Buy Early for Marie Brassard and Save!

As excitement grows for Marie Brassard's return to Calgary and her February performance at Theatre Junction GRAND, we are pleased to offer our patrons a special savings on early bird tickets.

Anyone who buys 4 or more tickets to any night of The Invisible, Feb 17-21/09, before January 1/09 will receive a 10% savings on the total ticket order.

Just call the box office 403.205.2922 x 1, or buy in person and you'll receive your savings. All 4 seats must be bought at the same time. This offer expires Jan 1/09.

TriPLAY Packs

See the remaining 3 shows of our 08/09 season for under $70!

The Invisible
Marie Brassard (Montreal)
Feb 17-21/09

On The Side Of The Road
Theatre Junction (Calgary)
Mar 18-Apr 4/09

Three Sixty Five
Wen Wei Dance (Vancouver)
Apr 15-18/09

Get a TriPLAY any way you want --
To make it even easier and flexible to enjoy the remainder of our exciting season, we are now offering the same pricing for weekday & weekend shows. Choose any night you want!

Students must provide valid student ID to take advantage of the $49 price.

Get your TriPLAY Pack:

1) Directly from the Theatre Junction GRAND box office.

2) Phone the Theatre Junction GRAND box office 403.205.2922.

Give the GRANDest Gift of All

Special Xmas Gift Packs are now available from Theatre Junction GRAND. Each gift pack includes 2 passes to the 3 remaining shows of Theatre Junction's 08/09 season and a limited edition GRAND Tarp. The Xmas gift packs sell for $315 and the show passes can be redeemed for any performance night. Options to include a gift certificate for Velvet Restaurant inside Theatre Junction GRAND can also be included.

The show passes are for:

Marie Brassard's THE INVISIBLE (Montreal), Feb 17-21/09.
Theatre Junction's ON THE SIDE OF THE ROAD (Calgary), Mar 18-Apr 4/09.
Wen Wei Dance's THREE SIXTY FIVE (Vancouver), Apr 15-18/09.

Buy the Xmas Gift Packs directly from the Theatre Junction GRAND Box Office in person or by calling 403.205.2922. The gift packs must be picked up in person where you can pick up any unique tarp bag of your choosing.

Critical Perspective on The Tiger Lillies' Seven Deadly Sins concert by Michael Thomas Taylor

When Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill wrote the ballet The Seven Deadly Sins in 1933, politics had forced them both into exile in Paris. Necessity prodded them to renew a two-year partnership that had begun in 1928 with the Threepenny Opera, a work that premiered in Berlin with characters straight from the gutter of London, in the city where the raucously burlesque form of musical theatre called Cabaret was born. But from its beginnings to Brecht and Weill, Cabaret looked beyond the demimonde and petty criminals of industrialized Europe to the New World. One of the earliest stars at the Folies Bergères in the 1890s was the innovative American dancer and choreographer Loie Fuller, and during the 1920s Josephine Baker had burst onstage in the exotic, highly sexualized Revue nègre. It was to this tradition, to the emerging idiom of jazz and to other popular musical styles that Weill, classically trained and well-versed in avant-garde musical developments, turned in his collaborations with Brecht. In the Seven Deadly Sins, the duo that had catapulted Cabaret onto the grand stages of Europe projected theses quintessentially Catholic vices across new-world cities from New Orleans to San Francisco. And their second operatic collaboration Mahagonny, less well known today than ballads from Threepenny Opera like “Mack the Knife”, tells the rise and fall of a Western boomtown at the height of a gold rush. In the operatic New World of Brecht and Weill, politics is little more than the nefarious scrambling of small-minded men, balanced perhaps only by the ruined hopes of their most captive commodities, their women.

