Mandate & History of the Company

Biographies

Francesca Albright
Artistic Director

Jude Thaddeus Allen
Former Co-Artistic Director

Gordon Pengilly
Dramaturg

Board of Directors

Ed Ross
President

Kelly Reay
Vice-President

Michael Lines
Secretary/Treasurer

Charles Tidler
Director

Megan Boddy
Director

Castlereigh Theatre Project is a professional theatre company in Victoria, British Columbia, dedicated to the research, creation and production of new documentary theatre: fact-based plays built on real life accounts and storytelling that exploreS and investigateS current and universal themes.

The company was created in created in 2007 by Francesca Albright and Jude Thaddeus Allen. Hearing of the terrible murders in Medicine Hat, Alberta, in 2006, when a twelve year old girl and her twenty-three year old boyfriend fatally stabbed her parents and six year old brother, the emerging company set out to research the events of the murders and create a piece of documentary theatre. The subsequent play, “Castle In The Sky”, was workshopped in Victoria in 2011 and given as part of Intrepid Theatre's You Show. This was soon followed by its festival premiere at Sage Theatre's Ignite Festival (Calgary) and was the most well-attended performance in the festival's history. A subsequent provincial tour followed including the city of Medicine Hat. 

The company went on to create “The Dublin Play” about the struggles of artists in Dublin, and “Ocean Fox” about the toils and hardships of a masterdiver in the Bahamas which was presented as part of Sage Theatre's Ignite Festival in 2013 and the Belfry Studio Theatre (Victoria). In 2016, Castlereigh presented a workshop production of "Castle in the Sky" at the Belfry Studio. It was directed by Atomic Vaudeville's Britt Small and featured six local performers.

In 2018, the play "God's Lake" (co-created by Francesca Albright & Swampy-Cree filmmaker Kevin Lee Burton) had its workshop production at Victoria's Metro Studio Theatre. The play was developed further that year and went on to be presented as part of One Yellow Rabbit's 2019 High Performance Rodeo in Calgary.

After a final stage of development, the Professional Premiere of "God's Lake" toured British Columbia during the month of February 2020 where it was presented in Burnaby (Shadbolt Centre for the Arts), North Vancouver (Presentation House Theatre) and Victoria (Intrepid Theatre's Metro Theatre.)

In 2020, “God’s Lake” was shortlisted for the inaugural JAYMAC Award (Victoria) for Outstanding Production of the Year.

We have learned through experience that our work within the communities enriches the lives of the members of those communities.  

Castlereigh Theatre Project respectfully acknowledges that we live, work, play and create on the traditional and unceded territory of the Lekwungen People, now known as the Songhees and Esquimalt Nations.