Marc Rimmer

Ten years ago, when Sage Theatre first found its way onto the Calgary scene with its production of Judith Thompson’s Lion in the Streets, the proliferation of small theatre companies in the city was relatively new. While recent years have seen the constant addition of new alternatives to the major houses, 1998 saw many of the city’s alternative companies with single-digit histories. Theatre Junction was seven, Ghost River Theatre five and Ground Zero Theatre had just finished its first season.
            Like so many company founders, Sage’s first artistic director, Rob Moffat, turned to self-produced work as a way of redefining himself, staging independent work that would let him take creative control. Soon after graduating from the University of Alberta’s acting program, Moffat decided that he wanted more control over his expression than acting offered. He turned initially to dramaturgy and playwriting, finding a position with Alberta Theatre Projects (ATP) as an assistant dramaturge.
            “I consider my three years at ATP as a real apprenticeship time,” he says. “I needed to get my own voice out there. I thought I had capabilities as a producer, so I continued with that, and it came time to really direct — to put it all on the line and see how well I could share my sensibilities with other artists and audiences.”
            Named when a suggestion by playwright Eugene Stickland rang true (“inviting people to our theatre who want to expand on a salt-and-pepper diet,” explains Moffat), the company began modestly enough, with its administration handled on an electric typewriter on Moffat’s kitchen table. After the company’s première production of Lion in the Streets, later seasons began to establish the company’s reputation as a potent alternative company. Plays included Polygraph, by theatre giant Robert Lepage, and David Rubinoff’s Stuck, whose success saw it remounted within the same season. Sage even eventually built its own short-lived venue, a converted community centre in Bridgeland that Sage named the Monograph Theatre — just one of many learning experiences for the company.
            “I remember mailouts, the dawn of e-mail coming in, Telus screwing us out of a connection at one point,” recalls Moffat. “At a few points, actually. I remember a ticket sales fiasco where the company that was handling us was disconnected the week before our opening.
            “I remember that sense of people going above and beyond,” he continues. “They catch a sense of the spirit of the company, whether it be all those hours painstakingly creating the poster images over doughnuts and coffee or running around town in the rain putting up posters.”
            After his sixth year as artistic director, an exhausted Moffat stepped down to return to Edmonton, where he has since returned to the University of Alberta to complete his masters of fine arts degree in directing. In 2004, it was Kelly Reay, then a regular stage manager for Theatre Junction, who Moffat chose as his successor. Though the two men came from different professional backgrounds, the impetus for both was a clear desire to define themselves and their fledgling company. “The same way I was able to step into Sage and redefine myself as a director and producer, I thought Kelly had the same sorts of capabilities and would look to other people in the community and be a friend and a great leader to the other artists,” recalls Moffat.
            As one of his first changes to the direction of the company, Reay created a new core for the organization, bringing in associate artists like Adrienne Smook, Geoffrey Ewart and Cameron Falkenhangen. Along with general manager Kelie Jensen, Reay began encouraging a small group of stakeholders to make Sage’s success its own. “We all enjoy each other, and they all feel they’re a stakeholder in the company, and all care about its success,” he says. “That’s huge to have that structure of people caring about the company and feeling invested.”
            In no small way, the commitment of a small company’s current artists is reminiscent of the company’s first production, now being restaged as the first show of Sage’s 2007-08 season. A visceral play full of brutal violence both physical and emotional, Lion in the Streets was the kind of statement intended to bring the company roaring into the Calgary scene, which is exactly what it did. It earned four Betty Mitchell wins, including one for direction and one for performance by an actress in a lead role (Esther Purves Smith). In addition to the show’s importance to the company, it was also a milestone for artists like the production’s director, Kate Newby.
            Before Lion in the Streets, Newby had built her career as an actor — even performing in an Edmonton production of Lion three years earlier. By the time Moffat had begun to explore the potential of the new company, Newby had become disenfranchised with performance, finding that the passion that had made her work vibrant had begun to wane. “When I started acting in the ‘A’ houses, I always felt there was something missing,” she says. “(Small companies) are struggling, and there’s a passion. You’re really doing it for a reason, because you’re not getting paid well. I always felt that the passion and commitment in the small companies is one of the reasons I wanted to stay in theatre.”
            Just as important as the company’s passion was the opportunity it afforded Newby: a first-time directing gig. In fact, the opportunity was an essentially defining one — 10 years later, she is known more as a director and as the artistic director of the Calgary International Children’s Festival.
            That task of definition is one that continues for the company, even as it has reached the loaded symbol of the double-digit anniversary. “I think at the time, there was so much raw energy, and companies were, Sage included, struggling to try and find a strong identity,” says Reay. “I think that’s always going to be the case when there are so many small companies in a community that’s not exactly theatre-friendly. To stake your identity and not just get lumped in, to stand out from the greater independent scene — that remains a struggle.”
            Continuing the company’s intimate, affecting mandate, this year’s season also includes the Canadian première of My Name is Rachel Corrie, a one-woman show adapted from the journal entries of its eponymous activist. Killed while protesting an Israeli house demolition, the American Corrie is a figure of contention whose story invites discussions of issues deeply ingrained with politics and race.
            Less political still, but renowned for its passion, the cult musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch will bring the story of an inexpertly sex-changed rocker to Sage for the company’s third production. As well known for its 2001 film adaptation as for its success as an off-Broadway musical, Hedwig’s glam rock will mark the company’s final full-length production before the season closes with the fourth annual Ignite! Festival of new work. From the political to the darkly comic, from the social realties of violence to a showcase of Calgary’s up-and-coming artists, it’s a season of distinct, intimate productions.
            If the company’s work continues to aggressively define it against a field of other companies, its position in the theatre scene seems to have stabilized. While Reay concedes that longer runs and larger audiences are certainly tantalizing notions, he insists that with the size of the company’s productions (at the Pumphouse Theatres), Sage has found a permanent place. “It’s a great niche,” says Reay. “We’re not looking to grow huge, we don’t want to sell a 500-seat theatre. We want high quality plays up close and personal, and we can’t get that same experience in a bigger house. I think that’s really a cornerstone, that intimacy.
            “There’s always the temptation of trying to do bigger and better, where for the last three years we’ve been governing ourselves (by taking) the resources we have and doing really well,” he adds. “We don’t sacrifice resources for a super-polished production. What we concentrate on are the performance, direction and design. We really try and showcase the things we can do well, and for the things we don’t have the resources to do well, we do the best we can and leave it at that.”
            Ten years ago, Sage began as an exercise in definition, taking its founder from assistant dramaturge to artistic director and making a director of Newby. Reay continues to define the company, finding its niche with work that cultivates an audience in Calgary’s ever-broadening field of theatre. In a city whose once-young companies are now established commodities, it’s comforting to see change remain a constant.