As Holiday season’s East Van Panto continues at The Cultch is preparing its recently announced 2023 Winter and Spring Season. With 12 in-person shows happening from January until June 2023, as well as significant digital season, there’s plenty for everyone on stage and screens.
An Urban Ink & Raven Theatre co-production in association with The Musical Stage Co Actor Dillan Chiblow Art Direction Andrea Tetrault
Photo: Matt Barnes
The Cultch has an exciting winter and spring are ahead, the season is filled with national hits, international spectacle, and local gems. Heather Redfern, The Cultch’s Executive Director, says, “This season, The Cultch will warm your winter and spice up your spring with exciting world premieres, songs, circus, comedy, theatre, and a Femme Festival filled with powerful feminist performance.”
The Cultch is always proud to present premieres of great Canadian work, and this 2023 season is no exception. Three highly anticipated world premieres from some of Canada’s top theatre creators will see their first audiences on one of The Cultch’s three stages this winter and spring. These shows include award-winning playwright Corey Payette’s Starwalker (Urban Ink), and My Little Tomato, a Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre (vAct) and Zee Zee Theatre co-production in association with rice & beans theatre, written by Rick Tae. And, kicking off 2023, in true Cultch style, is the world premiere of returning favourite, Ronnie Burkett. His Daisy Theatre characters are back, but this time to take on the Bard, in Burkett’s twisted reimagining of Romeo and Juliet, Little Willy.
Circus comes to the Vancouver Playhouse once more with another Cultch and DanceHouse co-presentation. Sacre, from Australia’s Circa, brings a contemporary acrobatic version of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring to life for Vancouver audiences.
The return of The Cultch’s Femme Festival celebrates feminist voices with five in-person shows*. The Femme Festival offerings include two international hard-hitters—RAVEN (from Germany’s circus collective still hungry), and BIRD by Kylie Vincent (USA), a darkly comedic stand-up set that explores trauma. Alongside these out-of-town hits are three powerful shows from some of Vancouver’s most influential creators, including Yvonne Wallace’s tale of language reclamation, ?tszan (to make better) from Ruby Slippers Theatre, comedic choreographer Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg’s Body Parts, and Cultch favourite Amanda Sum’s New Age Attitudes: Live in Concert, a concert-theatre hybrid which explores her 2022 album of the same name.
Wrapping up the season is a brand new work from Matthew Mackenzie (award-winning playwright of Punctuate Theatre’s Bears). First Métis Man of Odesa is the true account of his relationship with his Ukrainian wife and the tumultuous time of their life during the Russian invasion.
With The Cultch Stages filled with so many great performances, in addition to a fulfilling digital season on its RE/PLAY platform, including a digital Femme Festival, and a digital TRANSFORM Cabaret Festival, the season will bring the unexpected, the exceptional and something for everyone to enjoy.
The Cultch In-Person 2023 Season Includes:
Little Willy – January 10-29
Sacre – January 17-21
Starwalker – February 16-March 5
My Little Tomato – March 9-19
Paradise or The Impermanence of Ice Cream – March 23-April 2
Stupid F*cking Bird – April 12-23
Femme Festival
BIRD by Kylie Vincent – April 18-23
RAVEN – April 26-30
Body Parts – May 3-6
?tszan (to make better) – May 4-14
New Age Attitudes: Live in Concert – May 11-14
First Métis Man of Odesa – May 24-June 4
For more details on The Cultch Winter – Spring 2023 Season Shows, Subscriptions and Single tickets visit thecultch.com