael Wheeler

The biggest benefit of last night’s Mayoral Arts Debate organized by ArtsVote is the massive interest there was in the event itself. The doors opened at 5pm. At 5:10pm the room was declared at capacity and attendees were directed to an overflow room at OCAD. Next the overflow room itself began to overflow before being declared at capacity at 5:40pm. Anyone after that occupied the OCAD lobby, which became the overflow room for the overflow room. An estimated 1750 streamed it live on their computers, while 540 others watched it since.

All told, this untelevised debate attracted an audience of over 3000 active and engaged citizens. This will matter much more a year from now when the elected members decide which election promises to keep and which will shatter on the altar of “hard economic times”.  Clearly this is an issue that the populace is engaged in and is willing to organize around. In short, and this is the only thing that really matters around City Hall, there can be tangible political consequences to politicians who dismiss the arts as inconsequential.

James Di Fiore spoke at the AGO as a mayoral candidate with a mission to improve citizen engagement in civic politics by 18-35 year olds.

Praxis Theatre was tweeting the whole debate if you’re looking for a play by play of the he said, he said, and a video replay is streamable here, but post-debate chat unanimously agreed the candidates presented a series of lacklustre performances due to the absence of both substance to the discussion and charisma or a sense of leadership on anyone’s part. Ford said a couple of outrageous things that were by no means the craziest things he’s ever said, and the other contenders managed to snipe at one another in a way that no one looked like a hero.

A bright spot to the evening was James Di Fiore, the candidate invited to participate through an online poll on the ArtsVote website. Admitting he had no chance to become mayor, he addressed the fact that in the previous civic election 18% of eligible voters under 35 participated.  His main thrust was that the problem is not apathy, but a belief amongst this cohort that political engagement is a waste of their time as the discourse does not address them or their issues. None of the other candidates addressed these concerns, which pretty much reinforced the notion that James was correct in his analysis.

With major arts policy announcements earlier in the day, both Rossi and Smitherman announced their arts and culture platforms, which they both refer to as their “Creative City” plans, referencing the city’s 2003 Creative City culture plan. Heavily influenced by the ideas of Martin Prosperity Institute Director Richard Florida, it suggests that arts and culture can improve a city’s economy by improving its “creativity index”. Separate from the highly suspect nature of the premises Florida uses to support these claims, last night it allowed these candidates to use broad platitudes about contributing to both the “soul” and the “economic engine” of the city without saying much of substance.

Most candidates agreed to increase cultural funding from $17 to $25 per capita, which is exactly what councillors have solemnly resolved to do for quite some time while not actually doing it, so this was hardly earth shattering territory. Rossi tried to distinguish himself in this regard by committing to making the increase in his first year as mayor and have it up to $33 by the end of his (highly theoretical at this point) mandate.

The most memorable moment of the evening occurred when Rob Ford suggested holding fundraising dinners as a substitute for arts funding. Until that point the audience had been fairly civil and respectful to a candidate that had aggressively attacked the arts as a councillor at City Hall, but the crowd couldn’t resist responding with a pretty solid “Boo” from all corners of the room to this remark. Praxis Artistic Producer Aislinn Rose later noted: “It was like suggesting to an aspiring actor to consider getting a job at Stratford.” We had thought of that one a little while ago.

Skip ahead to 4:40 to see Praxis Board Member Bridget Macintosh explain the Praxis Gourmet Dinner fundraising events we’ve been holding since 2004. Complete with slides!

This will be remembered as the debate that no one could get into it was such a hot ticket. Blog TO reports that even some media were initially being turned away as the debate began due to capacity issues, and accounts from the overflow room suggest a boisterous crowd responding vocally to each performance. As the numbers attest, this was AN EVENT.

The whole evening was possible due to some impressive work by ArtsVote, a volunteer advocacy group that has already been influential in civic politics as a force that contributed to Barbara Hall’s successful run for mayor. The focus and media attention this debate brought to the cultural community and the issues of arts funding this election solidify ArtsVote as a major player in Toronto elections by forcing politicians to explain their cultural positions in a high profile venue under a bright media spotlight.

Tip O’ The Hat ArtsVote.

Things you should know about today’s Toronto Mayoral candidate debate:

* All the major contenders have confirmed. The debate will be moderated by Jim Fleck.

* Read this excellent backgrounder on the event by Torontoist Senior Editor Hamutal Dotan.

* Arrive at The Art Gallery of Ontario early: Doors open at 5pm, the debate starts at 6pm, it finishes at 7:30pm.

