Northumberland Players Pop-Up Patio continues at the Cobourg Yacht Club over the weekend.
The Pop-Up Patio kicked off on Friday with a reading of The Graduate and an announcement by MPP David Piccini of a Ontario Trillium Grant for Northumberland Players.for $81,400.
The Northumberland Players will be launching a Pop-Up Theatre project this summer thanks to an $81,400 Resilient Communities Fund grant from the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Trillium Foundation (OTF). The popular theatre group will be delivering outdoor performances for local audiences with equipment purchased from the
grant.
“I am pleased to announce this investment of $81,400 to Northumberland Players to help their organization resume programming and welcome back their audiences,” said MPP David Piccini. “The COVID-19 pandemic has had an unprecedented, devastating impact on arts and culture in the province. This funding has helped Northumberland Players adapt to current health measures to begin offering safe, outdoor performances for local audiences.
It is critical that we continue to support organizations that are finding new ways to engage and reconnect with their community.”
The grant made it possible to develop the Pop-Up Theatre Project; a series of performances in outdoor venues this summer. There will be two staged readings of “The Graduate” by Terry Johnson, “Love Letters” by A.R.Gurney, and two one-act plays, “Laundry and Bourbon” and “Lone Star”, both written by James McClure. These performances will take place on the lawn at the Cobourg Yacht Club and the Lion’s Pavilion in Victoria Park from July 30 to September 27.
The pandemic caused the stage to go dark for the first time in Northumberland Players’ 43- year history. The grant has allowed the community theatre organization to pivot to outdoor performances by purchasing portable lighting, sound and recording equipment. The grant also helped purchase sanitation equipment, plexiglass barriers, as well as ventilation equipment for the Firehall Theatre and Costume House, improving the safety and air quality for patrons, volunteers and summer camp youth.
“When we thought of what we needed to continue providing the community theatre experiences we thought of the safety of our volunteers and patrons first,” said Sharon Anderson, Board member and the Ontario Trillium Foundation grant lead.
The Ontario Trillium Foundation (OTF) is an agency of the Government of Ontario, and one of Canada’s leading granting foundations. Last year, nearly $112M was invested into 1,384 community projects and partnerships to build healthy and vibrant communities and strengthen the impact of Ontario’s non-profit sector. In 2020/21, OTF supported Ontario’s economic recovery by helping non-profit organizations rebuild and recover from the impacts of COVID-19.
Author: Pete Fisher
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