Thursday night, this Western boomtown heard the newest incarnation of the Seven Deadly Sins, the London trio The Tiger Lillies, whose theatrics and musical style traces its roots to Brecht and Weill. You can read reviews of the band and, for those who missed the Grand Ideas discussion Friday evening, watch several interviews with Martyn Jacques on the Tiger Lillies webite (http://www.tigerlillies.com/); you will see quickly enough why reviewers consistently twist adjectives such as abject, anarchistic, lurid, and sordid into the highest forms of praise. We saw them at Theatre Junction at their most elemental, without any elaborate props or set, the dramaturgy of their antics concentrated in the impact and musical virtuosity of their three characters: the bonhomie-bashing and wry slapstick of the drummer Adrian Huge; the understated, experimental brilliance of Adrian Stout (playing the bass, a saw, and the theremin); and the singular presence of Martyn Jacques. Graphically shocking, ugly and grotesque, at times lyrical: the band revels in all these registers. (The audience was alternately electrified, stunned and bowled-over with belly laughs.) What The Tiger Lillies bring to the Wild West is what Brecht and Weill originally seized as the theatrical potential of Cabaret: a stage on the far side of society in which the obscenities and distortions of human nature shout out loudly (but not crudely) like a circus barker and the crowd laughs along, entertained and fascinated and repulsed too. Stripped of the overt didactic and political aims so dear to Brecht (Weill famously explained the end of their partnership by saying that he could not set the communist party manifesto to music), The Tiger Lillies demonstrate these most vulgar qualities to be as utterly individual as the band itself in today’s musical landscape.

Critical Perspective on The Tiger Lillies' Seven Deadly Sins concert by Natalie Meisner

The Tiger Lilies latest show, Seven Deadly Sins at Theatre Junction fuses spine tingling operatic vocals with innovative music and impeccable comic timing in a style that singer and band member Martyn Jacques calls avant-garde cabaret. The trio play seamlessly off one another, likely due to their long careers in the field and their multi-faceted body of work. Not only their instrumental and vocal synchronicity register with the audience, but so too do their facial “asides” and use of physical comedy.

Martyn Jacques appears in bowler hat and demonic white-face. Imagine that Charlie Chaplin and Marilyn Manson had a love child… and you have a reasonable approximation. He plays the accordion skilfully, his body posture and manner evoking left bank Paris. Jacques then ditches his accordion for a couple up tempo ukulele numbers in which he tests the limits of said instrument. Who knew the ukulele could be menacing? The singer, who trained himself as an opera singer while living above a strip joint in Soho, has not only an impressive set of pipes but an uncanny sense of timing as he delivers devastating vocal missiles of profanity and beauty in one breath. He trills and grunts, he berates and bemoans, he harasses and entices. In short he gives an impressive and devilish vocal performance that would be interesting enough in its own right for a musician and yet he is accompanied by two equally theatrical performers.

Adrian Huge provides the heartbeat of the performance with delicate and unusual drum accompaniment that uses not only conventional drums but pots and pans, brushes and toys for surfaces and drum sticks. His unruffled, phlegmatic stage persona adds style to the performance. He looks as if he would keep drumming through a natural disaster. This makes his percussive meltdown during “Banging In The Nails” all the more dramatic. As the frantic tempo of the piece builds he begins to knock over and destroy his drum kit with progressively bigger toy hammers, seemly coming emotionally unglued as he does so: A perfect bit of stage business that creates a delicate balance of wit and humour to counterpoint provocative lyrics that claim responsibility for the methods of torturing Jesus Christ on the cross.

Adrian Stout lankily stretches out over a soulful contra bass and occasionally switches to the ethereal wale of the musical saw that seems eerily like a wordless human voice. One can’t help but hear, in this plaintive instrument the absent voices of the real people, the prostitutes and drug users, the hustlers and street people who provided the inspiration and raw material for these numbers.
The Lilies particular brand of gleeful macabre clearly strikes a chord with youth as their massive international appeal attests to. Their facility for plumbing the depths of human experience to discover small moments of beauty clearly appealed to the young opening night crowd, many of whom wore either gothic street clothes or costumes that gave a nod to the seven deadly sins. The atmosphere in the audience was electric, especially in the moments when the group switched between tender melancholic ballads and thrusting, in your face offensives featuring darkly comic graphic depictions of sexuality and street life.

