A francophile from Toronto walks into a café in downtown Montréal. His coffee order and small talk with the barista turns into a political rift that eventually leaves him lost in translation.

A box office worker longs to be on the opera stage.

A box office worker longs to be on the stage. When the lead of the production is injured, she begs for her chance in the spotlight.

A famous blues singer is warming up in her dressing room before the show. Her partner, Jack, enters and a fight begins.

A dying father and his son drink their last bowl of water. They need oil for the machines that will keep them alive and purify their water. A truck rolls past with a huge barrel of oil in the back. The son flags it down, only to discover the person driving the truck is a monstrous creature from the nation they’re at war with.

A blind dancer and the shadow of her former sight share a final dance.

Democracy lies dead in a coffin, mourned by two citizens... But slowly Democracy raises her weak head and begs the two citizens to keep her alive by executing a difficult but necessary task.

Each of two brother bulls attempts to convince the other to enter the barn. Neither wants to go, knowing their lives are at stake. The two flatter, dare, and challenge one another, until a race finally settles it: first one to the barn wins. Sort of.

An entire relationship in microcosm, from first meeting to last sunset together. This piece uses a couple’s dancing together as a metaphor for their time passing.

Elvet is struck with grief over the death of his newborn child, not yet named.

A son gets caught sleeping with his father's girlfriend, Eva. A three-way fight erupts, the son professing his love for Eva and vice versa, while the father warns they’ll betray each other soon enough. They leave, and the father grieves the loss of them both.

Robert helps Charlie, who is sick, check his stool and be calm in the face of death.

First meeting of an adult son and his birth mother.

A couple fights as a woman leaves to pursue her dream.

While claiming sovereignty of an ice floe, Harper meets a seal, then drowns as the floe melts.

Ex-lovers encounter each other in hotel lobby with their new partners and insult each other.

An undersea monster sings to the scientists observing her.

In a deep sea submergence vehicle, a crew voyages in search of a sea creature whose gaze can cause burns to the eyes.

A mother and son have dinner. The mother is suffering from Alzheimer’s, and her son has increasing difficulty coping with that fact.

A figure skater and coach review a disappointing routine together.

A figure skating coach reminisces about her own time in the competition spotlight.

A figure skater reflects on her experience in competition and decides to switch to a new career path.

After a disappointing performance a coach chastises the skater, then dreams of her glory days; the skater decides this has been her last performance.

George and his wife Martha have three very different versions of a difficult conversation over breakfast.

At 4 a.m., a composer stands looking out the window, his tools nearby. Across town, a librettist is doing the same. Both are just slightly panicking about their latest work: an opera about a dog named Harley.

A mother with postpartum depression leaves her husband and son.

Two mothers in the audience for a beauty pageant: while Eunice's daughter performs, Samantha reads an article about a murdered 11-year-old girl.

Two travellers trying to communicate in English- which neither of them speaks well- find they are attracted to each other.

Two lovers discuss what love is.

A child walks on a beach, in search of their parents.

On a solitary walk a Man gets buried by an avalanche; a Woman thinks his absence means he is cheating on her.

James, an eye doctor wanting to keep his new x-ray vision, argues with his colleague Sam and accidentally kills him, as his assistant Diane watches.

Sitting by the fire, Merk tries to discover what his mentally disabled daughter will remember when he is no longer with her.

A man tries to write a letter home, but he cannot find the right words. He burns each rejected attempt.

Stephanie is getting ready to go out on a date, but she begins to unravel when she checks herself in the mirror. The voices she hears in her head are variations of her own critical voice. She sees herself the way she imagines her date will see her.

The 1947 Partition of India forces two children to say goodbye. One departs for Pakistan, leaving her pet rabbit and childhood treasures with her friend.

A man coerces a woman to have sex with him in exchange for saving the one remaining temple bell from being melted down for the war metal supply.

Miners crack open a mountain and two green children emerge. They sing, then the minors pray to them as they fall asleep.

Having escaped forced confinment in a basement, a girl approaches a stranger. She asks if the stranger knows her, as she tries to remember her past.

A middle-aged couple's romantic night: the Man, reading poetry to the Woman, is distracted by the need to hunt down a mosquito in the room.

Tabitha helps her father Ken, who has had a stroke. She combs his hair and helps him with his therapy ball, retrieving it each time he drops it.

A female barista is infatuated with a male customer and stalks him. He thinks he recognizes her from his neighbourhood.

A woman cryptically remembers her past as she is briefly examined by three different people.

Peter is leaving Carla for another woman. Carla, sensing she will have a breakdown if he leaves, insists that he take their son to live with him.

Hector and Isabelle express their resentment towards each other for the sacrifices they each made.

Excited by the possibility of a night with a new lover, Sumana anxiously expresses her anticipation.

Agnieska questions why all of her previous relationships have failed.

Waking early, Agnieska admires her new lover Sumana as she is sleeping.

Agnieska and Sumana share an intimate night together after meeting in a bar. Memories of past lovers almost make Agnieska give up on this new love, but Sumana convinces her to hold on to hope.

Waking early, Agnieska admires her new lover Sumana as she is sleeping. When Sumana wakes, the couple share an intimate conversation and eventually descend into fits of laughter.

Late at night, Allie receives a visitation from her deceased best friend, Karen.

In the Blue Room of the Quebec National Assembly, Denis Lortie kills and wounds people with a submachine gun as a protest against Quebec sovereignty.

