Kitt & Jane
A Survival Guide to the Near-Post-Apocalyptic Future
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A Survival Guide to the Near-Post-Apocalyptic Future ~
Show description
The show begins: two grade-eights presenting to the audience, purportedly as part of a school assembly. Very soon, the students go off-script, barring the doors and hijacking the presentation to deliver an important message:
They will be dead in an hour,
the apocalypse will occur in five years,
and they’re here to train you how to survive.
What follows is “a wild, impressively choreographed romp featuring dance numbers and live music that is by turns hilarious, heart-rending and in small glimpses, beautiful. . .You won’t want to leave your seat.” – The Marble. At the heart of this show is a poignant exploration of the world today’s youth are inheriting, and what they’re prepared to do about it.
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Directed & Co-Created by Kathleen Greenfield
Performed & Co-Created by Ingrid Hansen & Rod Peter Jr70 minutes, no intermission
~ Shadow Puppetry ~
~ Video Projection ~Kitt & Jane premiered at the Belfry Theatre SPARK Festival in 2012, with the support of the Incubator Project. In 2013 the we received Dramaturgical Support from Kathleen Flaherty and the Playwright’s Theatre Centre via the Vancouver Fringe Festival’s New Play Prize.
THE PODCAST
As research, SNAFU artists have been interviewing classes of high-school students in Victoria asking about their visions of the future of the planet, the apocalypse, utopia, and what they would be prepared to do to survive a crash. SNAFU is compiling interviews with real live teenagers to create the podcast series: A Teenager’s Guide to Surviving the Apocalypse.PRODUCTION HISTORY
Kitt & Jane: A Survival Guide to the Near-Post-Apocalyptic Future
With the success of Little Orange Man, The Belfry Theatre invited SNAFU for the 2012 Incubator Project to create Kitt & Jane. The piece then won the New Play Prize, which included a year’s worth of dramaturgical support from the Playwrights Theatre Centre, and continued development with the support of the BC Arts Council. In 2014 after a cross-canada tour, the University of Victoria presented a two-week run of Kitt & Jane for their Alumni series. In 2018, Kitt & Jane is undergoing a new writing and development phase that culminates in a premiere at the Revolver Festival in Vancouver, with the support of the Capital Regional District and the Canada Council for the Arts.
CONTENT WARNING
Recommended for Audiences age 10+.
WINNER
VICTORIA’S CRITIC’S CHOICE - BEST NEW PLAY
VANCOUVER PLAYWRIGHT’S CENTRE - NEW PLAY PRIZE
PRESS
“THIS PLAY IS GOLD. The whimsical humour, manic energy, and intelligence ...Just come prepared to drop any assumptions at the door. This is an unpredictable roller-coaster of an evening. You will not leave this show in a bad mood.”
“We are living in an insane time and it’s evident as they sing ‘Children Leading The Revolution’…clearly there is something very powerful here.”
“Kitt and Jane’s genius lies in the ability of the creators to craft a story that has simultaneously tapped into young people’s concern and anxiety about the state of the world while reminding their elders of a simpler more playful time.”
“Endlessly unpredictable, Kitt & Jane is a hilarious, invigorating piece of theatre that will follow you home.”
“INCREDIBLY TALENTED DUO.”
“You won’t want to miss this one.”
Photo: Louis Longpre
Credits
Kitt & Jane is Co-Created by
Kathleen Greenfield,(Survival Skill: Fermentation & Good Advice), Ingrid Hansen. (Survival Skill: Tree Climbing & Toe-Thumb Dexterity), & Rod Peter Jr. (Survival Skill: Willing to Kill Anyone if Needed)
Shadow Puppetry Design & Construction by
Jeni Luther, with shadow design consultants Chloe Ziner and Jessica Gabriel and Puppetry Consultant Andrew G. Young
LX Design by
Michael Franzmann and Kathleen Greenfield,
Poster and Survival Card Art by
Hank Pine
Dramaturg
Kathleen Flaherty
Thank yous
We would like to thank everyone who donated to the Kitt & Jane North American Tour !
With your help we were able to tour our show to seven cities across Canada and perform for thousands of people in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, and Victoria. We met artists from across Canada and all over the world, and built new connections for future creative projects.
Thank you so much for your love.
