We are a collectively run not-for-profit theatre company building a community & a cultural hub in Toronto’s East End. Underpinning all of our works the core value of accessibility.
Outdoor Theatre
Using Shakespeare as a foundation, we re-interpret, re-write, and re-new these stories for a contemporary audience. We push the boundaries of what is possible in outdoor theatre.
Education
Integrated into the artistic practice, education gives theatre purpose, encourages risk-taking, and reminds us to look towards the future of the art. We strive to educate younger generations of theatre artists through our educational programming, and connect with emerging professional artists through our annual summer production.
Community Building
We welcome our community into our work; sometimes as audience, sometimes as fellow artists. We understand that when people gather and an experience is shared, the sense of community becomes stronger.
Accessibility
We offer our programming free, or Pay-What-You-Can. Accessibility unlocks everything we do. The stories we tell are useless unless our audience understands and connects with them. Education can only influence if it is made available based on need rather than money; community can only be built if everyone is welcome.
History
Taking something that was already there, using it as inspiration, and leading it to unexpected territories is what Ruff has always been about.
In 2012, Brendan McMurtry-Howlett returned to Toronto in hopes of working in the park that he grew up in, Withrow Park, with a company that inspired his love of theatre in, Shakespeare in the Rough. But Upon returning, he learned the company had taken their final bow. So he gathered a team of artists he loved working with, and began hosting micro-events in living rooms and neighbourhood backyards. Before long, the group of emerging artists had earned enough money to put on their first show Two Gents, an adaptation of The Two Gentleman of Verona that reimagined the play as a more egalitarian offer.
This began Ruff’s long history of adaptions, which ventured to re-conceptualized casting (Romeo & Juliet), explorations of form (Macbeth: Walking Shadows), to entire rewrites (Portia’s Julius Caesar, My Co-Mates & Brothers in Exile).
In 2016, Kaitlyn Riordan took over the company as Artistic Director, pushing the company to a fiercely feminist edge. In 2018, Eva Barrie joined her as Co-Artistic Director, and the two worked under, and advocated for a flattened hierarchy and intersectional value systems.
In 2021, a new collective leadership team – made up of Patricia Allison, Christine Horne, Kwaku Okyere, PJ Prudat, and Jeff Yung – was appointed the head of the company. This collective embodies the flattened hierarchy and intersectional value systems that Ruff has been building towards. Every decision is guided by Ruff’s 5 Key Values.
Since 2012, Ruff has taken a decidedly un-precious delve into classical plays, finding ways for them to embody our modern city. With the support of our engaged community, we’ve been able to take risks in our organization and our art, and look forward to surprising and delighting our community in ways we can’t even yet imagine, for years to come.
Artistic Leadership Collective
Patricia Allison
Collective Member
Patricia Allison (she/her) is a queer/ disabled choreographer and movement director. She comes from a contemporary dance background and spent a significant time studying canonical-counter discourse. Patricia lives with her wife and two birds named Larry and Wilbur who enjoy sitting on her shoulder while she types (the birds, not her wife).
Nathaniel Hanula-James
Collective Member
Nathaniel Hanula-James (he/they) is a theatre maker who collaborates on new work as a dramaturg, playwright, administrator, and performer. Nathaniel facilitates the Local Young Playwrights Unit at Tarragon Theatre, works as a freelance dramaturg with artists across Ontario, and apprenticed at the dramaturgical company Nightswimming for three years under the guidance of Brian Quirt and Gloria Mok. As a playwright, Nathaniel dedicates himself to crafting unabashedly queer worlds in which irreverent humour, caustic cynicism, and childlike wonder exist in constant conversation. In his object theatre piece, UNTITLED FLAMINGO PLAY (Talk is Free Theatre 2022, OutFest Halifax 2023, Incoming Festival 2024), a stuffed flamingo dispenses questionable advice to two queer children in search of their authentic selves. Nathaniel's play A CLOUD OF INK IN THE SHAPE OF HERSELF, commissioned by ZeeZee Theatre's National Queer and Trans Playwriting Unit, follows an archivist who descends to the Underworld in search of three Black queer historical figures who consume her research and her imagination. Beyond playwriting, Nathnaiel is a staff writer at Intermission Magazine and is working with Dr. Karen Fricker to develop a new open-access course in Equitable Theatre Criticism. Nathaniel is a graduate of the National Theatre School of Canada's acting program, Humber College's Arts Administration Program, and McGill University (BA Drama & Theatre).