An especially great choice for All Hallow’s Eve, this show will be appealing year round to anyone with a taste for gallows humour and black comedy. They deliver witty acidic lyrics, innovative music , engaging characters and the theatricality of a total spectacle. You will be entertained, you will be surprised and you might be forced to a belly laugh over a topic that you never thought you could so much as chuckle at. None of this exploration of the taboo and profane is trite, however. On the contrary, the shock tactics and side-show antics; the blood, guts, and gore, are suffused with a wonderful humanity and empathy for the underdog. Paradoxically and skilfully the Tiger Lilies tackle topics that so often provoke a sense of helplessness and disassociation and ask us to feel more, not less.

Dr. Natalie Meisner
Department of English, Mount Royal

Show Up and Ship Out

Opening Night of The Tiger Lillies' Seven Deadly Sins Concert (Thursday Oct 30th) will mark Theatre Junction's first Ship Bus of the 2008/09 season. Meet us at the Ship & Anchor pub where 30 tickets to the show will be available for $20. Each ticket includes a free drink and transportation to and from Theatre Junction GRAND (bus @ 7pm). Tickets will go on sale at the Ship & Anchor pub at 6pm. First come, first served.

Alex Cuba Special Ticket Offer

Worldbeat Lovers Rejoice! Catch Cuban-Canadian Guitar Sensation Alex Cuba This Saturday!

Special Seat Offer!
Buy one Alex Cuba ticket for $29 and receive all additional tickets 20% off! Contact Theatre Junction GRAND box office to buy. Tickets subject to availability so buy fast!

Singer-songwriter Alex Cuba hails from Artemsia, Cuba and currently resides in Smithers, B.C. His trademark sugarcane-sweet melodies, pop-soul hooks and rock chords subtly subvert commonly held notions of Cuban music. Alex is on the vanguard, crafting a cross-cultural sound that mirrors his geographical journey.

In 2006, his debut solo CD earned him a Juno award for World Music Album. His second album “Auga Del Pozo” was released in February 2007 and earned Alex his second Juno award in the same category.

CLICK HERE TO WATCH ALEX CUBA

CHECK OUT ALEX CUBA ON MYSPACE

About the GRAND Independent Music Series:
Theatre Junction GRAND is excited to welcome more emerging and breakthrough Canadian artists. Focusing on independent performers which share our Do-It-Yourself attitude and featuring an eclectic body of music styles, The GRAND Independent Music Series enters its 3rd season to strong anticipation. The series highlights up and coming artists achieving success without compromise. Those who forge a path of independence, allowing them to flourish distinctively, earn recognition on its own musical merits and avoid all attempts at music industry categorization. The 07/08 series featured sold out concerts by Kathleen Edwards, Patrick Watson, and Chad Van Gaalen. On October 4, 2008 award winning world music artist Alex Cuba will open this season’s series.

Enjoy music that determines its own destiny!

4Play From Theatre Junction

NEW! 4PLAY ACTION SAVER!

See the remaining 4 shows of our 08/09 season for under $100!

Seven Deadly Sins Concert
The Tiger Lillies (London)
Oct 30-Nov 1/08

The Invisible
Marie Brassard (Montreal)
Feb 17-21/09

On The Side Of The Road
Theatre Junction (Calgary)
Mar 18-Apr 4/09

Three Sixty Five
Wen Wei Dance (Vancouver)
Apr 15-18/09

Get 4Play action any way you want --
To make it even easier and flexible to enjoy the remainder of our exciting season, we are now offering the same pricing for weekday & weekend shows. Choose any night you want!

Students must provide valid student ID to take advantage of the $64 price.

Get your 4Play Action Pack:

1) Directly from the Theatre Junction GRAND box office.

2) Phone the Theatre Junction GRAND box office 403.205.2922.

