Marjorie is a theatre artist based in Toronto, working in stage, screen and radio. She is the recipient of a Dora Mavor Moore Award in performance as well as the prestigious K.M. Hunter Artists’ Award in Theatre. Marjorie is currently Associate Artistic Director of Cahoots Theatre Projects where her work focuses primarily on youth and play development. Some of the projects under her leadership since January 2006, have included supporting Loyal-T, a 45 member cast play about gun violence incorporating African-Caribbean dance and song (North Albion Collegiate), Lift Off Hong Kong, a performance and outreach series in Hong Kong and Macao, as well as Crossing Gibraltar, a theatre training and outreach program for youth from refugee backgrounds. |
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Trained as an actor at George Brown Theatre School, she was awarded the John Bannerman Bursary. In her first production outside of school, Marjorie garnered a nomination for the Dora Mavor Prize (Outstanding Performance in a Professional Debut.) Since then, she has continued to delight and command audiences across the country from New Brunswick to British Columbia. She has voiced numerous radio dramas for CBC Radio including as a regular on Hardfeldt, and her own script, Spring Arrival.Film and television credits include This Is Wonderland, Degrassi: The Next Generation, Train 48, Soul Food, Hooch, and The Real Blonde as well as many short films and unmemorable commercials. Some of the award-winning companies she has performed for include Daniel MacIvor’s da da kamera, Nightwood Theatre, Canadian Stage, Crow’s Theatre, Factory Theatre, Theatre Passe Muraille, Theatre Direct Canada, Grand Theatre, Cahoots Theatre Projects, Young People’s Theatre, and The Vancouver Playhouse. She was most recently seen as the volatile, unpredictable Claire in The Actors’ Repertory Company’s 36 Views, which was nominated for a Dora for Outstanding Production. |
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Her debut as a playwright was the acclaimed drama China Doll (Nightwood Theatre) which was nominated for several Dora Mavor Moore Awards, including Outstanding New Play and Outstanding Production. China Doll was published and subsequently nominated for a Governor General’s Literary Award. It was also performed in Hong Kong as a part of Festival Canada Hong Kong. Marjorie wrote the libretto for the short opera Mother Everest for Opera To Go (Tapestry New Opera Works) which was recorded and aired on CBC Radio. For the 60th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Marjorie, along with award-winning playwright Damien Atkins, adapted Hisashi Inoue’s celebrated play about Hiroshima in the garden, two suns from Roger Pulvers’ translation. It was performed at the Japan Foundation, York University, and the University of Toronto as well as at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa. Other produced pieces include several radio dramas for CBC Radio (Spring Arrival, China Doll, Rabbit Box and In a Heartbeat) as well as text for a multi-disciplinary dance piece Nanking Monologue (Wu Ming Dance Project). As a writer, she has participated in the Dim Sum Festival (Harbourfront Centre/Fu-Gen Theatre), Diaspora Dialogues, Deep Wireless Radio Theatre Ensemble (New Adventures in Sound Art), Factory Theatre Playwrights’ Lab, The Radiophonic Workshops (CBC Radio/Banff Centre), playRites Colony (Banff Centre), Groundswell Festival (Nightwood Theatre), On the Verge (NAC), as well as having been Playwright-in-Residence for Theatre Direct Canada and Cahoots Theatre Projects. |
Upcoming premieres include Sanctuary Song in June 2008, a new opera for children created with composer Abigail Richardson, produced by Theatre Direct Canada and Tapestry New Opera Works which will also be a part of the acclaimed LuminaTO Festival. As well, Nightwood Theatre in association with Cahoots Theatre Projects will premiere Marjorie’s new drama, a nanking winter in February 2008. |