Brian Deedrick - Director

Edmonton-based theatre and opera director Brian Deedrick is delighted on board for the WWPT Playwrights' Cabaret, and to be a small part of the all-important process of developing Canadian plays and playwrights.  A former Artistic Director of Edmonton Opera,  his freelance opera gigs take him all over Canada and the US, with occasional forays as far afield as Israel, Germany and Italy.  And whether the work is full-blown grand opera with too many high notes to count, or that magical blend of words and song that makes music theatre so loved, or that intimate experience of the spoken word and the proverbial two boards and a passion, it is all about the telling of tales, the sharing of the human experience that make the work we do so exhilarating and worthwhile.  It is the privilege of storytelling that brings Brian to the Playwrights' Cabaret, to the stage of any theatre or music hall that'll let him play, and to his other great love, working as a tour guide every summer on the streets of Berlin.

John Anderson - The Arrest of Joseph K

John has lived in Edmonton all his life. His One Act play, Pulling Teeth, won Outstanding New Work at the 2024 Stage Struck Festival. He'll be directing The Valiant at Stage Struck for one performance only on April 12th.

Gregory is a multi-disciplinary theatre artist based in amiskwaciy waskahikan, colonially known as Edmonton . He has created several productions, including Spearsical the Musical: The Britney Spears Musical, Spearsical the Musical 2: Oops...We Did It Again!, Give A Little Whistle, The Dixieland Murders, Hooked, To HELL With the RULES!, MAN UP!, MAN UP!'s Cirque Electrique, MAN UP! BONDAGE, MAN UP! SPICE BOYS, MAN UP! has DADDY ISSUES, Fortunately Unfortunate - by Marcus Spencer, Walter, Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk: A Tribute to Rufus Wainwright, and Just A Girl.

Recent performance highlights include Ensemble/Ass’t Director/Frank Understudy in Rocky Horror Show (Grindstone), Barry in The Prom (NUOVA), Hedwig in HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH and Alex in Buyer and Cellar (Next Stage Productions), Molina in Kiss of the Spider Woman, Cliff in Cabaret, and Mary Sunshine in CHICAGO (Two One-Way Tickets to Broadway).

Gregory is also a cabaret performer, improvisor and theatre instructor, and has extensive experience as a film performer, writer, and director. He has been nominated for two Sterling Awards (2011 and 2023) and was named an Avenue Top 40 Under 40 for his contributions to the Edmonton theatre community in 2018. He is a graduate of the MacEwan Theatre Arts Program. 

Michael Watt is a multi-disciplinary artist based in Amiskwacî (Edmonton) interested in creation, production, and performance. They are so thrilled to be back at Springboards this year after the reading of their play Arthur & Titi at the Wildside Cabaret last year. Their writing frequently explores identity, absurdity, musicality, gender, and (mis)understanding. Michael can frequently be found creating and indulging in music and theatre projects both independently and with frequent collaborator, Jacquelin Walters, with their company Walters & Watt Theatre Projects. Recent writing credits include: Arthur & Titi (New Works Festival); Reign Check (Off the Page, SkirtsAFire); and Let’s Not Turn On Each Other and What Was Is All (Walters & Watt). You can catch a full production of Reign Check this summer – follow @waltersandwatt on Instagram for more updates on the premiere production coming soon!

Leslea Kroll is an Edmonton based writer. Her first play, Domesticatrix, was nominated for a Sterling Award for Outstanding Fringe New Work. An excerpt of the play was featured in The Martha Stewart Projects at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre. Her script ZedBC: Genus Lemus won the Alberta Playwrights’ Network annual playwriting competition. Her play White Count Up aired nationally on CBC Radio. Monologues from The Light Fishers toured venues throughout Manitoba as part of International Women’s Week presented by Winnipeg’s Sarasvati Theatre. Her play Riverside was included in the inaugural Canadian National 10-Minute Play Festival presented by Theatre in The Wings in Belleville, Ontario. Some of her other plays include Swallow, Stains, Auksenberg: Trial by Fury and Wellspring. Babblers was first featured in the third volume of The Edmonton Public Library’s Capital City Press Anthology. Leslea is delighted to be joining in on the fun of the Springboards Cabaret.

