1 Dr. CYNTHIA ASHPERGER has taught psycho-physical acting technique at Ryerson Theatre School since 1994 and has served as the Director of the Acting Program since 2004. She has taught, published, and lectured on Michael Chekhov’s acting technique all over the world. In Toronto she works with many independent theatre companies. In 2013 she was nominated for a Dora Award for outstanding female performance in Feral Child by J.Tannahill. In 2013 she directed Tender Napalm by P. Ridley for Summerworks theatre festival to critical acclaim (outstanding direction in Now magazine). Her publications include: The Rhythm of Space and the Sound of Time. Michael Chekhov’s Acting Technique in the 21st century (Editions Rodopi of Amsterdam, 2009), and chapters in Stanislavski and Directing: Theory, Practice and Influence (ed. Anna Migliarisi, Legas, 2009), Trans-Gendered Imaginary of Nina Arsenault (ed. Judith Rudakoff, Intellect Press, 2012).

2 HUGO BÉLANGER est le fondateur et le directeur artistique de la compagnie théâtrale montréalaise Tout à trac. Depuis 1998, Tout à Trac explore les rouages de l’imaginaire et du théâtre à travers un processus de création où participent activement le jeu masqué, le conte et la marionnette. La compagnie a monté, entre autres, Alice au pays des merveilles (2008), Münchausen (2011) et Pinocchio (2012). http://www.toutatrac.com/

3 Born in Vancouver, BC, EURY COLIN CHANG is a theatre scholar and artist, currently enrolled as a doctoral student and research assistant at the University of British Columbia. In addition to his work as a dramaturge, Eury has served as the editor of The Dance Central (2004-2011) and Ricepaper: Asian Canadian Arts and Culture (2008-2012). In 2013 he received the Errol Durbach Graduate Scholarship in Theatre. His research on Asian Canadian Theatre has been funded by SSHRC (Masters and Doctoral Scholarships).

4 Chilean-born LINA DE GUEVARA is a director, actor, writer, and facilitator. She is a specialist in mask work, Commedia dell’Arte, and Transformational Theatre. In 1988 Lina founded PUENTE Theatre in Victoria, BC and was its artistic director for twenty-three years. She retired in June 2011. PUENTE’s mandate was to create and produce plays about diversity and the immigrant experience. Her director and writer’s credits include Sisters/Strangers, Storytelling Our Lives, I wasn’t born here, Crossing Borders, Commedia dell’Arte Scenarios, Act Now Against Racism, and Journey to Mapu. Her director’s credits include The House of Bernarda Alba, Uthe/Athe, Chile Con Carne, Emergence, The Woman Who Fell from the Sky, Canadian Tango 09, Scene and Heard, Puppets and Traditions, The Pilgrimage of the Nuns of Concepción, Mother Courage and Her Children, Familya, and Letters for Tomas. In addition, Lina taught Commedia dell’Arte, Mask work, and Transformational Theatre at the Canadian College of Performing Arts, University of Victoria’s Theatre Department, Lester B. Pearson College of the Pacific, Royal Roads University, and Camosun College. She also worked as teacher, actor, and director in Cuba, Spain, Chile, and the USA. After retirement Lina freelances as director, actor, and teacher. Her passion is to use theatre to promote understanding and respect between cultures.

5 GENEVIÈVE DE VIVEIROS est professeure au département d’études françaises de l’Université Western Ontario. Ses recherches portent sur l’histoire du théâtre du XIX^e siècle et sur le procédé de l’adaptation. Elle s’intéresse aussi à l’œuvre d’Émile Zola et à l’épistolaire. Elle vient de faire paraître en collaboration avec Karin Schwerdtner et Margot Irvine, Risques et regrets. Les dangers de l’écriture épistolaire (Nota Bene, 2015) et elle participe en ce moment à l’édition critique du Théâtre d’Eugène Labiche (éditions Garnier).

