Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre-Media Centre
4-red-stars-102w.png “Strachan and Richards…are terrific alone, but wonderful together”Free Press

As a storm rages on April 3, 1968, civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. retires to his room at the Lorraine Motel. Exhausted, jumpy and craving a cigarette, King wrestles with his next speech. When a beautiful maid delivers coffee to the room, small talk veers into a surprising conversation that exposes the preacher’s vanity, vulnerability and uncompromising humanity. In this gripping reimagination of the night before King’s assassination, we witness the hope and struggle of a man who must confront his destiny and his legacy to the people.
 

Click on the image to download the digital program:

Ovation4Cover.jpg

Warnings: 
Mature themes; strong and racially charged language, including slurs; recommended for grade 10+; theatrical haze, flashing lights

 

Running time: 
Approx. 90 minutes, no intermission


Opening Night sponsor:



Cast & Crew

Production
Katori Hall photo
Katori Hall

Playwright

Playwright Katori Hall
Katori Hall photo

Katori Hall

Katori Hall is a Pulitzer Prize and Olivier Award-winning playwright and television creator/producer from Memphis. A two-time Tony Award nominee, she won the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for her play The Hot Wing King, which she directed for the first time at Atlanta’s Alliance Theatre in February 2023. Other works include The Mountaintop, Our Lady of Kibeho, Saturday Night/Sunday Morning, The Blood Quilt, Tina: The Tina Turner Musical and Hurt Village, which is being developed into a feature film. She’s also the executive producer and showrunner of P-Valley, the critically acclaimed and ground-breaking Starz drama based on her play Pussy Valley. She is an alumna of Columbia University, A.R.T. at Harvard University and Juilliard. Her other awards include the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Literature, the Susan Smith Blackburn Award, Lark Play Development Center Playwrights of New York (PONY) Fellowship, two Lecompte du Nouy Prizes from Lincoln Center, Fellowship of Southern Writers Bryan Family Award in Drama, NYFA Fellowship, the Columbia University John Jay Award for Distinguished Professional Achievement, National Black Theatre’s August Wilson Playwriting Award, and the Lorraine Hansberry Playwriting Award. katorihall.com

Hazel Venzon photo
Hazel Venzon

Director

Director Hazel Venzon
Hazel Venzon photo

Hazel Venzon

ROYAL MTC Cultural Consultant: Calpurnia (with NAC/Black Theatre Workshop). Director: Where.Are.You.From. (Tiny Plays, Big Ideas). Assistant Director: The Mountaintop (2021). 2020/21 National Mentorship Program.

OTHER THEATRE Directing: Everything Has Disappeared (UNIT/Mammalian); Volare, Stories Houses Tell (PTE); I Think We Are Alone (U of W); Places We Go, EMBRACE (UNIT/Nakai); Haircuts By Children, Children’s Choice Awards, Eat The Street, These Are The People In Your Neighbourhood (Mammalian); Ongoing: Homecoming (Urban Ink). Associate Directing: Bad Parent (vAct PTE). Assistant Directing: By Grand Central Station (PTE). 

FILM/TV Director: 1st AD: I Knew My Murderer (Frantic Films). 2nd AD: Gone (Buffalo Gal); Perfect Match (Farpoint).

TRAINING Studio 58 (Langara); Black Hole Theatre Program, School of Fine Arts (U of M).

ET CETERA Hazel is the Artistic Director and Producer of U N I Together (UNIT) Productions.

Audrey Dwyer photo
Audrey Dwyer

Original Director

Original Director Audrey Dwyer

Audrey Dwyer

Brian Perchaluk photo
Brian Perchaluk

Set Designer

Set Designer Brian Perchaluk
Brian Perchaluk photo

Brian Perchaluk

ROYAL MTC Recent and favourites: Clue (with Grand), Burning Mom, The Three Musketeers, The Color Purple (with Citadel), The Cottage, John, The Humans, Once (with Grand), Sarah Ballenden, Black Coffee, Billy Elliot the Musical, Harvey, August: Osage County, The Lonesome West, Patience, Picasso at the Lapin Agile (with NAC), M. Butterfly (with NAC).

OTHER THEATRE Brian’s work has been featured at theatres across the country, including two seasons each at the Shaw and Stratford festivals. Selected recent credits include: La Cantatrice chauve et La Leçon (Théâtre Cercle Molière); The Whipping Man (WJT); The Hockey Sweater and The Little Mermaid (Rainbow); Post Democracy (PTE).

