Praxis Theatre

Your contribution matters

Last week Calgary’s annual theatre awards, The Bettys, took place. It was a good night for Alberta Theatre Projects (ATP), which garnered eight awards, but especially for ATP Artistic Associate Vicki Stroich, who accepted an Outstanding Achievement Award for her work as a dramaturg and advocate for new work.

Word of the awesomeness of her acceptance speech has spread far and wide, so we were pleased to see it posted on the ATP blog, which we have reprinted below with her permission.

Click here for a list of all the Betty nominees and winners

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Vicki Stroich holds her Outstanding Achievement Award after giving an outstanding speech

I have a lot of people to thank because any contribution I have made has come with the support, guidance, encouragement and inspiration of the people around me.

First, thank you to the Betty Mitchell Awards Steering Committee and especially Adrienne Smook for this surprising and humbling honour.

I have to thank my teachers, my friends and my family. My parents (who are here tonight) for showing me the value of hard work and for supporting my choice to live a life less ordinary.

I need to thank all the collaborators and co conspirators I’ve worked with, all the playwrights, directors, actors, designers, stage managers and crew for the amazing and unique experience of creating new things together year after year, with all the challenges and triumphs that process brings.

I want to thank my fellow dramaturges, the ones in this room and the ones across Canada, across the border and in other parts of the world for reminding me what a vital role we have.

I thank the Canadian theatre community and most especially I have to thank this community of artists here. I grew up here in Calgary both as a person and an artist and every year I am reminded that this is a community of artists who make things happen. There is ambition and heart and an ingenuity here that is constantly inspiring. No matter how big and bold the idea, I know we will find a way to make it happen. And that’s rare. And I treasure it.

And I must thank Alberta Theatre Projects and the people who have raised me up in the theatre, who supported me, gave me not only the encouragement but the resources to foster the work and make things happen and who have done so with a great deal of love and a massive amount of good humour; Bob White, Dianne Goodman, Vanessa Porteous, Lyndee Hansen and all the great people I have worked with.

I can appreciate what goes into supporting someone or something. It’s what I have chosen to do. And as someone who has chosen to support and advocate for the vision and work of other people, it seems strange to be up here at the mic alone accepting an award for something that is meant to be behind the scenes.

But when people ask me what it is I do, exactly, I use that word “support” a lot. I also use words like listen and witness. On the surface these words might seem passive, but I have learned not to think of them that way. It has been my experience from working with artists that the act of listening, the act of witnessing is a powerful and rare contribution to someone’s work. I used to take it for granted. I don’t anymore.

The other part of that “support” is more vocal; I ask questions and advocate. I use my voice to help people understand their work better (at least that’s the goal) and if I can, I help them gather the resources and team together to make their project everything it deserves to be. I used to take that for granted, too; my voice. I don’t as much anymore.

I chose to support people because I wanted to make some contribution to the world they wanted to create, to the voice they wanted to express, to a vision they wanted to share. The unique quality of theatre to create an exchange of ideas and emotions and most of all, energy, captivates me. I didn’t think about what the result of 9 years of listening and witnessing and questioning and advocating day to day would contribute. I choose to do it everyday because, like you, I love the theatre. Because I wanted to contribute to it. Because it means something.

That I am standing here being given an award for the sum of those contributions (so far) is truly humbling. I will not take it for granted. It inspires me to contribute my eyes and my ears and my voice and my heart tomorrow and the next day and the next day and on and on.

Listening and witnessing and questioning and advocating is something we can all do. These are contributions that we can all make to our community, to our culture and to this art form that we all love. Please don’t take your own individual contributions day to day for granted. They mean something.

Click here to read the a longer post by Vicki on the ATP website for more context and inspiration!