Critical Perspective on SITI Company's Radio Macbeth by Michael Thomas Taylor

Macbeth plays in the hinterlands called Scotland, beyond the borders of English civilization. Radio Macbeth, so the program notes tell us, plays in the “guts of an abandoned theatre,” as a group of actors rehearses for a radio broadcast of Shakespeare’s play. But in neither world are the boundaries between center and periphery as clear as they might seem. From the witches with which Shakespeare’s play opens, Macbeth’s Scotland is a realm governed by sorcery and violence, and above all by fear; in which the line between the natural and the supernatural, the living and the dead, has come under siege as Macbeth and his Lady invoke the darkness and eschew the day. And if the conceit of the Radio broadcast in this new production seems to fade into a subtext as the rehearsal gets underway, it nevertheless continues, like Scotland, to define the scene of the play. As the audience will doubtless know if they have read even one review of Radio Macbeth, this is a production about sound and the power of sound to set the stage. But it is also a play about the transposition of this medium—the worlds it can conjure up and the boundaries it can cross—onto a more modern stage.

A reliance on sound is not so far from Shakespeare, who wrote for a theater in which afternoon performances meant that darkness, the color of this play, could only be had in the imagination; and it is an obvious twist on a work famous for the tolling of its bells and the knocking at its gates. But this continuity from Shakespeare to Orson Welles, whose 1936 “Voodoo Macbeth,” set in Haiti and played with an all-black cast looms behind Radio Macbeth, haunts this production even as the designers make full use of more modern theatrical means such as light and shadow. Sound and sight do not compete, but they are also not equals. Indeed, the radio-frame begins offstage, as the actors arrive and loudly fumble their way toward finding the lights; but only as they enter does the theatre go dark, hiding the actor who will play Macbeth, and who has been silently inhabiting the stage as the audience comes in. The retreat from this well-worn device (some might say worn-out cliché) of contemporary theatre to an earlier setting is obvious and intentional. It is also a retreat into a world of stage-craft in which the spooky, even kooky effects of Radio theatre, can be employed with the brazen confidence of a Halloween ghost-pageant. Witches cackle and winds blow and we will not leave without a blood-curdling scream of murder! The clear artistry of Radio Macbeth is to bring about these effects simply and fundamentally, with voices and objects on stage; just as the actors’ basic physical vocabulary allows them to effortlessly increase the pace or redraw the center of action. But it is the constant modulations in sound, the playful fashioning of Shakespeare’s lines, the trading of roles back and forth among the cast, that carries through the shifting scenes and the shadows on the wall. Indifferent to light and darkness, sound fills outs distinctions of center and periphery, just as radio is a medium that is both everywhere and nowhere.

Hence if sound does not so much establish boundaries as pass around and through them, it does place several things squarely in the center of this performance: the actors’ voices and Shakespeare’s text. To say that Shakespeare’s text lies at the center of things is no empty or idle observation. It reflects a Shakespeare bent, ironically enough, away from centuries of concern about historical chronicles, Scottish costumes, and the great question of Macbeth’s character, to a post-modern sensibility. The overwhelming weight of the soliloquies, of the murderers’ open calls to darkness, have always threatened to tip the play into comic farce. In Radio Macbeth, they have found an apt medium. We always and literally see on stage the split between the grand ambitions of these illusions, amplified and reverberating through the theatre (and in broadcast, into the world), and the script from which they are read. But what does this make of the text? In her program notes, Anne Bogart, who co-directed the play together with the prolific sound designer Darren West, writes that the actors “cling to the sanity of words while the chaos of history grows to be undeniably present with them in the room.” What, one wonders, could be sane about this text? We need no literary scholars to tell us that witches speak in riddles, that ambition blinds Macbeth to dangerous ambiguity, that words shamelessly lie under the thin cloak of irony. Perhaps the sanity resides, nevertheless, in the blunt force of language, in Shakespeare’s poetic surety, swiftness, and precision? Or in the sharp blows of comic relief that connect with the audience? Or, as Bogart seems to suggest, in the ritual of coming together around the play, in the very power of theatre to share and shift roles and voices? However one answers this question, it articulates the most pressing risk of SITI’s Radio Macbeth: an unyielding decision to stage Shakespeare in a way that avant-garde theatre has today largely abandoned, to display a deliberate trust in the tradition of its text as capable of “exorcising” its ghosts.

