The Belfry Theatre is a theatre and associated theatre company in the Fernwood neighbourhood of Victoria, British Columbia

Victoria, British Columbia

Victoria is the capital city of British Columbia, Canada and is located on the southern tip of Vancouver Island off Canada's Pacific coast. The city has a population of about 78,000 within the metropolitan area of Greater Victoria, which has a population of 360,063, the 15th most populous Canadian...

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. The theatre is, in fact, a nineteenth-century church designed by Thomas Hooper.

Origins

The Belfry’s history begins in 1974, when University of Victoria

University of Victoria

The University of Victoria, often referred to as UVic, is the second oldest public research university in British Columbia, Canada. It is a research intensive university located in Saanich and Oak Bay, about northeast of downtown Victoria. The University's annual enrollment is about 20,000 students...

 graduate student Blair Shakel began to use the unheated Springridge Chapel of the Emmanuel Baptist Church for performances. At the time, the building was shared with a youth hostel and dental clinic

Dentist

A dentist, also known as a 'dental surgeon', is a doctor that specializes in the diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of diseases and conditions of the oral cavity. The dentist's supporting team aides in providing oral health services...

.

In 1975, inspired by the model of the Vancouver East Cultural Centre and supported by federal Local Initiative Program grants, Don Shipley took charge of the theatre and together with Michael Stephen, established the Springridge Cultural Centre. Pat Armstrong joined Shipley in 1976 as co-director of the (then-called) Belfry Cultural Centre, which initially served as an “alternative” booking facility for touring performances by Tamahnous Theatre, The Mummers, Codco

CODCO

CODCO was a Canadian comedy troupe from Newfoundland, best known for a sketch comedy series which aired on CBC Television from 1987 to 1992....

, Theatre Passe Muraille

Theatre Passe Muraille

Theatre Passe Muraille is a theatre company in Toronto, Canada.-Brief history:One of Canada's most influential alternative theatres, Theatre Passe Muraille was founded in 1968 by director and playwright Jim Garrard, who started the company out of Rochdale College.Its radical intention was create a...

, Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Lawrence Ferlinghetti is an American poet, painter, liberal activist, and the co-founder of City Lights Booksellers & Publishers...

, and the Kronos Quartet

Kronos Quartet

Kronos Quartet is a string quartet founded by violinist David Harrington in 1973 in Seattle, Washington. Since 1978, the quartet has been based in San Francisco, California. The longest-running combination of performers had Harrington and John Sherba on violin, Hank Dutt on viola, and Joan...

.

By 1977, the Belfry was producing its own shows. The first of these was Puttin’ on the Ritz, a revue based on the songs of Irving Berlin

Irving Berlin

Irving Berlin was an American composer and lyricist of Jewish heritage, widely considered one of the greatest songwriters in American history.His first hit song, "Alexander's Ragtime Band", became world famous...

. Created by Shipley and co-directed by Armstrong, it featured choreography by Judith Marcuse, sets by Ken MacDonald (the Belfry’s Resident Designer from 1977-1980), and an early-career performance by Sheila McCarthy

Sheila McCarthy

Sheila McCarthy is a Canadian film, stage, television actress, and singer. She is one of the most honoured actors in Canada, having won two Genie Awards , two Gemini Awards , and two Dora Awards among multiple nominations. As of 2007, she can be seen on the Canadian television series Little...

. Ritz also inaugurated the association between the theatre and Board Chairman Patrick Stewart.

In 1980/81, artistic directorship of the renamed Belfry Theatre passed from Shipley to James Roy. Roy’s tenure (1980-84) launched many characteristic Belfry traditions: an apprenticeship program with the University of Victoria’s Theatre Department, co-productions with other theatres, tours and remounts of its own shows in Vancouver, at the Shaw Festival (and later elsewhere), and a commitment to new Canadian plays.

Difficulty and regrowth

Miles Potter presided over the Belfry from 1984 to 1986, difficult years in which the theatre reeled under an accumulated deficit and fell back on Broadway and West End hits, offering only one Canadian play in the 1984/85 season.

From 1986, under the artistic leadership of Glynis Leyshon (an occasional Belfry actor and director since 1977), the theatre entered a decade of growth. With the demise of Victoria’s more mainstream Bastion Theatre in 1988, the Belfry lost its “alternative theatre” credentials, but redoubled its commitment to new work: between 1988 and 1990, world premières of Canadian plays constituted the bulk of the repertory.

Notable premières in the Leyshon years include Chalmers Award winner, Sally Clark

Sally Clark (playwright)

Sally Clark is a Canadian playwright and filmmaker.-Career:After moving to Toronto in 1973, Sally Clark served as playwright/dramaturge for Theatre Passe Muraille, the Shaw Festival, Nakai Theatre, Buddies in Bad Times Theatre and Nightwood Theatre.Her plays have received two Dora Mavor Moore...

