Zinnia Productions and The Toronto International Fringe Festival present:
Wanted, If Not Wed
A solo show created and performed by Jennifer Gillespie*
May 27, 2010…. In the era of reality tv, Wanted, If Not Wed brings the ultimate reality to the stage. This funny and poignant 60-minute play features dialogue taken directly from interviews with real women from all over the world, including from Toronto. This unique solo show interweaves the words of real people with personal narrative to take a compelling and humorous look at life from the perspective of real single women.
Wanted, If Not Wed showcases the voices of real women talking with remarkable honesty about personal experiences. Some are married to someone they don’t love; some are incapable of love; and others are desperately in love with someone who doesn’t notice them. There’s a Newfoundlander who used to be a nun; a first generation Canadian woman who is struggling with her parents’ desire for her to have an arranged marriage; an elderly woman who came to America seeking love but has never found it; a woman in her late thirties who has jumped back into the mating game; a bride and groom puppet show; a musical number; and yes, spinsters with cats.
“Gillespie is a warm and subtle performer. With nothing but a bare stage and a chair, she crafts an engaging meditation on love, loneliness, and choice..” – Georgia Straight, Vancouver
“Fascinating” – Winnipeg Free Press
“A thoughtful and well-acted show…, Gillespie is capable of many moving and unsettling moments.” – CBC Manitoba
Wanted, If Not Wed plays at Theatre Passe Muraille Backspace, 16 Ryerson Avenue, Toronto
Thursday, July 1, 2010 @ 9:30 pm
Saturday, July 3, 2010 @ 10:15 pm
Sunday, July 4, 2010 @ 2:45 pm
Wednesday, July 7, 2010 @6:30 pm
Thursday, July 8, 2010 @ 4:30 pm
Friday, July 9, 2010 @ 10:30 pm
Saturday, July 10, 2010 @ 8:00 pm
Sunday, July 11, 2010 @ 12:30 pm
Tickets
$10 at the door, $11 in advance includes service fee. Call the Fringe box office at 416.966.1062
Visit Wanted, If Not Wed on Facebook & Twitter at:
http://www.facebook.com/people/Jennifer-Gillespie/635495389
www.myspace.com/gillespiejennifer
*Jennifer Gillespie, creator & actor – BIO
Jennifer is a professional actor and arts educator. Acting work includes Nancy Bannon’s groundbreaking theatrical-installation piece The Pod Project, at Dance New Amsterdam in New York; Allison Grant’s production of Private Lives for Theatre Athena in Waterloo; and successful runs of her most recent solo play Wanted, If Not Wed, in the Winnipeg and Vancouver Fringe Festivals. Other solo works have been produced in Toronto, Seattle and New York. Her solo piece My Favourite Things, was awarded the Theatre Creators Reserve grant by the Ontario Arts Council and was performed at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, Ontario in 2008. A Newfoundlander, Jennifer travelled to West to earn her B.A. at UBC, and later a Masters of Fine Arts degree in Acting, from the University of Washington in Seattle. There, she trained with Tony Award winners Jon Jory & Bartlett Sher. She is also a graduate of the Second City Conservatory where she worked with Dora Award winner Chris Earle. Jennifer has taught acting at the University of Washington; for the Bad Dog Theatre in Toronto; City Lights Youth Theatre in New York; and for the DAREarts Foundation; and is a two-time recipient of the Ontario Arts Council’s Artists in Education grant. Her latest solo show Wanted, If Not Wed, will be produced in the Toronto International Fringe Festival this July and in the Edmonton International Fringe Festival in August.