Support EXCESS

Help bring EXCESS to the Haskell. Contact us at info@theactoratelier.com or 514-655-2858 to talk about sponsoring, donating, or investing.

A Cultural Event — Not Just a Performance

Mounting EXCESS at The Haskell offers an opportunity to create something rare: a cross-border theatrical experience that brings audiences together at a time when dialogue matters.

The production has the potential to attract:

• Theatre audiences from Canada and the United States
• Visitors seeking unique cultural experiences
• History and arts communities
• Supporters of cross-border collaboration
• Sponsors interested in meaningful community engagement
  
  :READ MORE: /pages/excess-support

Charlotte Moore, Paul Hopkins, Wade Lynch....Read more about the team

Built in 1904, the Haskell Free Library and Opera House is one of North America’s most extraordinary cultural landmarks. Straddling the international border between Stanstead, Québec, and Derby Line, Vermont, it was created as a shared home for neighbouring communities on both sides. The stage rests in Canada while much of the audience sits in the United States, making every performance a uniquely cross-border experience.

More than a century later, the Haskell remains a rare place where borders exist, yet culture brings people together. It is a living reminder that theatre can transcend geography - and that one stage can become common ground.

Could there be no more fitting place for EXCESS to begin its journey?/pages/excess-about-the-haskell

WHO WON THE US/CANADA WAR OF 1812/14?

Canadian screenwriter and actor Grace MacDonald knows. Visiting three-time Daytime Emmy winner American film and television producer Arthur Briknale has no clue. That doesn't stop him from trying to bully Grace into rewriting a revered piece of Canadian history for his FOX series Ready, Aye Ready! Repatriating America's lost Heroes: Episode One. Laura Secord Redux.

Good luck with that!

EXCESS is set in Grace’s upscale Montreal flat on March 14, 2003....

“Nothing is enough for the man for whom enough is too little.’ – Epicurus

It’s March 14. 2003. Canadian Prime Minister, The Right Honorable Jean Chrétien, has declined American President George W. Bush’s ‘invitation’ to participate in the unsanctioned invasion of Iraq.
“No,” Prime Minister Chrétien tells him. "First Iraq, then who is next!?"
Who indeed? In this no-holds-barred comedy of bad manners, our hero, Grace MacKinnon and her fugitive son Grant conspire with Lazzara to neutralize a predatory existential threat.
Invasive Hollywood producer, two-time Daytime Emmy winner Arthur Briknale has come to Canada to peddle his TV series Ready Aye Ready: Repatriating America’s Lost Heros. Episode One; Laura Secord Redux.
Art’s ham-fisted reimagined Laura (she ran north by mistake) affronts everything Grace holds dear. Art offers Grace a minor role. Laura Secord, the undisputed Canadian hero of the War of 1812-14, now elderly and filled with regret, recants.
Grace hits the roof. “First Laura Secord. Then who is next?”
Art is undeterred. Since Làzzara is here already, there’s a thing or two he’d like to get off his chest regarding Cuba.
Big mistake. Still, there’s something about the brash, upbeat, gung-ho American.
In Grace’s upscale Montreal condo, tempers rise, passions flare, the drinks come on and the gloves (and clothes!) come off. Everyone behaves badly for the best of reasons, until…
EXCESS’s climax must be seen and heard to be believed!