A Conversation with Sara Lee Lewis: Celebrating Nova Scotia's Mermaid Theatre

Abstract

Résumé: Dans cette entrevue accordée en novembre 1996, Hilary Thompson et Sara Lee Lewis font le bilan des vingt-cinq années d'activité de leur compagnie, le Mermaid Theatre de la Nouvelle-Écosse. Cette troupe a, d'une part, toujours favorisé la creativité chez les jeunes à l'échelle locale et, d'autre part, oeuvré à l'établissement et à la diffusion d'un répertoire de théâtre canadien pour la jeunesse. Summary: In this retrospective interview which took place in November 1996, Hilary Thompson and Sara Lee Lewis, Managing Director and Co-Founder of Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia, discuss the company's history and mandate, as well as issues such as funding, repertory, and the controversial question of cultural appropriation Now in its twenty-fifth season, Mermaid Theatre makes its home in Windsor, at the gateway to Nova Scotia's rural Annapolis Valley. The Theatre's focus is two-fold. On the one hand, Mermaid's activist and outspoken Youth theatre program is intensely local, having as its objective the encouragement of creative self-expression among the region's adolescents At the other end of the spectrum is the Theatre's energetic touring theatre for family audiences, which has won international acclaim for original multimedia productions with a strong emphasis on puppetry.