’s Moo, which represented Canada at the Cultural Olympic Games in 1988 (co-produced with Alberta Theatre Projects); Jovette Marchessault’s The Magnificent Voyage of Emily Carr

Emily Carr

Emily Carr was a Canadian artist and writer heavily inspired by the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast. One of the first painters in Canada to adopt a post-impressionist painting style, Carr did not receive widespread recognition for her work until later in her life...

and John Murrell’s The Faraway Nearby in 1992 (the latter co-produced with Tarragon Theatre, and for which Nancy Beatty won a Dora for Best Actress); works by Morris Panych

Morris Panych

Stephen Morris Panych is a Canadian playwright, director and actor.Morris Panych was born in Calgary and grew up in Edmonton. He studied at Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, and the University of British Columbia...

 (1994 and 1995), Joan MacCleod (1989 and 1992), and Michel Marc Bouchard (1995); and the world premières of three of Dan Needles’ Wingfield Series

Wingfield Series

The Wingfield Cycle is a Canadian series of seven one-man plays - Letter from Wingfield Farm, Wingfield's Progress, Wingfield's Folly, Wingfield Unbound, Wingfield on Ice, Wingfield's Inferno and "Wingfield Lost and Found" - written by Dan Needles, directed by Douglas Beattie and performed by Rod...

, the best-selling, longest-running one-man-shows in Canadian history.

In 1987 Mary Desprez joined the company as General Manager. In 1990, energetic fund-raising enabled the company to buy the building from its landlord and co-tenant the Victoria Cool-Aid Society. Over the next 13 years, Mary headed up 5 Capital Campaigns totalling $4.5 M to build a Lobby, renovate the Mainstage Theatre interior, restore the heritage exterior and renovate and equip a second performance space. This 100-seat Studio Theatre would henceforth mount annual new-play festivals in addition to the mainstage offerings of the 279-seat Patrick Stewart Theatre. During Mary's 23 year tenure the annual budget grew from $250,000 to $2.5 million, the deficit and mortgage were retired and programming increased three-fold.

In 1997, Roy Surette took over as Artistic Director, bringing with him a Robert Lepage-inspired visual approach to staging, if a slightly reduced commitment to new work. By 1999, the Belfry’s season had grown to ten plays, its subscription audience to 4,000, and its annual budget to $1.2 million (almost 80% of which is earned through non-government sources). Upon Roy's departure to take on the Artistic Producer role at Centaur Theatre, the Belfry's subscriber base had grown to 6,700 - one of the highest in Canada for a theatre of it's size.

The Belfry has fostered theatre in its immediate community—through the hiring of local artists, and through educational outreach programs—while enriching that community with imported talent like of Martha Henry

Martha Henry

Martha Henry, is a Canadian stage, film, and television actress, who is best known for her appearances at the Stratford Festival.-Background:...

, Donald George Davis

Donald George Davis

Donald George Davis was a Canadian actor.He was born in Newmarket, Ontario, where his father owned the Davis Leather Company. He attended St. Andrew's College from 1941-1946, graduating with the Class of 1946, and studied theatre at the University of Toronto. He performed at the Woodstock...

, Seana McKenna

Seana McKenna

Seana McKenna is a Canadian actress primarily associated with stage roles at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival.-Background:Seana Mckenna was raised in Etobicoke, west of Toronto, Ontario...

, Francis Hyland, Rod Beattie

Rod Beattie

Rod Beattie is a Canadian actor who is best known for performing the Wingfield Series of plays by Dan Needles. In these plays Beattie plays all the characters, employing changes in voice or facial expression to denote which character he is playing...

, Joan Orenstein

Joan Orenstein

Joan Orenstein was a British-born Canadian actress, primarily on stage, although she performed in other media...

, Stuart Margolin

Stuart Margolin

Stuart Margolin is an American film and television actor and director.-Television:Margolin is best known for his role on the television show The Rockford Files, playing Evelyn "Angel" Martin, the shifty friend and former cellmate of Jim Rockford...

, R.H. Thompson, Christopher Newton

Christopher Newton

Christopher Newton is a Canadian director and actor and served as Artistic Director of the Shaw Festival from 1980-2002.Newton was born in England and educated at Sir Roger Manwood's School in Kent, the University of Leeds, Purdue University in Indiana and the University of Illinois, where he...

, and Amiel Gladstone

Amiel Gladstone

Amiel Gladstone is a Canadian playwright and director. A graduate of the University of Victoria, Gladstone is a founder of Theatre Skam, an alternative theatre company in Victoria, BC and is the former Artistic Associate at Caravan Farm Theatre and the Belfry Theatre...

.

Sources

• McPherson Library Archives at the University of Victoria,
• Archives of the Belfry Theatre.