* If you can’t get in because it’s packed – head to OCAD room 230 where they will be livestreaming the debate.

* Bring your friends. Turnout for the debate will indicate, in some broad  way, support for arts and culture in the city.

* Post-debate drinks are at Sin and Redemption across the street on McCaul.

* If you can’t make it at all, Torontoist is livestreaming the debate live on their website.

* Do not attack the Borg. Shooting (or insulting) the Borg only makes them stronger.

Someone forgot to tell the PM that encouraging Nickelback actually reduces Canadian culture...or did they?

by Michael Wheeler

Shortly after the 2008 Federal election, Peter Donolo, soon-to-be Chief of Staff to Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff, addressed a select group of executive directors and organizational leaders at an industry seminar organized by The Arts Advocate. In his role as pollster for The Globe and Mail during the election, Donolo had accumulated extensive data on the arts and how it had impacted the race. One piece of information from his presentation produced audible exhalations and dismayed nodding of heads:

The highest polling numbers the Harper campaign ever saw in the province of Ontario were on the day after his Ordinary People Don’t Care About The Arts statement (Sept 24/08).

However much it seems retrospectively the comments were a careless slip that may have cost the government a majority, the reality is there was an emotional resonance to this message that initially gave him momentum in a battleground province. Eventually, these numbers receded in the weeks before voters went to the polls, leaving the merged Canadian Alliance and PC parties short of a majority government with the support of just over one third of the electorate.

Seen in this context, comments made by the PM to the national media that he was “concerned” by Catherine Frid’s play Homegrown at the 2010 Summerworks Festival begin to fit into the government’s larger agenda as a strategic exercise by a government no longer able to communicate through rational discourse.  These comments point to a desire to use emotionally charged signposts to frame discussions and talking points, rather than the merits of programs and policies based on data or logic.

Will we talk about the arts next election in relation to harnessing our imaginations and creativity within a complex and multidimensional culture? Or will we discuss the arts in relation to whether we should use tax dollars to support terrorism? These are the types of paradigms that are being established in the discourse leading up to the next election.

If Harper succeeds in connecting arts funding and supporting terrorism, it will fit in well with a campaign that paints public funding for political parties to replace the influence of massive donations by corporations and unions as supporting separatism, a coalition government as advocating socialism, and an inquiry into the largest series of civil rights violations in Canadian history at G20 as supporting anarchism.

Of course none of these references are true, but it doesn’t matter. Every mainstream reviewer who saw Homegrown went out of their way to specifically address the allegations by the PM and his office that the play “glorified terrorism”. Each one reached the identical explicit conclusion that the play in no way justified or supported terrorism. What matters is that arts funding and taking a “sympathetic” view of terrorism are now a cultural meme that some people will remember. Mission accomplished.

This type of highly emotional and dramatic hyperbole will be backed up by an impressive war chest accumulated by the Conservative Party that has been significantly out-fundraising the opposition since fall 2008. In the lead up to the next election, this will back a multi-million dollar wave of negative ads in every media geared at emotional flashpoints in an effort to define complex policy issues with simple narratives that elicit a kneejerk response from sub-cortical “reptilian” elements of the brain.

By hoping to communicate with voters through fight or flight stimuli, the goal is to avoid any rational or substantive debate. Next year, without any reliable or detailed information available through the census, there will be even less data available to evaluate and discuss policies and programs. The heavily partisan bent of the Harper government has forced it to abdicate a knowledge-based discussion of their policies, save a few economic statistics that neglect to mention the sizeable budget surplus Canada had when they took the reins of government and the huge deficit they have generated five years later.

When Kory Teneycke (l) was Communications Director to the PM they both lunched in NYC with Fox News President Rupert Murdoch. Four months later he left his position to lead Quebecor Media's attempt to rewrite CRTC rules in their favour to start Fox News North, which he is pictured announcing.

This embrace by Conservative strategists of US Tea Party-style political tactics is set to be joined by the biggest weapon in regressive populist media: Our very own Fox News. Upset that the current CRTC head won’t fast track a special Category 1 licence for a national TV station to be run by Harper’s previous spokesperson, Harper is set to replace him with someone who is willing to break CRTC rules to allow him a national TV station dedicated to supporting and propagating his ideology.

