The next Script Salon event is on Sunday, January 10, 2021. It features readings by BIPOC playwrights from across the province, supported by PlayConnect at the Playwrights Guild of Canada.

To receive a Zoom link for the event please send a request to [email protected].

We’d like to thank the Playwrights Guild of Canada for making these readings possible and warmly welcome the following playwrights to our Script Salon online stage:

Makram Ayache

Makram Ayache is a community-engaged theatre artist and educator who splits his time between Edmonton and Toronto. His playwriting explores meaningful representations of queer Arab voices. He often endeavours to bridge complex and interlocking political struggles to the very intimate and real experiences of the people impacted by them.

Ayache has been nominated for four Elizabeth Sterling Haynes Awards for his plays Harun (2018) and The Green Line (2019). Most recently, Harun won the Playwrights’ Guild of Canada’s annual Tom Hendry Award in the RBC Emerging Playwright Category. In 2020, Ayache completed Factory Theatre’s Mechanicals Actors’ Enhancement Training in Toronto and co-created and performed in Azimuth Theatre’s All That Binds Us in Edmonton.

Currently, his play The Hooves Belonged to the Deer, is commissioned by the Alberta Queer Calendar Project which will be workshopped and recorded for online public viewing, directed by Peter Hinton. In 2021, he will spend his time at the Citadel Theatre developing his skills as a director and he is a participant of Generator’s Artist Producer Training program. He is also excited to join the Musical Stage Company and Prime Mover’s NoteWorthy program to explore musical theatre creation this winter!

Lady Vanessa Cordoba

Lady Vanessa y yo soy Caleña, Colombiana is a visitor here on Treaty 6 Territory, Amiswachiwaskahegan:
“I am committed to honouring the treaty by learning tunderstand it, observing the ways in which we are not honouring it at the moment and listening to the original people of this land on how to protect and take care of this home. I offer my hands and my heart to Turtle Island, Madre Tierra, Abaya Yala, The Caribbean and Namibia (the land that birthed and embraced the poet in me). I am a multi-disciplinary artist choosing to learn from as many mediums to get my messages across. I offer tools for self- healing and community engagement, building and accountability. I am the 2018 ‘Candian’ Individual poetry slam champion. I am a former youth mentor of “Newcomers are Lit”. I am playwright, author and performer of the play Three Ladies and co-creator of Whiteface. I am Founder of Sinergia, Fiesta y Resistencia and “Remix the Ritual”- A Hip Hop theatre collective. I am a crew member of “Los FreeRoosters” in Cali, Colombia. I am a daughter, a granddaughter, a sister, a lover, a neice, an auntie, a woman, a human, a future birth worker, a healer, a mentor, a student, an artist, a poet and a prophet always aiming to channel the message of loVe.”

Dale Lee Kwong

Dale Lee Kwong is a Calgary-based poet, playwright, and essayist. She is third-generation Chinese-Canadian. Her work explores Chinese-Canadian history, diversity and inclusion, adoption, and LGBTQ issues. She is passionate about Calgary’s Chinatown, and was a frequent host of pre-pandemic Chinatown walking tours. Dale is a sometime performer under the direction of her border-collie/heeler cross, Fonzarelli.

Mūkonzi Mūsyoki

Mūkonzi Mūsyoki is a writer, director and a dramaturge. He is a second-year PhD student at the University of Alberta in Performance Studies. Mũkonzi graduated from Kenyatta University in Kenya on July 2016 with a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in English, Linguistics and Literature. He later went on to do his Masters in the University of Alberta specializing in Kenyan Theatre. He has been in Canada for four years and has worked with Workshop West, Timms Centre Studio Theatre, the University of Alberta Drama Department, MAA and PAA Theatre and The Citadel Theatre. Mũkonzi has also worked as a dramaturg for Ignite Afrika Trust where he continues to participate in the OSNW (Old Stories in New Ways) Project and TIC (Theatrical Interactions for Change) back in Kenya collaborating with local artists from Kisumu. His research is on Postcolonial Theatre and Performance, Dramaturgy, Urban Discourse and Identity Politics in contemporary East Africa.

Michelle Todd

Michelle Todd is an Edmonton native and has been active in the arts community for over 25 years as an actor, writer, choreographer, director, facilitator, and producer. A graduate of MacEwan’s Theatre Arts program, Michelle most recently performed with Saint Maggie Productions, Shadow Theatre, and Northern Light Theatre. She was Theatre Alberta’s 2020 recipient of the Michelle Dias Community Award.