TRAINING Graduate of U of W and NTS.

ET CETERA Recipient of Gemini, Jessie Richardson, Prix Rideau and Evie Awards.

Rachel Forbes photo
Rachel Forbes

Costume Designer

Costume Designer Rachel Forbes
Rachel Forbes photo

Rachel Forbes

ROYAL MTC Set Designer: Calpurnia (with NAC/Black Theatre Workshop). Costume Designer: The Mountaintop (2021).

OTHER THEATRE Set and Costume Design: Serving Elizabeth (WCT); A Million Billion Pieces, Risky Phil (YPT); Victory, 1837: The Farmers’ Revolt (Shaw); The Bridge (Neptune/2b Theatre); Choir Boy (Centaur); Iterate (Mile Zero Dance). Costume Design: A Streetcar Named Desire, The Brothers Size (Soulpepper); Fences (Grand). Set Design: School Girls (Obsidian Theatre); In The Abyss (Political Movement).

FILM Shorts: 21 Black Futures (Obsidian/CBC); A Revolution of Love (THM/Awakenings); Body So Fluorescent (Madonnanera/lnside Out).

TEACHING She has designed, mentored and taught at Ryerson University and is currently serving on the board of directors of the Associated Designers of Canada.

ET CETERA Rachel received a Dora Mavor Moore Award for her costume design on The Brothers Size (Soulpepper 2019) and a Merritt Award for her set design on The Bridge (2b/Neptune 2019).

Hugh Conacher photo
Hugh Conacher

Lighting & Video Designer

Lighting & Video Designer Hugh Conacher
Hugh Conacher photo

Hugh Conacher

ROYAL MTC (selected) Lighting & Video Designer: The Mountaintop (2021), Vietgone, Venus in Fur. Video Designer: Network. Lighting Designer: among men (with TPM), Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (with Segal), The Secret to Good Tea, Into the Woods, New, Orlando, Women of the Fur Trade, Fun Home, The Color Purple (with Citadel), Kill Me Now (with NAC), Seminar (with Mirvish), Dry Lips Oughta Move to Kapuskasing and many other productions since the ‘80s.

OTHER THEATRE Hugh collaborates with choreographers, visual artists and dance and theatre companies worldwide.

ET CETERA Hugh enjoys working beyond the constraints of traditional lighting design using various forms of interactive media, video and photography. His photographic work resides in private collections and has been published worldwide. Hugh is a member of the Associated Designers of Canada and L’Association des professionnels des arts de la scène du Québec. www.pellucid.me

Chris Coyne photo
Chris Coyne

Sound Designer

Sound Designer Chris Coyne
Chris Coyne photo

Chris Coyne

ROYAL MTC Into the Woods, Calpurnia (with NAC/Black Theatre Workshop), The (Post) Mistress, The Mountaintop 2021, Fun Home, Kill Me Now (with NAC), The Hound of the Baskervilles 2016 (Tour). Technical Director at the John Hirsch Mainstage (2018-2022).

OTHER THEATRE Chris has had the pleasure of working with many local and international theatre groups. Credits include Routes 2016/17 Tour (MTYP); The Hound of the Baskervilles Mar. 2015, Little Thing Big Thing Sep. 2015 (PTE); EDEN 2013 (Sarasvàti); Bashir Lazhar Mar. 2013 (TPM); Angels in America 2012, Perestroika 2014 (WJT); Three Sisters 2011 (zone41).

TRAINING Chris is a graduate of the Ontario Institute of Audio Recording Technology.

ET CETERA Chris has been involved in the theatre industry in Winnipeg for many years. Currently working as Royal MTC’s Head of Sound at the John Hirsch Mainstage.

Jacquie Loewen photo
Jacquie Loewen

Fight Director

Fight Director Jacquie Loewen
Jacquie Loewen photo

Jacquie Loewen

ROYAL MTC Fight Director (selected): Clue (with Grand), Yaga, Into the Woods, The Rez Sisters, Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical (with Arts Club/Citadel), Vietgone (with fu-GEN/Hope and Hell), Hand to God, Private Lives, Gone With the Wind, August: Osage County, Romeo and Juliet, The Seafarer. Actor: The Three Musketeers, Alice Through the Looking-Glass, Top Girls.

