Canadian Theatre and Monuments

The representational power that the Stratford Festival holds in the history of contemporary Canadian theatre cannot be overestimated. Stratford has long been a monument of (and to) theatre in Canada, partly because of the distinctive architectural design of the Festival Theatre, and partly – perhaps more likely – because of its manufactured story of origin.1 In Performing Canada: The Nation Enacted in the Imagined Theatre, Alan Filewod explains how Stratford came to be “the template which ... governed the dominant model of professional theatre structures in Canada” (56) and Canadian theatre itself. This monumentalization is all the more interesting given that, for Filewod, Stratford has actually “contributed little to the overall development of theatre in Canada” (57) beyond a location for symbolic value. It does, however, provide the basis for a useful oppositionality: Canadian theatre – developed to some extent in the shadow of Stratford – now casts shadows itself. This paper focuses on three plays that open dialogues with monumental images of the nation: The Death of General Wolfe by Brian Quirt, Angélique by Lorena Gale and Sled by Judith Thompson.