Michael Thomas Taylor, Assistant Professor, University of Calgary

Critical Perspective on SITI Company's Radio Macbeth by Natalie Meisner

SITI Company’s production of Radio Macbeth exploits the centuries of superstition and lore surrounding “The Scottish Play.” Actors in rehearsal will go to great lengths to avoid pronouncing the name of the play or the protagonist inside the theatre due to the belief that they will bring misfortune and disaster upon themselves, the theatre or the production. This results in elaborate euphemisms such as referring to the couple as Mr. and Mrs. M. or the king himself as Mackers or MacBee.

The origin of this curse has many supposed points of origin. In the play’s original production, legend has it, the trick daggers were switched for real ones resulting in an on-stage death of an actor. Talk about suffering for your art! Some say that Shakespeare “borrowed” the spells of the Weird Sisters from a coven of “real” witches who, lacking any protection under copyright law, opted to haunt subsequent productions, causing actors to fall to their deaths and stagehands to drop dead in the wings. A less romantic view would point out that classical theatre with their ad-hoc back stage areas were prime areas for disaster, or that since Macbeth was such a popular play that theatres would often stage it as a last-ditch effort to stave off financial trouble and hence the association between the play and the closing of theatres.

The remedies employed by actors to fend off misfortune are legion and include leaving the theatre, spinning around three times, spitting or reciting a virtuous line of the play itself. No doubt the legend grew as each generation of veteran actors regaled the new ones with weird occurrences they had witnessed during production with their own eyes.

Determining the true origin of the legend, however, is perhaps less important than examining the haunting effect that it has and continues to have upon theatre artists and audiences alike. The enduring themes of the dangers of overarching ambition, the torture of a guilty conscience and the onslaught of madness continue to resonate with contemporary audiences while the lean, pared down production that SITI delivers highlights one of Shakespeare’s particular gifts; the infusion of the guts and gore, the gritty bodily aspects of life with high poetry.

Radio Macbeth leans heavily on the play’s most famous speeches, allowing a return to the ritualistic incantatory aspect of theatre making it a species of meditation for the Shakespeare fan. You can almost feel the spectator in the seat next to you mouthing the words silently during the dagger speech. The open-ended approach that the production takes allows you to consider all other productions you might have seen of the play, or even perhaps your own thoughts when you previously read or studied it. The bare stage and the lean approach place the focus on the skill of the actor and the beauty of the text. Spectators are free to contemplate all the emanations and meanings of the complex metaphors and figurative language in a placid pool, free of spectacle, impressive costumes, and special effects.

In his book, The Haunted Stage, Marvin Carlson points out the extent to which the spectator’s enjoyment of classical theatre depends upon what he calls ghosting. In other words, any production of a play is haunted, to a certain extent by all previous productions of the play due to the memories (and even the body memories) of both stage performers and audiences. The dagger we see before us is even a ghost of all the other daggers which have hung before the eyes of all other amazed performers and audiences of the past. This creates a plenitude of stage meaning in each moment that is not reducible to any one interpretation. This haunting of the live performance by the collective memories of actors and audiences produces the “frisson” or shiver that we feel in live performance and may also explains why we, in theatre are in turn so obsessed with ghosts.

SITI Company has capitalized on the phenomena of “ghosting” in live performance. The focus is shifted from the obvious dramatic tension of the murder plot and returned to poetic contemplation of the words themselves. The production intentionally violates the taboo, and the performers themselves seem to intentionally taunt the ghosts of past performances with each utterance of the king’s name. The play opens, as the liner notes tell us, in the “guts” of an abandoned rehearsal hall. This visceral, corporeal personification of the architectural space of performance is likely a nod to the company’s well documented use of the viewpoint method of actor training.