OTHER THEATRE Fight Director (selected): Macbeth (Bard on the Beach); Indigenous Playwrights New Works Workshop (PTC – Vancouver); Beauty and the Beast (Rainbow); The Flood Thereafter (CS); Don Giovanni (Manitoba Opera); Macbeth, The Merry Wives of Windsor, The Taming of the Shrew (SIR); Prairie Nurse (PTE).

TEACHING U of Winnipeg, U of Manitoba, Trinity Western, Simon Fraser University, Kansas State University.

ET CETERA Jacqueline was a founding member of the Canadian Comedy Award-nominated sketch group Hot Thespian Action.

Sharon Bajer photo
Sharon Bajer

Intimacy Director

Intimacy Director Sharon Bajer
Sharon Bajer photo

Sharon Bajer

ROYAL MTC (selected) Actor: Clue (with Grand), The Three Musketeers, Sense and Sensibility, Kill Me Now (with NAC), Hand to God, Late Company, The Seagull, A Christmas Story, August: Osage County, Top Girls, Steel Magnolias, Humble Boy, Of Mice and Men, Angels in America, Les Belles-Soeurs, Our Country’s Good. Intimacy Director: Clue (with Grand), Sexual Misconduct of the Middle Classes, Into the Woods, New.

OTHER THEATRE Afterlight (The Keep/Walk&Talk/Rainbow); The Outside Inn (upcoming at PTE); The Wizard of Oz (Rainbow). 

TRAINING Studio 58, Michael Langham Directing Program (Stratford). Certified Intimacy Director (ICC and IDC).

FILM/TV Recent projects include Little Bird, Written in the Stars, Dark Harvest, Ordinary Angels, Acting Good, Run; Intimacy Coordinator for The Porter, SkyMed, Wintertide, El Toro, Alter Boys, Little Bird and Don’t Even.

ET CETERA sharonbajer.com

Amani Dorn photo
Amani Dorn

Dialect Coach

Dialect Coach Amani Dorn
Amani Dorn photo

Amani Dorn

ROYAL MTC The Mountaintop (2021).

OTHER THEATRE Victory (Capitol Classics).

TRAINING/TEACHING University of California at Irvine; Knight-Thompson Speech Trainer Certification; Fitzmaurice Voice Training.

ET CETERA Amani Dorn is a dialect coach originally from Austin, Texas currently residing in Atlanta, Georgia. She is professionally represented by Pamela Vanderway at Entertainment Linguistics. Amani coaches actors preparing accents for auditions, roles and their careers. She is beyond excited to join the team on this very relevant work. amanidorndialects.com

Melissa Langdon photo
Melissa Langdon

Assistant Director

Assistant Director Melissa Langdon
Melissa Langdon photo

Melissa Langdon

ROYAL MTC Actor: The Three Musketeers; Artistic Associate; Assistant Director: Trouble in Mind (with Citadel), Orlando; 2020/21 National Mentorship Program; Artistic Coordinator: Tiny Plays, Big Ideas. 

OTHER THEATRE Twelfth Night (SIR); Voice (PTE); Spelling 2-5-5 (MTYP); School Girls; Or The African Mean Girls Play (Obsidian/Nightwood Theatre); Hamlet (SIR); Blink (One Trunk/W&T); Home 2.0, The Game, New Beginnings (Sarasvàti); O(phelia) (ShakespeareFest); Animosity (Winnipeg Fringe Theatre Festival); Time and the Conways, Concord Floral, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (U of W).

FILM Macbeth (SIR/Blackfriar).

TRAINING Bachelor of Arts Honours in Theatre and Film Acting from the University of Winnipeg.

ET CETERA Dora Award: Outstanding Production and Toronto Theatre Critics’ Choice Award: Outstanding Production of a Play (School Girls), Bethia Henry Memorial Scholarship in Theatre and Drama, Reg Skene Emerging Artist Award. Love you Matt 💕

Anika Binding photo
Anika Binding

Apprentice Lighting Designer

Apprentice Lighting Designer Anika Binding
Anika Binding photo

Anika Binding

ROYAL MTC among men (with TPM). 

OTHER THEATRE Lighting Designer: From Up Here (U of W). Costume Designer: Stupid Fucking Bird (U of W). Stage Management: Scenes from Love and Information (U of W). Assistant Lighting & Set Designer: The Prom (Dry Cold). Upcoming: Stage Management for Something Rotten! (MTYP); Lighting and Costume Design for Miss Shakespeare (WST). 

