My stories onstage in Ottawa, April 9 - 13

So far as I know, my work has only once before been adapted for the stage. That was back in 2006, when Halifax-based choreographer/dancer Lisa Phinney created a dance piece around my wonky little poem "Three Scoops, Waffle Cone" ("When they took inventory / in hell / Velda thought maybe / Garrett / had took / some paper clips.")

Tonight, two of my short stories, adapted for the stage, debut in Ottawa.

It was a month or two ago that Ottawa-based director Fraser MacKinnon asked about the performance rights for a couple of my stories from Buying Cigarettes for the Dog. I was ambivalent, because I didn't want to see those particular stories onstage. So I told him that, and invited him to choose some other stories. Which he did.

So Sans Sense will feature works by four writers, including me, and the adaptations of my stories, both presumably brief, will be the evening's bookends. The stories he chose are "Shooting the Poodle" and "The Engagement." Both pieces are monologues. I'm going to make the trip to Ottawa to see what he does with them.

It's exciting to have my works seep over into other art forms! I'm still thrilled about Ben Walker's CD An Orphan's Song, for which he transformed 15 of my poems into songs — pop, jazz, blues, folk. And I guess, in a sense, that was a stage adaptation too, because for the CD launch he played the entire set live at the (now-defunct) Oasis on College Street in Toronto.

Over and out.