Thank You
Tasha Diamant, Piper Gordon, Sean Guist, Kira Hall, Solveig & Jorgen Hansen, Shayna Linds, Heather Lindsay, Mike Mackenzie, Emily & Darren Maillot, Kurt & Marilou Pedersen, Michael Stephen, Sue Wardlaw, Mira Burt-Wintonick, and Andrew Young, and our amazing billet hosts who let us stay in their homes along the way.
SNAFU gratefully acknowledges support for Kitt & Jane from the CRD Capital Regional District and the BC Arts Council. We also acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, which last year invested $153 million to bring the arts to Canadians throughout the country.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Kathleen Greenfield
Director & Co-Creator
About KathleenKathleen Greenfield is dedicated to collective creation, the development of new work and community involvement. Her interests and experience are in site-specific outdoor performance, puppetry, folk stories, and community activism. She holds a BFA in Theatre from the University of Victoria and studied at the Banff Puppet Theatre Intensive in 2012. In 2013, she joined SNAFU Dance Theatre as Co-Artistic Director. She has directed the premiere productions of many new works including The Hunt Workshop (Impulse), Little Orange Man (SNAFU), Kitt & Jane (SNAFU), I Have Seen Beautiful Jim Key (Intrepid Theatre), The Shoes (Humble Wonder Theatre) and Bullfrog Lullaby (head through painting). In 2015, she co-directed the smash-hit-remount of Lieutenant Nun, a site-specific spectacle where the audience moves through an old battlement, pageant style. Kathleen also teaches play building to kids ranging from 3 to 13 at Kate Rubin Theatre and Drama @ SKAM Studios and George Jay Elementary. In 2013, Kathleen joined the artistic team at William Head Prison as a facilitator, workshop leader, assistant director, projection designer, writer and performer for Time Waits for No One: A Prison Play(2014) and HERE: A Captive Odyssey (2015) alongside a team of residents and fellow artists. In 2016, she directed and devised Sleeping Giants with the men at William Head on Stage (WHoS).
Ingrid Hansen
Co-Creator & Performer
About IngridIngrid co-founded SNAFU in 2006. Raised by gregarious Danish immigrants, Ingrid loves talking to strangers. She likes to push polite Canadian boundaries with great mutual respect and humour. She has co-created and performed the multi-award-winning touring shows Interstellar Elder, Little Orange Man, Kitt & Jane: An Interactive Survival Guide to the Near-Post-Apocalyptic Future, and Snack Music.
Ingrid has created and performed original work with SNAFU at events curated by The Belfry Theatre, the Next Stage Festival, the Gabriola Theatre Festival, the SummerWorks Festival, The Great Canadian Theatre Centre, The Centaur Theatre, the PUSH Festival, and others. Outside of SNAFU, she has performed with Corpus Theatre, Story Theatre, Theatre Direct, The Quickening, Theatre SKAM, Shakespeare in the Ruff, Architect Theatre, Atomic Vaudeville, and Suddenly Dance Theatre.
She spent four summers performing as a lead puppeteer and voice actor on the children’s television series Tiga Talk on APTN. She has toured across the country performing her solo show Little Orange Man at festivals and schools, and worked as a designer on the Dora-Award-Winning Ride the Cyclone with Atomic Vaudeville. For the past seven years, Ingrid has built an ongoing collaboration with the inmates at the prison theatre company William Head on Stage, which operates inside a federal prison near Victoria, BC.
Rod Peter Jr
Co-Creator & Performer
About RodRod is a comedian, writer, and actor. He co-created and performs in Kitt & Jane: An Interactive Survival Guide to the Near-Post-Apocalyptic Future. His past works include: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Craigdarroch Castle 2009) and The Fall of the House of Usher (Craigdarroch Castle 2011), The Qualities of Zero (Atomic Vaudeville 2007), Agnes B (Suddenly Dance 2010). Rod is a three time Pick of the Fringe winner for The History of Everything (Best Dance Performance,) The War of 1812 (Best Comedy,) and Tara Firm (Best Comedy). He is the Co-Producer of Twisted Theatre, a founding artist of Atomic Vaudeville, and has created original works for BIKE RIDE with Theatre SKAM. He is currently working on a new show 421 is Dead with Charlie Ross.
Jeni Luther
Shadow Puppetry Design & Construction
About JeniJeni Luther is a visual artist who moved to Victoria in 2001. She found SNAFU through volunteer work at William Head on Stage. She learned to love acting and all things theatre and is now honoured to be part of SNAFU.