By Andrea Scott
Directed by André Sills
World Première
“YOU GOT TO TAKE A LIKKLE BIT OF SUFFERIN' TO GET THAT HOPE.”
Richard Whyte is determined to celebrate Jamaican Independence Day in style. The rice is soaking, the ginger beer is cooling and today his lottery ticket is finally going to hit it big! But Richard’s squabbling family have other ideas, and over the course of a single sweltering day in Toronto’s Little Jamaica, a lifetime of buried secrets and dreams will finally come to light. Making its world première at the Studio Theatre, Get That Hope is a bittersweet drama of personal and cultural diasporas that brims with laughter and tears.
“Life is hard wherever you go. We fight for control and happiness in life but when do we ever get it … and if you do, for how long?” —Director André Sills
The 2024 Season is supported by Ophelia Lazaridis.
Production Sponsors:
Bryan Blenkin & Alan Rowe
Sylvia D. Chrominska
(she/her) Birmingham Conservatory 2022/23
2024: Rachel Whyte in Get That Hope. Third season. Stratford: Princess of France in Love's Labour's Lost, Richard II, Player Queen in Hamlet and Olabisi in Death and the King's Horseman. Elsewhere: 16 characters in No Child (Arts Club); Ann Atwater in The Best of Enemies, Novelette in 'da Kink in My Hair (Pacific Theatre); Same Difference (Theatre Conspiracy); Catherine in The Numbers Game (Storefront Theatre). Film/TV: Corrective Measures, Swan Song, Voir, The Baby-Sitters Club, Detour, Song Bird, Scared Lies, Sirens. Radio/Recordings: Aisha in Redbone Coonhound (Arts Club); Mama in Rishi & d Douen (Rumble Theatre and Carousel Theatre). Training: York University. Awards: Peter Donaldson Award recipient, Michael Mawson Award recipient, Jessie Award nomination and B.C. Arts Council Pivot recipient.
2024: Simeon Whyte in Get That Hope. Stratford debut. Elsewhere: Miles/Rashaad/Shawn in Gloria (Crow's Theatre); Scotch in Is God Is (Obsidian Theatre/Canadian Stage/NAC); AJ in Choir Boy (Canadian Stage/Arts Club Vancouver). Training: Wexford Collegiate School for the Arts, National Theatre School of Canada. Accolades: One of six in Glenn Sumi's 2022 Breakthrough Artists of the Year. Online: Instagram: @SAATURN15; YouTube: SAATURN. Et cetera: Savion is an RnB singer, rapper, dancer and producer with music on Spotify and Apple Music under SAATURN. He is super honoured to be a part of Stratford this year! Let's rock out!
(she/her)
2024: Millicent Flores in Get That Hope. Second season. Stratford: Lisette de Courval in Les Belles-Soeurs, King Lear, and Much Ado About Nothing. Elsewhere (selected): Pilgrim in 1184 (Phoenix Arts/Aga Khan); Chorus in Wedding at Aulis, Old Major/Poophead in Animal Farm, Ensemble in Alligator Pie, Celia in As You Like It, Lucy in The Threepenny Opera, Mary in The Time of Your Life (Soulpepper); Ladybug in James and the Giant Peach, Fumiko in Hana's Suitcase, Jojo in Seussical, Bird/Mole in A Year With Frog & Toad, Loa in Blue Planet (YPT); Huong in Vietgone, Lady Nijo in Top Girls (RMTC). Training: University of Winnipeg (B.A.-Honours) and Soulpepper Academy. Online: Instagram: @jennifer_villaverde. Et cetera: Thank you to my agent, Karen, and all my love to Mike and Catie. Go, Aces!
Playwright: Get That Hope
Andrea Scott is an award-winning playwright and screenwriter from London, Ontario, currently residing in West Hollywood, California, working for Disney.
Her playwriting credits include Princesses Don't Grow on Trees (Solar Stage); Frenemies (Mixed Company Theatre); Every Day She Rose (co-written with Nick Green, produced by Nightwood Theatre); Eating Pomegranates Naked, Better Angels: A Parable, Don't Talk to Me Like I'm Your Wife (produced by Call Me Scotty Productions at the SummerWorks Performance Festival); Controlled Damage (Neptune Theatre, recipient of 4 Merritt Awards).
Get That Hope is Andrea's Stratford Festival playwriting debut.
Her plays Better Angels: A Parable and Controlled Damage were turned into podcasts for PlayME by Expect Theatre and the latter was adapted into an award-winning graphic novel, No Reason to Apologize: The Resilient Legacy of Viola Desmond by Teach Media.
