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Melanie (she/they) is a theatre maker who stubbornly insists on approaching arts administration work with the same joy and creative rigour she deploys in the studio. Her background in embodied, consent-based performance practice grounds her passion for innovation in sectoral change, governance, and management. Her passion for fat liberation and body neutrality is woven into all of the work she does.
Melanie helps keep PTC running smoothly, with a special focus on creativity in capacity management, mentorship, and values alignment. In addition to her administration work, she’s proudly served on the boards of several arts organizations, while being committed to dismantling the inequities inherent in this system.
As an artist, Melanie has worked with companies such as Music on Main, Tara Cheyenne Performance, Bard on the Beach, Carousel Theatre, re:Naissance Opera, and Boca del Lupo. She’s collaborated on many new works, including interdisciplinary projects with theatre, opera, dance, and music artists. She works as a performer, dramaturg, intimacy director, director, and playwright. She has dedicated more than 25 years to the performing arts community and holds a BFA in Theatre Performance from SFU.
Melanie currently lives on the unceded stolen territories of the the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. Born on the territory of the Tsuut’ina, Siksika (Blackfoot), and Stoney (Nakoda) people (Treaty 7), her people are European settlers and refugees. She feels most connected to her lineage when she’s engaging in work that transforms intergenerational trauma with compassion and pleasure.
Joanna (any) is the co-founder, with Yoshie Bancroft, of Universal Limited. Joanna sees dramaturgy as a practice of investigation, research, advice, and above all advocacy, for both a project, and for the artist behind it. Joanna is a frequent mentor, collaborator, and teacher, within PTC and outside of it; and would like their projects to speak for the practice. Joanna is humbled to have long and repeating working relationships with incredible artists, and looks to meet them continually with curiosity and rigour.
Current dramaturgy includes: UL’s To the Sea; Kamila Sediego’s Engkanto, José Teodoro’s Binary Star, Christina Cook’s Postcards to My Younger Transsexual Self, Tara Cheyenne’s Pants, and Anais West’s Tomboy.
Co-creator, with Yoshie Bancroft, of JAPANESE PROBLEM, a piece about the Japanese Canadian Incarceration, performed site-specifically in Vancouver, at Soulpepper in Toronto, and across BC. Joanna is struck by the systemic inequities that repeat in Canada, and commits to trouble those patterns through performance. Other recent credits: Head Dramaturg, National Queer & Trans playwriting Unit (Consortium of 9 Canadian Companies); Berlin: The Last Cabaret (PuSh), Poly Queer Love Ballad, (Passe Muraille, Toronto)
Joanna has been nominated for three Jessie awards; the Pure Research grant (Nightswimming, Toronto), Sydney Risk award for directing. Joanna moved to Unceded Coast-Salish territory to get an MFA in directing at UBC, and focus since has been primarily in new play development, multidisciplinary, and site-specific work. Joanna also trained with Anne Bogart and the SITI Company in New York.
Davey (he/they/siya) stewards many artists and people who come to PTC, where mutual trust is forged when melding stories into meaningful theatre for our community. His dramaturgy, artistic, and producing mandate revolves around community-centered values, collaboration, performance experimentation, and artistic agency. He is Co-Founder of New(to)Town Collective, a former theatre collective aspiring to provide economically accessible, experimental training workshops and create new interdisciplinary works. Davey’s first written solo show, Big Queer Filipino Karaoke Night!, premiered at the 2018 Vancouver Fringe Festival (Produced by Tender Container and associate producers New(to)Town Collective and Neworld Theatre) and continued to be presented throughout the years (most recent, the Variety Program for 2022/23 Evergreen Cultural Centre [Coquitlam, BC], and interactive livestream – Big Queer Filipino Karaoke Night! ONLINE [2023 rEvolver Festival, Vancouver]). Currently, he is the artistic lead for Deep Fried: A Pinoy Musical! (part of PTC’s Company Collaborations), a show about Filipinx-Canadian and racialized service workers who serve us daily. As a child of Filipinx immigrants contending with the consequences of colonialism within his heritage, he is dedicated to learning from and being in good relations with the host nations of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples.
Current dramaturgical projects are God’s A Drag by Jessica Lemes da Silva (2023-24 Fringe New Play Prize Winner, exploring the intersection of Drag and Worship within a play; 2024 Vancouver Fringe Festival) and It Lives in my Bedroom by Mily Mumford (2021-23 PTC Associate), an immersive art-house horror experience. Davey has worked with nationally recognized companies and individuals – including Neworld Theatre, Alley Theatre, Paul Wong, rice and beans theatre, and the Greater Vancouver Professional Theatre Association. Davey is a current member of Playwrights Canadian Press’ Editorial Committee.
Carmela (she/her/siya) is a Filipino-Canadian artist living and working on the unsurrendered traditional territories of xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), səlil̓wətaɁɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) and Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish Nation). She is a graduate of the University of Alberta’s BFA in Acting program and has been working in theatre and film in Western Canada since 2010. Beyond acting, she has been a producer, arts administrator, and is an active acting coach for young actors. She has also taken on translation in the past few years with her show, Lasa ng Imperyo, the Tagalog translation & adaptation of A Taste of Empire by Jovanni Sy. She is thrilled to join the PTC team to continue making art happen and make theatre more and more accessible to all.
Jess (she/her) is a communications and engagement specialist based on the traditional stolen and occupied territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. She works with creatives and companies across North America and the UK to develop integrated communications and fundraising strategies, business solutions, designs, and visual concepts. Her current portfolio includes PTC, Kauma Arts, Artistry Youth Dance, Angela’s Pulse, and Rungh. She has previously worked with organizations including DV8 Physical Theatre, Green Thumb Theatre, and One Dance UK.
Heidi (she/her) is a dramaturg, director and performance maker, based on the traditional stolen and occupied territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. She joined PTC as Associate Dramaturg in 2005, became Dramaturg in 2008, and Artistic and Executive Director in 2012. She is omnivorous in her theatrical tastes, developing performances from first idea through production for sited, text-based, community-engaged and solo works. She has dramaturged the world premieres of Pedro Chamale’s Peace Country, Derek Chan’s Happy Valley, yellow objects, and Chicken Girl, Carmen Aguirre’s Anywhere But Here, Tetsuro Shigetmatsu’s Empire of the Son, 1 Hour Photo, and Kuroko, Ziyian Kwan’s Public and Private, Kendra Fanconi’s Tinkers, and Amber Funk Barton’s How to Say Goodbye, amongst many others. She is currently process dramaturg for Mermaid Spring, created by Barbara Adler and Kyla Gardiner (The Public Swoon). Heidi served as Board Treasurer of LMDA and was the founding president of LMDA Canada. She was a co-founder and co-artistic director of Proximity Lab/Arts from 2003-2016, and taught acting as a sessional at Simon Fraser University from 1999-2013.
PTC is mourning the loss of Kathleen Flaherty, an irreplaceable and beloved Dramaturg and company leader. Both during Kathleen’s eight years of service at PTC, and since her departure, she was instrumental in the organization. Kathleen was an example of how to be an artist and activist in the world.