TRAINING BA Hons. in Theatre and Film from the University of Winnipeg, with specializations in Design, Stage Management & Production, and Directing.

ET CETERA Anika would like to thank Theatre Projects Manitoba and Creative Manitoba for this opportunity. She also thanks her family, friends and teachers at the University of Winnipeg for their endless support.

Katriona Dunn photo
Katriona Dunn

Apprentice Lighting Designer

Apprentice Lighting Designer Katriona Dunn
Katriona Dunn photo

Katriona Dunn

ROYAL MTC First engagement. 

OTHER THEATRE Assistant Set & Props Design: Casey and Diana and Women of the Fur Trade (Stratford). Assistant Costume Design: Murder on the Orient Express (Vertigo Theatre) and Company (MacEwan University). Co-design: Pro Series II: Just Breathe, Okâwîmâwaskiy (U of C). Design: Wagonstage (U of C). Costume Design: Horse Girls (U of C). Assistant Lighting & Projection Design: Formations (U of C).

TRAINING Graduate of University of Calgary’s Drama program and Mentee through the ADC.

ET CETERA The services of Katriona Dunn were made possible through the Associated Designers of Canada Mentorship Program funded by the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Calgary Arts Development.

Michael Duggan photo
Michael Duggan

Stage Manager

Stage Manager Michael Duggan
Michael Duggan photo

Michael Duggan

ROYAL MTC (selected) Stage Manager: Clue (with Grand), Into the Woods, New, Calpurnia (with NAC/BTW), Vietgone (with fu-GEN/Hope and Hell), Hand to God. Assistant Stage Manager: Burning Mom, The Mountaintop (2021), The Color Purple (with Citadel), A Christmas Carol, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (with Citadel), Chimerica. 2022/23 National Mentorship Program.

OTHER THEATRE (selected) The Nutcracker (RWB); The Little Mermaid (2023), The Wizard of Oz (2022), Mamma Mia! (Rainbow Stage); Space Girl, The War Being Waged (PTE); The Winter’s Tale/Le conte d’hiver (SIR/TCM); MTYP’s Midwinter Mosey (MTYP); The Flying Lovers of Vitebsk (WJT); Meet Me at Dawn (TBTR). 

TRAINING B.A. (Hons) in Theatre Production and Stage Management at the University of Winnipeg.

ET CETERA Enjoy the show!

Leslie Watson photo
Leslie Watson

Replacement Stage Manager

Replacement Stage Manager Leslie Watson
Leslie Watson photo

Leslie Watson

ROYAL MTC Stage Manager: Orlando, The Mountaintop (2021), The Color Purple (with Citadel), A Doll’s House, Part 2 (with Mirvish), Once (with Grand), Kill Me Now (with NAC), Black Coffee, My Name Is Asher Lev (with Segal), Myth of the Ostrich, Late Company, Cabaret, Venus in Fur, The Melville Boys (tour), Wingfield on Ice (tour), Looking Back – West, Bad Dates (tour). Assistant Stage Manager: As You Like It (with Citadel), Billy Elliot the Musical, Jane Eyre, Gone With the Wind, Grumpy Old Men: The Musical, White Christmas, Pride and Prejudice, Fiddler on the Roof, Educating Rita (tour), Guys and Dolls (with TC/Citadel). Other: Tiny Plays, Big Ideas, All is Bright.

OTHER THEATRE Over 50 productions at theatres in Winnipeg and across Canada.

TRAINING Graduate of Sheridan College, Member of CAEA.

ET CETERA Love to Sean and Murtaugh.

Katie Hoppa photo
Katie Hoppa

Assistant Stage Manager

Assistant Stage Manager Katie Hoppa
Katie Hoppa photo

Katie Hoppa

ROYAL MTC First engagement.

OTHER THEATRE Select recent credits include: The Waltz (PTE); Afterlight (Walk&Talk/The Keep); The Little Mermaid, The Wizard of Oz (Rainbow); Twelfth Night, Much Ado About Nothing (SIR); Summer of Semitism, Narrow Bridge (WJT); A Charlie Brown Double Bill (MTYP); Bad Parent (PTE, vAct).

ET CETERA Love to Kristjan, Rupert and Juniper for all their support this season.