During the pandemic, Andrea was the Canada Council Playwright-in-Residence at Tarragon Theatre, where she continued writing a play inspired by Eugene O'Neill's 'Long Day's Journey Into Night'; that play turned into Get That Hope.
She concurrently began working on the CBC/BET production The Porter in 2020, followed by three seasons on the Canadian classic, Murdoch Mysteries.
Andrea is a graduate of the Master's Program at the University of Toronto, and proud to be represented by Marquis Literary, The Characters Talent Agency, and 3Arts.
Birmingham Conservatory, 2005
2024: Orsino in Twelfth Night and director of Get That Hope. 10th season. Stratford: King Lear, Much Ado About Nothing, Richard III, All's Well That Ends Well, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Coriolanus, The Tempest, etc. Elsewhere: Director: The Royale (Citadel Theatre); Gloria (ARC/Crow's). Acting: Glass Menagerie, Sex, An Octoroon, "Master Harold"...and the Boys (Shaw Festival); Julius Caesar (Crow's Theatre). Film/TV: Revenge of the Black Best Friend, Kim's Convenience (CBC); Slumberland (Netflix); Private Idiots (YouTube). Voiceover: Tiny Louis in Summer Memories (Family); Fins in Sago Mini Friends (Apple TV). Training: George Brown Theatre School. Awards: Sterling Award for Direction, The Royale; Toronto Theatre Critics Award and Dora Award - Best Actor, "Master Harold"...and the Boys; MyEntWorld Critics' Pick Award - Best Actor, An Octoroon. Online: Instagram: @dre373. Et cetera: Love you NARI.
2024: Set and costume designer of Get That Hope. Third season. Stratford: Death and the King's Horseman, Wedding Band. Elsewhere: Trouble in Mind (MTC and Citadel Theatre); The Mountaintop, The Fiancée (Persephone Theatre); Steel Magnolias (Theatre Calgary); Sound of Music, Where Words Once Were (Storybook Theatre). Film/TV: Director & Producer - Catharsis, To Belong, Home, To My Inner Child, Trapped (in her head). Radio/Recordings: Creator and Host of Afros in the Diaspora Podcast (available on all podcast platforms including YouTube). Training: MFA University of Calgary for Theatre Design, BA Redeemer's University Nigeria for Theatre Arts. Awards: 2022 RBC Emerging Artist Award in Calgary. Online: sarahuwadiae.com, @sarahuwadiae. Et cetera: Life is too short! Do the thing!
2024: Lighting designer of Get That Hope. Fourth season. Stratford: Lighting designer of Nathan The Wise, Long Day's Journey Into Night and The Physicists. Elsewhere: The Royale (Citadel Theatre); Appropriate (Coal Mine Theatre); Lehman Trilogy (Canadian Stage); Of Marriage and Men (Shaw Festival); 2 Pianos 4 Hands (original production and tours); The Drawer Boy (original production and tour, Theatre Passe Muraille); Rope Enough (Buddies in Bad Times Theatre); The Real McCoy (Factory Theatre); Timecode Break (Toronto Dance Theatre); The Pigeon King (Blyth Festival); BREATH[e] (Theatre 2.0); Shadowball (AGO); Heisenberg (Canadian Stage); Fool for Love (Soulpepper); 2014 Festival Hub (Luminato Festival); Fun House (Nuit Blanche). Awards: Four Dora Awards, 34 Dora Award nominations, Sterling Award Nomination (Edmonton). Et cetera: Steve and his beautiful family live beside the Noisy River, just outside of Creemore, in a converted 180-year-old barn.
2024: Composer and sound designer of Get That Hope. Third season. Stratford: Composer and sound designer of Les Belles-Soeurs; Sound designer of I Am William. Elsewhere: Woking Phoenix (Theatre Passe Muraille); WILDWOMAN (Soulpepper Theatre); Kim's Convenience (The Grand Theatre, Thousand Islands Playhouse); The First Stone (New Harlem Productions and GCTC); 1184 (Phoenix Arts & Aga Khan Museum); TOKA (Theatre Passe Muraille); White Girls in Moccasins (Buddies in Bad Times Theatre). Original Work: 4inXchange (xLq with Jordan Campbell); Love You Wrong Time (Bad Muse Collective with Deanna H. Choi and Erin Brubacher). Residencies/Training: NoteWorthy 2021 (The Musical Stage Company and Prime Mover Theatre); Humber College, Theatre Performance. Awards: Two Dora Mavor Moore Awards for Love You Wrong Time (Outstanding Sound Design and Composition, Outstanding Performance in an Ensemble) and 3 more nominations. Online: maddiebautista.com. Et cetera: For Ma, Pa, Anya, Douie and John.