The setting and the sparse lean production are infused with the layers of meaning applied by the actors in response to their own quotidian experience in the rehearsal hall. The spooky terrain between the actor and the “character” he is playing is on display here. Each time we hear Macbeth, the tension in the room heightens. There are crashes in the dark. The use of the microphones allows the audience to focus on the performers’ formidable vocal skills and the earthy poetry of one of Shakespeare’s most beloved plays.

Dr. Natalie Meisner

Department of English, Mount Royal

Critical Perspecitives

Theatre Junction will be publishing critical perspectives on each of its season shows. They will be written by Michael Thomas Taylor, Assistant Professor at the University of Calgary & Natalie Miesner, English Instructor at Mount Royal College. We would like to create a discourse with the public and we welcome responses to these critical perspecitives and any other comments you may have about our presentations.

The first set of responses about Radio Macbeth (Sept 24-27) created by Anne Bogart's SITI Company (New York) will be published online here following Opening Night.

We want to hear from you so don't hold back!

Alex Cuba Kicks Off 08/09 GRAND Independent Music Series

GRAND Independent Music Series
& Tooth Blackner Present

Alex Cuba with Guests

Saturday, Oct. 4, 20008

Tickets will be available on Friday, September 5, 2008 $24.00

Singer-songwriter Alex*Cuba hails from Artemsia, Cuba and currently resides in Smithers, B.C. His trademark sugarcane-sweet melodies, pop-soul hooks and rock chords subtly subvert commonly held notions of Cuban music. Alex is on the vanguard, crafting a cross-cultural sound that mirrors his geographical journey.

In 2006, his debut solo CD earned him a Juno award for World Music Album. His second album “Auga Del Pozo” was released in February 2007 and earned Alex his second Juno award in the same category.

CHECK ALEX CUBA OUT HERE!

About the GRAND Independent Music Series
Theatre Junction GRAND is excited to welcome more emerging and breakthrough Canadian artists. Focusing on independent performers which share our Do-It-Yourself attitude and featuring an eclectic body of music styles, The GRAND Independent Music Series enters its 3rd season to strong anticipation. The series highlights up and coming artists achieving success without compromise. Those who forge a path of independence, allowing them to flourish distinctively, earn recognition on its own musical merits and avoid all attempts at music industry categorization. The 07/08 series featured sold out concerts by Kathleen Edwards, Patrick Watson, and Chad Van Gaalen. On October 4, 2008 award winning world music artist Alex Cuba, will open this season’s series.

Enjoy music that determines its own destiny!

What's Next...

The federal Tories have made a decision to cut funding for the Canadian Heritage PromArt Program that provides travel grants for artists to travel abroad to promote Canadian culture. The reason is that some grant recipients are considered by government to be "radical, left-wing, anti-globalization". They also cite an experimental rock band "Holy F___" as a fringe alternative group that taxpayers should not be funding.

A recent poll at the Globe and Mail asked Canadians to respond to whether they support the federal government's recent decision to slash funding available through Canadian Heritage to artists working abroad.

Final Results -- more than 50% of responders said they do agree with the cut in funding. Wow!

CLICK HERE to see the final results.

Fringe Friends With Benefits

During the Calgary Fringe Festival (August 1 - 10) you can visit us in Inglewood at Mandarine Couture, which is located at 1224B 9th Avenue SE (right across the street from Fringe Venue - From The Ground Up). Mandarine Couture is a fashion boutique that carries high-end designer clothing, accessories, and gift items from Asia, Europe, and North America. Theatre Junction is pleased to welcome them as a partner for the 08/09 season. Stop by the store when you take a break from The Fringe and sign up to receive a special savings on our Season Ticket packages.

Mandarine Couture hours:
Wed-Sun noon - 5:00 pm

Closed: Mondays and Tuesdays

Student Sales Junction

Throughout our 08/09 season we'll be putting together a student sales committee to expand our audience and in the process, give you an opportunity to save on Opening Night seats. If there's anything to expect on Opening Nights it can only be the unexpected and this season we'd love to have you and your friends there to share in the excitement!

