Lodestar Theatre’s theatre gardens is their new shows are designed to be performed safely in your garden or back yard. You can pick from classics by Shakespeare, Chekhov or G.B.Shaw, blistering new Canadian writing . New productions are always in rehearsal. They will arrive at a time you choose, mark out their space and serve up a generous portion of delicious, high-quality theatre, just for you and your guests. We had the pleasure of speaking with Jackson Card member/performer of the company on how they were able to keep theatre a live during a pandemic.

Lodestar Theatre’s Garden Theatre

What is it?

Garden Theatre is a project under Lodestar theatre, a theatre company originally from Liverpool, the UK, brought across the seas by Max Rubin, who is a director and theatre-maker here in Edmonton. Who has now made a home here with his wife and son Spike (this is necessary information). This came from a sort of lack and cancellation of all the theatre productions that were going to be happening this year that did not sit right with Max. So he contacted some of us artists, all BFA in acting graduates like yourselves. He asked some of the people he worked with before if they would be interested in rehearsing these plays. Initially, they were rights free plays; Shakespeare, Chekhov, Shaw long-dead artists who do not need the money but you know starving artists might but anyway, we asked if he wanted to rehearse these plays so we can have something to do but then with the potential promise to bring them forth and share them.

The idea is using gardens as a space to perform them socially distanced in people’s backyards, so we started working we gathered a cast, he cast the plays, did an initial read-through realized as we were reading that this was very plausible to do with a), not a stage or lighting or sound, stage managers and can be all simply run by the actors behind a curtain and Max giving us direction on the floor. We are sort of now have two plays that are available on our online menu to book for a private show, and as we learned that people like having shows in their background personally for them so they can choose who they want to bring as an audience member. Now we are getting more to our menu like more contemporary plays, musicals, or potentially improv! Some people dig that, and some people hated that! It would be great to have a little variety on the menu. It all started from a seed of “oh no!” theatre needs to keep going, we were like, alright, we can do it! And the health guidelines were like keep it socially distant alongside the audience members so families can sit together close. Still, family friends you have not seen since corona started must keep their distance watching the show unfold. That is both how it began and what we are doing and things we had to go through along the way.

The rehearsal process.

So what was the rehearsal process like?

It started with us being unsure, and a lot of people are feeling confused about how to approach these new norms we have. We started off wearing masks, socially distant and not in each other’s bubbles until we decided this is going to cause many problems like on the performer’s voices, not being able to touch in a production like Midsummer Night’s Dream there is a lot of love in that play and fights and intimacy not being able to touch each other proved to be an issue. So we decided to be a cohort. If you look at the AHS guidelines, it is basically like classification or label on a group of people who have decided to make a bubble out of themselves, and that just clarifies who you are in close contact with, so we made the commitment to do so we all got tested to make sure that we were all COVID negative which all were so we proceeded with rehearsals. Then we thought of about additional things we have to consider going into people’s s homes. So we wrote up a policy both ourselves to keep the artists safe and for the audience members as well and the people that they would invite. That involved looking up what AHS recommends and what procedures have changed over time, the number of people you can have in a space, the distance you need to maintain, insurance regarding the legalities if we get injured, and the policy we wrote seemed to work with us and satisfied our customers and bringing the necessary documents when we met them. And it all started to unfold with demands and the theatregoers. Still, I guess we are the goers since we are going to them. The theatre desirers wanted to see something, so they were willing to a) sort of risk it, and we do ask them to wear masks as we set up space in their backyards b) it was so clear that people were starving for something and seeing a connection.

The biggest thing there was one moment in the play nearly right at the beginning me and Braden Butler we straight up to greet each other in a hug for four seconds and stand back and look at each other with a just a foot between us and I guarantee you everyone in the audience wants to have that experience with their best friends. Still, they can’t because it is scary and unsafe, but we get to do that every show, and they can kind of vicariously live through us at that moment. It is apparent that people want life as life imitates art, and art is life. They want the aspects of life that they are missing, whether that be a simple embrace by two friends on stage.

Stage to people’s gardens.

For you as an actor and performer, what is it like for you to go from a classical training theatre on a stage to now being performing in backyards?

It is exciting because we had the opportunity to rehearse in a backyard. We assumed that was probably a universal setting we were probably going to be performing in. As we were getting booked, we got booked one time in a tiny backyard near them, and then we got booked in an outdoor hockey rink because it was all grass in the summertime. The situations we found ourselves in was fun because we can whisper in one space. The audience can hear us, and then in another, we have to scream the whole time so everyone can listen to us on top of the natural elements of the wind, rain, sun, all of these things amplifying or dampening our sound depending on the way you look at it. So coming from a program like the BFA at the University of Alberta, they do prepare you for anything when it comes to, for example, making your voice supported enough so that everybody can understand what you are saying cause worse thing going to show is when you can’t understand anything that the performers are saying because you are paying for that.

Meanwhile, the stamina of being able to keep a whole show like an hour and 15 minutes, no intermissions, thirty different quick changes the program has prepared us. I think one it hasn’t is the heart and sort of care just as a human, not as a performer to understand that all these people are going through the same thing is this Pandemic! So knowledge for a moment that while you are up there, it is your time and your story they (audience) are inviting you into their space because they feel comfortable. I think it comes does to comfortability in general as people, and like you, the performer leaning on your cast members and trusting one another, there is nothing you have to worry about. It is just giving them the show at that point. And maybe you might think, “oh,” you want them to react a certain way, want them to laugh at this moment, cry at this moment, but at the end of the day, it’s their show because they are paying for it. Many performers have a different take on it. It took for me to understand that they do want an experience that is starving for—so having the grace to give them that without reservation.

Exciting Discoveries.

What has been the most exciting part about doing theatre in gardens? And why do you think no one else has hopped on this opportunity?

We are the first theatre company to do this in Edmonton as far as we know. And I was expecting a flood gate of other artists follow in our wake, and I still hope that there will be. If I know one thing as a capitalist (kidding), but the capitalistic idea is that competition increases the quality of everybody’s work because they want to do better, so if more people consider this an option, it would only boost Edmonton’s theatre community.

Someone said after a show which was beautiful to hear listening to them with my mask on theirs too six feet apart, weirdly awkwardly distanced but still close at heart. The “wow, that was great; it was the balm I needed for my soul.” I was like, oh my god, that is great and not a bomb but balm for your soul, and it was a confirmation to me that this is what people need amongst the CERB, amongst the face masks, and hand sanitizers. Art is so necessary, so my favourite part of doing it is hearing people’s relief. It never cheers at the end of each show, but a sense of cathartic release that this happened in front and man life can be tiresome right now, especially if you are stuck inside or extremely stressful if you are outside and on the frontline. So having the opportunity to sit and watch. The release for both the audience and us has been amazing and that it is felt on both sides. Also, I get to operate a puppet in one of the shows, which is fantastic. By no means am I a master at puppeteer, but I have worked pretty hard to give something memorable. A lot of reasons to love what we are doing primarily gets to keep working in a time when a lot of things are at a standstill.

Most importantly, it is the reception, whether it be that they might not have enjoyed the show or they could have loved the show. It’s okay. The feeling I crave every time whenever we perform is that “wow” people just have this breath at the end like they are fulfilled. 

Thank you, Jackson Card, for sharing with us. Click the link below to checkout Lodestar Theatre’s Instagram and website. Also Jackson’s Instagram to stay on the look out for his upcoming musical!

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