Christine Horne
Collective Member
Christine Horne (she/her) is a mother and actor, last seen on stage as Hamlet in Why Not
Theatre’s Prince Hamlet. She’s a fledgling gardener, excitable bird watcher, and avid reader aloud of children’s literature. Christine has received several awards for her work in theatre, television, and film, but she holds none so dear as when she was crowned The Queen of Weird Shakespeare by a passing cyclist while rehearsing Ruff’s Portia’s Julius Caesar.
PJ Prudat
Collective Member
PJ Prudat (she/her) is a Treaty 6, Meadow Lake born, proud Métis/Cree (roots to Batoche, Red River, Qu’Appelle) & French/Scandinavian actor and a writer. PJ is galvanized by Indigenous perspectives, experiences and stories of this land. She is a resident artist with the Theatre Centre & amp; Nightswimming and recently with Canadian Stage. PJ has performed as a company actor at both the National Arts Centre, the Shaw Festival and has performed in Indigenous~Creative-led shows extensively across the country. She holds a B.A. in Drama from the University of Alberta. Kitatamihinâwâw.
Jeff Yung
Collective Member
Jeff Yung (he/him) is a Tkarón:to based actor, martial artist, and sometimes poet. As an actor Jeff recently appeared in Two Noble Kinsmen with Shakespeare BASH'd as well as appearing as Monk Tsutop in the Netflix adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender. Previously Jeff appeared in the world premieres of Prodigal (The Howland Company ,Crow’s Theatre) and Trojan Girls and the Outhouse of Atreus (Outside the March, Factory Theatre). Before becoming a member of the Shakespeare in the Ruff Artistic Leadership Collective Jeff appeared in their production of Portia’s Julius Caesar alongside fellow collective member Christine Horne. Jeff loves videogames, TV, movies and boba and is a graduate of TMU.
Collaborating Artist
Kwaku Okyere
Collaborating Artist
Kwaku Okyere (he/him) is a queer Ghanaian-Canadian multidisciplinary theatre artist. Most
recently, Kwaku played Oberon in the Dora-nominated ensemble of Theatre Rusticle’s
acclaimed swan song production of Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream, performed at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, which recently presented Kwaku with the 2020 Queer Emerging Artist Award. Kwaku is also an emerging director, most recently having co-directed the 2nd Year Period Study Project at George Brown Theatre School with veteran director Jeannette Lambermont-Morey, and will return to GBTS this summer to co-direct the 1st Year Shakespeare Scene Study with the visionary Allyson McMackon.
Founding Members
Andrew Joseph Richardson
Artistic Associate
Lois Adamson
Founding Youth Development Coordinator
Emma Mackenzie Hillier
Founding General Manager & Producer
Marcel Stewart
Founding Youth Development Coordinator
Lawrence Smith
Founding Board Chair
Past Artistic Directors
Brendan McMurtry-Howlett
Founding Artistic Director
Kaitlyn Riordan
Artistic Director (2016 – 2021), Founding Member
Eva Barrie
Artistic Director (2018 – 2021)
Past Company Members
Makram Ayache
Desirée Leverenz
Darwin Lyons
Giovanni Spina
Thomas Stoneman
Caitlin Sullivan
Kwaku Okyere
Jesse Griffiths
Brookyln Doran
Nicole Myers
Holly Laflamme
Board
Shakespeare in the Ruff acknowledges and sincerely thanks our volunteer board for their commitment and generosity. If you are interested in joining our Board of Directors, please contact us here.
Bonnie Clarke
Board Chair
Cecile Peterkin
Treasurer
Marah Smith
Secretary