Who owns the station “applying” for this licence? You guessed it: SUN Media. The very same SUN Media that created the Homegrown controversy in their Toronto newspaper and scandalously asked Harper about the play with one of only two English language questions available to the media in Harper’s first comments to the country in over a month. It has since been revealed that virtually every other journalist in attendance had already agreed to ask him about the census. (What the entire national media didn’t think Canadians from coast-to-coast were dying to hear the PMs thoughts on a summer indie theatre festival?)

There is an unfortunate logic to politics that right-wing parties are succeeding when they are talking about the military and the economy, and failing when they talk about things like education, healthcare and culture. By framing culture as a “spending” and  “national security” issue they are effectively taking a topic that is a loser for them and turning it into a winner. Combine that with the strong numbers in Ontario after Harper’s anti-arts statements in 2008 and the fact the Conservatives have given up completely in Quebec, and we may be looking at another election where arts and culture is again under attack.

This is not necessarily a great strategy for Harper – where last election arts and culture supporters were caught off guard being attacked by their own government, this election they will be organized, have lists of active supporters in every major city, and have identified leaders and organizing strategies that target swing ridings. They are also way better than them at gaining earned media and using the internet. At the end of the day, it will be up to the opposition, the non-Quebecor owned press, and civil society to shift the debate out of the highly emotional, into factual analysis of the policies and parties that will best serve the country.

Lately, it has been the subject of some media as to whether an emotional, ideologically-based discussion of policies and programs can become a substitute for rational debate that includes data and information.

It can not.

Mon June 21st @ 8pm. Theatre Centre. Queen & Dovercourt. PWYC.

Wrecking Ball #10 is on its way, and with works by artists Marjorie Chan, Melody Johnson, Bea Pizano, Schuyler (Sky) Gilbert & Roland Schimmelpfennig, you really want to be there.  Click here for more information.

Councillors sat at these desks to pass the sign bylaw 25 -16 before investigating how the flux capacitor had caused the warp drive to go offline

By Michael Wheeler

Yep, that’s right: Toronto has a new sign bylaw and it’s a pretty good one. A ten-year battle by public space advocates was passed by an even wider margin they hoped for. It will create more than $10 million for the City of Toronto annually. Their success will likely go down as a famous and glorious moment in grassroots political organizing in Toronto, and a good story for the kids about what you can accomplish with a huge dose of sticktoitiveness and a flawlessly executed and integrated social and mainstream media campaign.

The news for arts funding advocates was less rosy. Even though the City of Toronto staff report recommended directing the revenue to arts funding, the bylaw was passed without this stipulation and there are many assurances, but no guarantees, that some of the funds will be earmarked for art. Councillor Rob Ford stated explicitly that he believed the monies would not end up being used for arts funding.

Ford was emblematic of the virulent anti-artist bias that still exists within City Hall. Attacking artists in attendance, referring to them as “freeloaders”, he questioned their ability to simultaneously be employed and participate in democracy by attending City Hall. Councillor Minnan-Wong went as far to suggest that artists are not real people – hoping to ensure that the funds would never see any arts groups going instead to, “real people, real communities”.

Councillor Rob Ford was comfortable hurling insults at artists during the debate.

Cheekiest moment of the debate went to Councillor Adam Vaughan for his motion that the City of Toronto congratulate Knaan for being chosen to perform in front of hundreds of millions with his 2010 World Cup song and for generally becoming a major world superstar who is still engaged with his community. Counsellor Vaughan was also quick to point out that Knaan had been the recipient of municipal arts funding when he was an emerging artist in Etobicoke – the region Rob Ford represents.

Net result: This is a great opportunity for artists to take the high road and and strengthen relationships with their allies. Clearly this bylaw would never have passed with out artists and arts-based activism. Clearly the arts should see some of this money – but what about the rest of it? After $1.4 Million of the tax is used to pay for proper enforcement of the new sign bylaws, what will the other $9 million go to? Obviously the Toronto Arts Council is a good start, all of it would double what TAC gives out in a given year, which seems unrealistic in a city with a cost-prohibitive transit system.

What are the other things that make a city beautiful?  I would go with 1) less hunger 2) more affordable housing 3) cleaner air/better cycling routes. Someone else might pick something else, but I bet most artists would be in the same ballpark. Arts activists are now in a unique position to increase their own funding and that of their allies and partners in making a truly beautiful city.

This is possibly the only way to prove ideologues like Ford and Minnan-Wong wrong: By showing we understand we are part of a grander scheme for society, one that incorporates many factors that work in tandem with one another that make our communities a better place to live. We are even capable of sharing resources amongst ourselves – because it is essential to each element that we all thrive. Real people and communities are complicated and multi-dimensional that way.