Key Caguioa photo
Key Caguioa

Apprentice Stage Manager

Apprentice Stage Manager Key Caguioa
Key Caguioa photo

Key Caguioa

ROYAL MTC First engagement.

OTHER THEATRE Stage Management: Macbeth (Black Hole Theatre Co.); MA-BUHAY! The Road to Rainbow Stage (Winnipeg Fringe). Directing: The Theory of Everything (Black Hole Theatre Co.). Misc: The Prom (Dry Cold).

TV Maria and the Mennos (YesTV).

ET CETERA Key is also the Associate Producer at Theatre Projects Manitoba. (Hi, team!) Special thanks to Robbie.

Cast
Camae Cherissa Richards
Cherissa Richards photo

Cherissa Richards

ROYAL MTC Director: Trouble in Mind. Assistant Director: Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley. Actor: The Mountaintop (2021), Sense and Sensibility, Di and Viv and Rose, A Christmas Carol, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (with Citadel), Mrs. Warren’s Profession.

OTHER THEATRE Director: Sleuth (Vertigo Theatre); Middletown (Dalhousie University); Julius Caesar (Bard on the Beach); Red Velvet – Globe & Mail Critic’s Pick (Crow’s Theatre); Backstage at Carnegie Hall (Centaur); Meet Me at Dawn (TBTR); VOICE (PTE); Subjection of Kezia, Poof (Shaw); The Power of Harriet T (MTYP). Associate/Assistant Director: Fall on Your Knees (CS/Neptune/NAC/Grand); Ladykillers, Getting Married (Shaw); Timon of Athens (Bard on the Beach). 

TRAINING M.F.A. Acting – York University, B.A.H. Theatre – University of Winnipeg, Independent Study: Directing – NTS, Neil Munroe Directing Internship – Shaw Festival.

ET CETERA Crow’s Theatre RBC Rising Star Emerging Director Prize 2021 and 2023 Dora Award winner for Outstanding Direction. cherissarichards.com 

Ray Strachan photo
Ray Strachan

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Ray Strachan
Ray Strachan photo

Ray Strachan

ROYAL MTC Into the Woods, The Three Musketeers, Calpurnia (with NAC/Black Theatre Workshop), The Mountaintop (2021), It’s a Wonderful Life: The Radio Play, Shakespeare in Love (with Citadel), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Romeo and Juliet, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (with TC).

OTHER THEATRE Director: The Velveteen Rabbit (MTYP); Hedda Gabler (Echo Theatre). Actor: Feast (PTE); The Prom (Dry Cold); The Tempest (Citadel); Deserter, Remember the Night (Moving Target); The Whipping Man (WJT).

FILM/TV The Porter (CBC Gem/BET); Violent Night, Vandits.

ET CETERA Proudly Black Hole trained. Much love to my family. Thanks for supporting live theatre. 

“True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice.” – MLK 

Production ID: 32030
Start Date: 2/14/2024 11:50:43 AM
End Date: 3/9/2024 11:51:00 AM
Title: The Mountaintop
Playwright: By Katori Hall
Billing: Original Direction by Audrey Dwyer
Directed by Hazel Venzon
Warnings: Mature themes; strong and racially charged language, including slurs; recommended for grade 10+; theatrical haze, flashing lights
Synopsis: 4-red-stars-102w.png “Strachan and Richards…are terrific alone, but wonderful together”Free Press

As a storm rages on April 3, 1968, civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. retires to his room at the Lorraine Motel. Exhausted, jumpy and craving a cigarette, King wrestles with his next speech. When a beautiful maid delivers coffee to the room, small talk veers into a surprising conversation that exposes the preacher’s vanity, vulnerability and uncompromising humanity. In this gripping reimagination of the night before King’s assassination, we witness the hope and struggle of a man who must confront his destiny and his legacy to the people.
 

Click on the image to download the digital program:

Ovation4Cover.jpg

Facility: John Hirsch Mainstage
Alternate URL: https://royalmtc.ca/Current-Plays/The-Mountaintop.aspx
Play Image:
Word Mark: af16bc57-d6af-4725-865a-c72bff2505d7
Rotator Image: 356f3826-bf1e-49a3-b508-99f5d2b15c59
Display Rotator From: 1/15/2024 10:57:33 AM
Display Rotator To: 3/9/2024 6:00:00 PM
 

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