Daniel sings of his fear at the prospect of going down into the cellar of his childhood home, after his father has died.

Judith sings angrily at her brother when he expresses his desire to leave their childhood home after their father has died.

Back in his childhood home after the death of this father, Daniel kills his sister when she wants to resume their childhood sexual relationship.

The Queen of the Amazon Ants laments the fallen state of her realm to her lone remaining subject.  She decides she must find a mate.

A teacher tries to inspire and distract a student as soldiers march outside their classroom, but the student is unable to escape into her imagination.

After a painful argument, a mother tells her son the truth of his father's absence and tries to comfort him.

Former lovers are reincarnated and reunited, but this time around one is a farmer and one is his cow.

A young woman, Laurel, runs through a dark forest, filled with anxiety and haunted by disturbing memories.

Laurel stabs the Stranger, killing him. As his body slides to the ground to rest at her feet, she begins to feel a new sense of freedom, not realising that it is at the cost of her conscience and her humanity. The aria should be performed with an improvisational blues quality over the regular pulse of the accompaniment, to convey both this sense...

In a wooded park at night, it seems like Laurel is running for her life- but it turns out she is running from the memory of the murder she committed that night.

A young religous brother tells an older brother that he is planning to leave the order. The older brother advises caution and obedience.

Two sock puppets wake up alone and lonely.

Tam and Pal spot each other- the only single socks in the park- speak, and fall in love.

In pain after being raped by Tassi, Artemisia tries to understand what just happened, while Tassi justifies himself.

A Boy slowly falls asleep as a Priest gives sermon on purity, and words go from meaningful to jibberish.

The Shaman introduces the audience to his newest clients, a Man and Woman hoping to have a child.

The Shaman explains the end of the couple's tale.

Two women watch and worry as the church elder walks through town with a telegram carrying news of a soldier son's death.

At a restaurant, a man flirts with a woman he thinks he recognizes. She is emotionally frank with him, but it turns out she isn't who he thinks she is.

Traumatized by her experiences, Alessandra reflects on her work as a translator in an American military prison.

Colonel Crane, Alessandra's supervisor, tersely tells her to lose what her perceives as her naive sense of morality: "We are just here to win."

2003: After leaking torture photos to the internet, American army translator Alessandra Jenson refuses to be hushed up, and live streams her suicide in protest.

Queen Liz imagines what it would be like to be free.

Irish pirate Chieftain Grace O'Malley sneaks into the bedroom of Queen Elizabeth I of England, and convinces the Queen to give her back her ship and free her lover. In return Grace will attend the Queen's birthday celebration and cause a sensation - which delights Liz.

Drag performer Charlie sings a number in the persona of the Virgin Mary.

The Virgin Mary explains to Charlie why he has been chosen to carry the child of God.

Charlie sings gently to his child, the Messiah, who he has been chosen to bear.

In his dressing room, drag performer Charlie puts on his Virgin Mary costume, witnessed by the real Virgin Mary inside his mirror.

Charlie performs the first number of his act: Mother Mary in the nativity scene, with the worries of a new mother carrying the son of god.

In his dressing room, Mother Mary explains to Charlie that he is pregnant with the son of god and offers him tips from her experience. Eventually, Charlie accepts that he will be a parent, and vows to protect the new messiah.

On the first warm spring day in the mountains, Olaf, a rich farmer, proposes to Runa, a poor farmer, only to discover that she is in love with the bandit Davith. Angered by this, Olaf burns down Runa's farm, and Runa escapes up the mountain searching for Davith.

Two sisters are outside by the river talking. One sister describes the boy she hopes to be with, and the other sister admits that she is pregnant with his baby. Jealousy is a deadly emotion.

A night out celebrating midterms takes a turn when one student doesn't return.

A Gardener, lost in the wilderness, ends up at Madonna's cabin. She recognizes him as the man in her dreams and vows to heal him of his grief.

An intersex woman wins a gold medal, but her struggles to get there mean nothing to the organization and the other athletes. She’s disqualified and shamed.

Chloe and Eddie are in the throes of love when they’re interrupted by Matt, Chloe’s athlete ex-husband. Matt asks where their daughter Ava is, and criticizes Chloe for abandoning Ava for a man.

A businessman is waiting for a streetcar, with his back to an unhoused woman. The two silently judge each other. The man is annoyed at seeing someone who wants something for nothing, and the woman is feeling judged for a situation she has no control over. The two finally acknowledge each other, and we discover their shared experience.

An awkward first date seems destined for failure, until the two bond over a mutual love of memes. The result? A hot, steamy connection over goats.

Four Victorian women sit down for a most unusual tea time. The women have two things in common: their dislike of the other women and of their husbands. Each woman refuses to drink tea for one reason or another while brainstorming ideas such as poison, prison, bee-stings or drowning. But who are they plotting against– their partners, or each other?

Janna and her grandpa are in Toronto’s distillery district. Before she has to leave, Janna asks him to tell the story of how he and Grandma met.

A boy and his mother make up ways of killing an unnamed woman.  When the game is over, the boy asks what would happen if they killed the woman “for real,” if it would make his father love them again.

A sister and brother go through the belongings of their recently departed mother and find an old snow globe from their youth. They both really want to keep it. A bitter fight ensues and the sister inadvertently blurts out a very painful secret.