2024: Stage manager of Get That Hope and assistant stage manager of Romeo and Juliet. Eighth season. Stratford: Women of the Fur Trade, Monty Python's Spamalot, Hamlet, Death and the King's Horseman, R + J, Henry VIII, Birds of a Kind, Bakkhai. Elsewhere: The Phantom of the Opera, Maggie & Pierre (Grand Theatre); Jack: A Beanstalk Panto (Capitol Theatre); The Marriage of Figaro, The Magic Flute (Canadian Opera Company); Every Silver Lining (Next Stage Festival); Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls (Roseneath Theatre); The Drowsy Chaperone, Footloose, The Addams Family, Spring Awakening, Spelling Bee, Nine (Randolph College); Godspell (Theatre Sheridan); Anne of Green Gables, Evita, Shrek the Musical (LOT); The Canadian (Thousand Islands Playhouse); Hamlet (Tarragon Theatre); City of Angels (Theatre by the Bay); The Story (Theatre Columbus). Et cetera: Originally from Lima, Peru. Loves food, music, dancing. Always looking for a good book recommendation.
2024: Assistant stage manager of Get That Hope. Sixth season. Stratford: Assistant stage manager of Wedding Band and Richard II; assistant lighting designer of Little Women; apprentice stage manager of I Am William. Production assistant for the Avon Theatre and the Langham Directors' Workshop. Elsewhere: Favourites include stage manager of Letters From Max (Necessary Angel); stage manager/associate lighting designer of Kiviuq Returns: An Inuit Epic (Qaggiavuut, National Theatre of Greenland, Tarragon Theatre); writer/director of The Stage Manager's Guide to Dating Assholes (self-produced at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and Toronto Fringe Festival). Some other companies include Gateway, Crow's, Gargantua, lemonTree creations, Ergo Arts Theatre and Tarragon. Training: MA in Art History and BFA in Theatre Production from York University.
2024: Apprentice stage manager of Get That Hope. Third season. Stratford: King Lear, The Meighen Forum (2022 and 2023), Richard III, The Birmingham Conservatory's Agamemnon and The Birds. Elsewhere: Danielle has been on many productions in Barbados and most recently a few shows at Sheridan College. Training: Sheridan College, Barbados Community College. Awards: Excellence in Stage Management (Sheridan College 2021). Et cetera: This season is dedicated to Pappy, Aunty Mary and Aunty Anne. I love you and wish you were here.
2024: Production stage manager of the Studio Theatre and stage manager of The Goat or, Who is Sylvia? 28th season. Stratford: Casey and Diana, All's Well That Ends Well, Little Shop of Horrors, The Rocky Horror Show, The Tempest starring Christopher Plummer, The Duchess of Malfi, The Swanne Trilogy. Elsewhere: Casey and Diana (Soulpepper), Angels in America (That Theatre Co./Buddies), Fall On Your Knees (Canadian Stage, Neptune, NAC, Grand); Heisenberg, Liv Stein (Canadian Stage); Constellations (Centaur/Canadian Stage); Body Politic (Buddies); The Death of the King (Modern Times); The Winter's Tale (Groundling); Bombay Black (Factory); Manon, Sandra and the Virgin Mary (Pleiades); Saint Carmen of the Main (NAC/Canadian Stage); Romeo and Juliet (NAC); Mother Courage and Her Children (NAC/MTC); Real Live Girl (MTC); Fully Committed, Silence, Einstein's Gift (Grand); Wit (Centaur); Hamlet (Neptune).
(she/they)
2024: Production assistant of the Studio Theatre. Stratford debut. Elsewhere: Billy Bishop Goes to War, Samqwan, Mimikej, As You Like It, The Beloved, Sweet Enough, Punch Up!, Into the Woods, The Best Brothers (Highland Arts Theatre); Elf, Matilda (Savoy Theatre); The Bells of Baddeck (Parks Canada). Training: Cape Breton University. Et cetera: I am beyond excited to be joining the Stratford team! Thank you to my family for your unconditional love and support, and to the Cape Breton arts community for helping me get to where I am today.
Celia Aloma, Conrad Coates, Savion Roach, and Kim Roberts.
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