Lane's Week, February 18, 2013

This week in theatre
by Chris Lane
@chrislanetweets

[PUB: We are very pleased to be introducing another weekly column today. Chris Lane, our Editor-in-Chief for our Vancouver division, will be sharing the national theatre news stories with you each Monday. If you have news, by all means send it along to us with the heading "Lane's Week" and we'll make sure Chris gets it! Or follow him on Twitter!]

Seasons Announced: (Toronto) Mirvish Productions has announced the lineup of its 50^th anniversary 2013-2014 season. The three big shows will be: Les Misérables, featuring West End star Ramin Karimloo; Aladdin; and the Canadian premiere of Once. Opera Atelier has also announced their 2013-2014 season, which will start with their fall show of Mozart’s Abduction from the Seraglio. The spring 2014 opera will be Lully’s Persée, which will also be travelling to France, for Versailles’ first production of Persée since being the inaugural show of the Royal Opera House in 1770. (Source) (Vancouver) Vancouver Opera has announced that its next season will open with Puccini’s Tosca in the fall, followed by Benjamin Britten’s Albert Herring (as seen this month in Victoria). Their spring 2014 shows will be a pair of Dons: Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Verdi’s Don Carlo.

Parsa

Welcome to: (Toronto) Jennifer Tarver has joined Necessary Angel Theatre Company as their artistic director. (Gananoque, Ontario) The Thousand Islands Playhouse has launched a Playwrights’ Unit, and selected five playwrights for residency: Jessica Anderson, Lawrence Aronovitch, Douglas Bowie, Sarah Dennison, and Craig Walker. (Source)

Hats off to: (Toronto) Soheil Parsa, artistic director of Modern Times Stage Company, has been awarded the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal. (Vancouver) PuSh Festival wrapped up a big year, with a 45% increase in attendance from last year. There were over 34,000 tickets sold to over 190 performances by 275 different artists. (Source)