Shawn Marshall (he/him) has been performing his entire life. Since 2012 he has been heavily involved in the theatre scene in Alberta, writing and performing in 7 plays for The Edmonton International Fringe Festival with his theatre company A3 Theatre. His latest was called Flicker and it garnered a 4/5 from the Edmonton Journal when it premiered in 2023. It was also handpicked to be a part of the Springboards Festival in 2023. His newest script The Chart was one of the five finalists for the EdmonTEN festival, presented by Alberta Playwright’s Network in 2024, as well as being chosen for the From Cradle to Stage Festival at Walterdale Theatre for their 2024 season. He is currently the Festival Coordinator for the From Cradle to Stage festival for the Walterdale Theatre and directing The Ballad of Maria Marten by Beth Flintoff for the Leduc Drama Society.

Hayley (she/they) is an actor and playwright. She is grateful to be living and working on Treaty 6 territory in Amiskwaciwâskahikan, colonially known as Edmonton. Hayley’s first play, Suspension, premiered at the 2019 Edmonton Fringe Festival. The script was later adapted into a podcast version for the Alberta Queer Calendar Project with Cardiac Theatre. Her play Tough Guy was a part of RISER Edmonton’s Development Stream in 2023/2024, and is scheduled to receive its world premiere in November 2025. Their latest play, Wanda and Wendy and the What-If Walrus, will be presented at the Sprouts New Play Festival For Kids in June.  

Sara Campos-Silvius (she/her) is a queer and multiracial Latine artist in amiskwacîwâskahican / Edmonton in Treaty 6 Territory in Alberta, Canada. She is a writer, director, producer, and performer creating work in prose, poetry, theatre, and film. Sara’s short films Power Chord and The Inner Ring have screened at festivals such as the Edmonto­n International Film Festival, Toronto International Women Film Festival, and Montreal’s Image+Nation Queer Short Film Festival. She was an Alberta Playwrights’ Network IBPOC Playwright In Residence 2023-24 where she penned a new queer rom-com which will be coming to audiences soon. Her playwright production credits include the award-winning comedy-horror Moonie And Maybee Dig Up A Grave at Nextfest. Her first poetry chapbook Sword and Smoke is published by Armistice Press and her short fiction and poetry have appeared in publications such as Capital City Press Anthology and Hungry Zine. She has performed and presented at many events including Nextfest, Found Fest, and CONNECTIONS//COLLISIONS, and she has been a company member of the integrated disability arts dance company CRIPSiE since 2013. Check out Sara’s work at www.saracs.art and @saracsart on Instagram. 

Ethan is a YEG-based performer, voice actor, and singer. You may have seen him in Jubilation’s Old Time Rock and Roll or Alberta Musical Theatre Companies' Jack and the Beanstalk. While appearing at the Edmonton Fringe in Urinetown and  Accidental Beach. Outside of theatre, Ethan has lent his voice to many animations such as Cardfight Vanguard Divinez and Super 10 he has also had the occasional television appearance on projects like APTN’s Tribal and Dept .9 Studios’ Dark Match. Ethan’s defining skill is his unwavering ability to name all 151 original Pokemon.

Simon Abbott is an organist, jazz pianist and composer living in Edmonton. In his musical director work this past year he is thrilled with the Nuova Vocal Arts production of Shrek, unapologetically boastful of Grindstone’s Rocky Horror, still laughing over Romeo and Juliet’s Notebook and the Matrixx at Spotlight, equal parts proud and ashamed of Accidental Beach at the Fringe, and generally chuffed about Marat/Sade at the University of Alberta.

Simon was responsible for all the good parts of Die Harsh: A Christmas Musical, which he wrote with Byron Martin. The duo’s breakout show was Jason Kenney’s Hotboy Summer for which they are still issuing public apologies. Simon shocked everyone who knows him when he partnered on a very non-silly show: Morningside Road with Mhairi Berg, which can be seen fall 2025 at Shadow Theatre.

Christopher Duthie is a Calgary-based actor, writer, producer and arts educator. His plays include A Dinner Party which was shortlisted for the Gwen Pharis Ringwood Award for Drama in 2020 and n00b which toured across Canada with Vertigo Theatre’s Y-Stage Series from 2012-2014. He co-wrote Ghost River Theatre’s Sensory Box with Eric Rose and translated it into La Boîte Sensorielle for production at L’UniThéâtre in 2021. In recent years, he has been writing and making short films in collaboration with Road West Pictures: Bladder Shy which screened at Fantasia International Film Festival in 2023, and his directorial debut Self-Tape which is currently in post-production with Media Pop. He has been performing in theatre for over 15 years, most recently at Theatre Calgary in A Christmas Carol, The Importance of Being Earnest, and understudying for Blithe Spirit and As You like It. He is represented by Details Talent for Film/TV and has appeared on Upper Class Crimes (JB Paramount), The Abandons (Netflix), Under the Banner of Heaven (FX), The Ties That Bind (Road West Pictures/Reckseidler Films). He holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Guelph and a BFA in Drama from the University of Calgary. He lives in Calgary with his wife and son, Harrison.

