September 8, 2024
The year 2024 has been called “The Year of the Election,” because more countries than ever before are goingto the polls in national elections; in some cases, we have already seen existing governments replaced by new powers-that-be. Like many other things in life, politicians have their exits and their entrances, and we may see more than our usual share of changes this year.
Perhaps there’s something in the air, because we will be seeing some big changes at the the Lester Centre of the Arts in the coming year, which is why we’re naming our 2024/2025 season “Exits and Entrances.”
Typically, in theatre, an official exit or entrance takes place on the stage; however, one of the biggest changes for us will be taking place in the audience section. At the beginning of our season, we will be saying good-bye to our old seats, which are being replaced as part of our “Please Be Seated” project. Our old seats have servedus very well since 1987, but it is time for them to exit and allow the new seats to enter.
Speaking of construction, the City of Prince Rupert is also replacing most of the roofs on the building, including the tall roof above the stage. Like the seats, this renovation will see an exit (of the old roofs) and an entrance (of the new roofs), which will ensure the building is equipped for many years of performances to come.
Upgrades like the seats and the roof are welcome changes, but some exits are bittersweet. This year, we will be saying good-bye to two prominent figures in the local performing arts scene: Dwain Harrison and Alison O’Toole. Dwain has been the Lester Centre’s stalwart Technical Director since 2017, and he has been involved in the local music scene for many years before that. After many years of dedicated service, he will be retiring from his position in the spring of 2025. Alison has taught drama at the high-school level for over 30 years, and she has brought a plethora of performances to our stage with high shool musicals, plays for zone competition, and fine arts revues. She is retiring at the end of the 2025 school year, and she will be directing the final musical of her award-winning teaching career this December, when she brings Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat to the stage. We wish Dwain and Alison all the best after their selfless dedication to the arts in our community.
Exits sometimes lead to corresponding entrances, and we’ll see two big entrances in the spring. In 2025, we will once again be bringing a musical to the stage, Shrek the Musical, which will run from April 10-12. It will mark the directorial debut of Heather MacRae, who is a familiar face to the local arts scene, and who has graciously agreed to take the reins of the community musical. We’re very excited to see what she comes up with for this very family-friendly production.
A month after the musical, the annual RockStock show will once again blow the roof off the joint, as the young musicians of Ring System Studio will play and sing their renditions of popular music. This show has been a presentation of the Lester Centre for over a decade, and this year, for the first time, it will be organized and produced by the new heads of the studio, Meghan Cunningham and Alley McCulloch,who took over after the previous head, Ian Lihou, exited into retirement. We know that the entrance of Meghan and Alley into a leadership role will only mean many more years of great shows by our town’s talented musicians.
We have more shows planned for the coming season; please see the table below for full details.
There may be many changes worldwide in this Year of the Election, and it may be difficult to make sense of it all. But maybe we can look at it, simply, as new faces replacing the old,similar to what William Shakespeare wrote:
“All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances.”
Through these changes, the Lester Centre remains a constant for the community, providing audiences a sense of connectedness with each other and with the performers on stage, and we will continue to provide you with experiences that are different, new, and inspiring. We’re looking forward to seeing you in our (new) seats for the 2024/2025 season!