6 DIRK GINDT holds a Ph.D. in Theatre Studies (2007) and is an Associate Professor in the Department of Culture and Aesthetics at Stockholm University. His research attends to post-war and contemporary queer theatre and performance. His project “Lest We Forget” analyzes the history of HIV/AIDS performance in Canada and “Tennessee Williams in Europe” unpacks the sexual anxieties and racial fantasies the American playwright’s works provoked in Sweden and France. Gindt has published fifteen refereed articles and book chapters. He is co-editor of Fashion: An Interdisciplinary Reflection (Raster 2009) and has until recently served as associate editor of alt.theatre: cultural diversity and the stage.

7 ANDREW HOUSTON is an artist-researcher in intermedia and site-specific performance, and an Associate Professor of drama at the University of Waterloo. He and Kathleen Irwin started Knowhere Productions Inc. in 2002, a company devoted to the exploration of site-specific and site-responsive performance (see www.knowhereproductions.ca). In the last seventeen years, he has directed and dramaturged several large-scale site-specific, intermedia productions. As a scholar, he has published broadly in his field and edited a Canadian Theatre Review issue on site-specific performance, as well as a collection of writings on environmental and site-specific theatre in Canada, published by Playwrights Canada Press. For more information see: www.andyhouston.net.

8 MATT JONES is a writer, dramaturg, and doctoral candidate at the Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of Toronto. His dissertation, “The Shock and Awe of the Real: Political Performance and the War on Terror,” is a transnational study of plays, performances, demonstrations, direct action protests, and new media campaigns that responded to the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. His most recent work as a dramaturg is the collective creation Death Clowns in Guantánamo Bay (2013). His theatre company is the Blacklist Committee for Unsafe Theatre.

9 DIANA MANOLE is a theatre and televison director, award-winning writer, translator, and scholar. She has published nine collections of poems and plays, as well as poetry and academic articles in national and international magazines and collections of articles. She holds a doctorate in Drama from the University of Toronto and has taught courses in Theatre, Cultural Studies, Journalism, Film Analysis, and Directing at several Canadian universities.

10 MANUEL GARCÍA MARTÍNEZ est Maître de Conférences à la faculté de Philologie de l’Université de Saint-Jacques de Compostelle (Espagne). Sa thèse réalisée à l’université de Paris VIII, sous la direction de Patrice Pavis, porte sur le temps et le rythme au théâtre. Il enseigne actuellement l’histoire de la littérature française, l’histoire du théâtre et l´analyse de spectacles. Ses recherches portent sur l’esthétique théâtrales et l’écriture dramatique contemporaine ; le temps, le rythme et la temporalité dans les textes dramatiques contemporains et dans les représentations théâtrales actuelles constituent l’axe central de ses recherches.

11 YANA MEERZON is an Associate Professor, Department of Theatre, University of Ottawa. Her research interests are in drama and performance theory, theatre of exile, and cultural and interdisciplinary studies. Her research project “Theatricality and Exile” has been sponsored by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). Her manuscript Performing Exile – Performing Self: Drama, Theatre, Film is published by Palgrave, 2012. She has co-edited two books on a similar subject: Performance, Exile and ‘America’ (with Silvija Jestrovic) Palgrave, 2009; and Adapting Chekhov: The Text and Its Mutations (with J. Douglas Clayton) Routledge, 2012. Her current projects include: Routledge Companion to Michael Chekhov (co-edited with Marie-Christine Autant-Mathieu); and History, Memory, Performance (co-edited with David Dean and Kathryn Prince) published by Palgrave in 2014.

12 SHEILA RABILLARD is Associate Professor, Department of English, University of Victoria. She has published numerous chapters and articles on modern and contemporary drama and is the editor of Caryl Churchill: Contemporary Representations, and special issues on eco-theatre (Canadian Theatre Review, 2010) and on rethinking maternity in contemporary drama (forthcoming).

13 KELSY VIVASH holds a BA from Brock University and an MA from the University of Toronto, and is currently a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Toronto’s Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies. Her doctoral research focuses on the secretions and excre- tions of the body, the long lineage of their relationship with understandings of subjectivity, and the ways in which this relationship has been aestheticized both on historical stages and within the contemporary performative frame. She has presented at TaPRA (University of Kent, 2012), PSi (Stanford University, 2013), and CATR (Brock University, 2014), and has recently published work in alt.theatre, Performance Research, Theatre Research in Canada, and Canadian Theatre Review.