Noelle Smith is an Edmonton based playwright and actor, with a BFA in Dramatic Arts from the University of Lethbridge. Noelle's plays are typically absurd comedies, as they feel there's not enough weird in the world. Their play pants has been produced twice in Lethbridge, by Theatre Xtra and Experience Theatre.

Coralie Cairns - Performer

Coralie Cairns (she/her) is an award winning actress who calls Edmonton home.

Favorite plays include: All the Little Animals I have Eaten, Bloomsday, Vanya-Sonia- Masha & Spike, Outside Mullingar, Much Ado About Nothing, Boston Marriage, Glace Bay Miners Museum, Honor, The Weir, Full Gallop, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Summer and Smoke, (Shadow Theatre), At the Zenith of the Empire, The Velvet Shock (Teatro La Quindicina), The Children (Wild Side Productions) A Christmas Carol (Citadel Theatre), Three Different Heavens, Blood Oranges (Northern Light Theatre), Apple (Workshop West Theatre) and Marion Bridge (Theatre Network Theatre).

Jacquelin Walters - Performer

Jacquelin Walters is a multidisciplinary theatre artist based in edmonton. She is a recent graduate of the University of Alberta’s BFA acting program, and also enjoys writing and producing original work when she can. Recent performance credits include Shrek: The Musical (Nuova Vocal Arts dir. Kim Mattice Wanat), Girls Can Eat Now (New Works Festival dir. Aidan Collins), White Christmas (Nuova Vocal Arts dir. Kim Mattice Wanat), Witch  (Bleviss Laboratory Theatre dir. Alissa Watson), Let’s Not Turn On Each Other (Edmonton Fringe dir. Nicole Maloney), Troilus and Cressida (Studio Theatre, dir. Brett Dahl), Indecent (Studio Theatre, dir. Ben Smith), and Helen (Trunk Theatre, dir. Amy DeFelice). Recent creative credits include Let’s Not Turn On Each Other (Walters & Watt, Edmonton Fringe, 2024), Tomato Girl (University of Alberta’s New Works festival 2024), What Was Is All (Walters & Watt, Edmonton Fringe 2023).You can catch Jacquelin next performing an excerpt of Reign Check by Michael Watt in the 2025 Skirtsafire festival.

Christina Nguyen - Performer

Christina is so excited to be back at WWPT, doing one of her favourite things: reading new plays!! Recent credits include: A Midsummer Night’s Dream: The 70’s Musical, A Christmas Carol, The Sound of Music, Jersey Boys, Clue, Jane Eyre (Mainstage, Citadel Theatre); Going Solo (House Series, Citadel Theatre).  Civil Blood: A Treaty Story, But Hark! A Voice (Thou Art Here Theatre); Romeo and Juliet, Twelfth Night, Much Ado About Nothing, Winter's Tale (Freewill Shakespeare);  Alina, Michael Mysterious (Pyretic Productions);  Here There Be Night (Workshop West Playwrights Theatre).  Upcoming: Little Women (Citadel Theatre). Christina is a graduate of the University of Alberta's BFA Acting Program. 

Lindsey Walker - Musician

Born and raised on Treaty 1 territory (Winnipeg), and currently residing in Amiskwacîwâskahikan (Edmonton), Lindsey Walker (she/her) is an award-winning singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, composer, and theatre performer. Lindsey’s music has been described as “achingly sincere”, and “cinematic”. As a theatre creator, Lindsey wrote the score and lyrics for ren & the wake, an original semi-immersive musical that she created with Catch the Keys Productions, as well as creating the music and lyrics for the one-man political musical Amor de Cosmos with Richard Kemick. Selected sound design work: Bea (Shadow Theatre), Re:Construct (Donkey Dog Theatre), In My Own Little Corner (RISER Edmonton), The Debut (Hoy! Productions), and was nominated for a Sterling Award for her contribution to the sound design for The Spinsters (Small Matters Productions). Lindsey is currently working on her latest EP, Something Real, which will be out Fall 2024. Follow all her exploits on social media here: @lindseywalkermusic