The Student Sales Junction will work like this:
A) You must currently be a student or a recent graduate.
B) For every 3 Student Season Ticket packages ($75 each, includes all fees and GST) you sell, we'll give you a season ticket subscription ABSOLUTELY FREE! These season tickets will be for the Opening Night for each of Theatre Junction's 5 shows as part of our 08/09 season.
C) For each individual show starting with Radio MacBeth (Opening Night - Sept 24), we'll offer you a 10% savings on your own seat for every ticket you sell. This means if you sell 5 tickets you'll save 50%, and if you sell 10 tickets you'll GET YOUR TICKET FREE!
D) If there is a performance for which you or your friends can not attend on Opening Night, we'd be happy to exchange your seat(s) for any other night as long as you give us advance notice.

If you're interested in joining the Student Sales Junction, please email David Gardner, Theatre Junction Marketing & Sales Manager, for more details -- david.gardner@theatrejunction.com

See you at the Theatre!

Theatre Junction 08-09 Season

To GRAND or not to GRAND

Since making the GRAND theatre our home in 2005, we've wrestled with ideas of what to name the historic downtown building. Originally we thought to keep it The GRAND since that's what everyone in Calgary has come to know it by. We even named our website ATTHEGRAND.CA But ever since we bought the building and raised millions to restore it back to Calgary's 'Culturehouse', we were thinking...

Perhaps it makes sense for us to leverage our own company name. Hence, last year's name change to Theatre Junction at the GRAND. While it explained who we were and where we lived, the venue name itself was left the same. Thus, nothing really changed.

So did we ever really have a problem or did we just create one in our heads? Were the struggles with branding that we thought to conquer - justified? After all, the building has always been a Calgary (and Western Canada to boot) landmark, and ever since it was built in 1912 it always remained GRAND in some capacity. Should we dare change this?

While Theatre Junction at the GRAND seemed to be a temporary branding solution, problems did indeed arise. First, it was a little long and a bit of a mouthful. We grew tired of always saying, "Hi, I'm So And So from Theatre Junction at The GRAND." Eventually and expectedly, we became either from "Theatre Junction" or "The GRAND". One or the other got lost, leaving little to zero consistency. Ambiguity amassed. Secondly, it did little in raising awareness that Theatre Junction owns and operates this fabulously renovated theatre, ideal for the art we've been presenting - multidisciplinary and diverse. While we made it our mandate to introduce Calgary to the World's best in contemporary art and produce thought provoking New Creation, we still felt shadowed by the venue itself, with all its historic and grandiose charm.

When we began the restoration project, and unlike the multiplex movie theatre and golf domes of the past which moved in and out over the years, Theatre Junction was determined to preserve as much of the original theatre as possible. Take a look at our entrance and you may wonder if we're still in the process of fixin 'er up (To clarify, our indoor restoration is complete and keeping the holes from the original ceiling as well as choosing the half-modern-half-authentic walls were part of the plan. As for the ongoing outside construction, that's a whole other beast).

That being said, we recently made the tough decision. We renamed the building, our breeding ground, our home. We chose the best of both worlds.

Theatre Junction GRAND was unveiled recently as the name of the venue and while we know it will be a challenge for our patrons, partners, the press, media, and the people of Calgary to forget "The GRAND or GRAND Theatre", we believe we made the right decision. We like to think of it as naming our new baby after a deceased, but whose presence is always felt, GRANDparent.

We dared. We've always believed in shaking things up and challenging society's status quo and expectations. We've based our entire existence on such a vision. Now it comes back to you, the people of Calgary, and our audience.

What do you think of Theatre Junction GRAND? Does it work? Does it sound right? Is it selfish? Should we have done it from the get go?

Most importantly, do we have a hope in hell of getting people on board with it!?

p.s. We also renamed our website THEATREJUNCTION.COM -- it just seemed like the right thing to do.