Content warning: political indoctrination, interrogation

Winston Smith is interrogated by a member of The Party about some of his journal entries. In this scene, Smith struggles to differentiate his reality from the reality of The Party.

Winston Smith helps Julia after she trips. This seemingly mundane interaction upends Smith’s world when he reads the note Julia slips into his hand. The words carry so much promise- and so much danger, in the context of an authoritarian government.

Rain and Simone are in the kitchen, prepping dinner. Things are weirdly tense. Suddenly, Rain snaps and accuses Simone of killing his ex-girlfriend, Sally. Of course, Rain doesn’t really have proof of this (other than the time Simone killed a Yorkie for biting her - but they’re an aggressive breed). Simone tries to placate Rain. She’s always bee...

A security screening at an airport takes on a somewhat more intimate frame; written verbatim from actual security language.

A summer evening. A writer is experiencing a bit of writer’s block as she is sitting in an outdoor cafe in an historic area of town. She looks around for inspiration and happens to see a man looking at the stars with binoculars. Clouds block his view, and when he looks around he catches her glance and smiles. Is he really there? Or is he just in...

Content warning: murder

Nighttime on a dock on a lake. Tea lights have been carefully arranged on the side of the dock to illuminate a path. Adele stands at the end of a dock holding an urn that contains her husband’s ashes. She takes the lid off the urn, and begins to sprinkle ashes on the water.

Her son Theo joins her and asks what she’s...

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.

Content warning: war

In a shack surrounded by barren fields, 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 c...

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

Democracy lies dead in a coffin, mourned by two citizens...

"She lies silently in a coffin of ice, arms bound by a flag, eyes sewn together, mouth wired shut...”

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.

Charlie and Robert stand over a toilet examining Charlie's poo and reflecting on lost loved ones.

It’s “gotcha day” – the term used for the first meeting between birth parents and adopted children – and Adam is about to meet his birth mother, Eileen. The reunion goes awry and they begin to wonder who has got whom.

Singer-songwriter Josie works on a song in her shared Portland apartment, a girl-at-the-guitar on the cusp of leaving for New York City and a long-anticipated big break. Though her luggage is packed and she’s almost out the door, her boyfriend interjects with objections—he’ll miss her. Josie’s reassurances, dreams of him visiting her on the East...

A historical reenactment: Prime Minister Stephen Harper sets off to the Arctic to claim dominion over a particular ice floe. Mr. Valernikov, a Russian seal, mistakes Harper for a full-figured female seal and propositions him. After sorting out the misunderstanding, Valernikov claims Harper is in Russian waters. Harper, chagrined, tries to make h...

Two exes, each with their new partner, run into each other in a hotel lobby. Unresolved tension and suppressed emotions resurface in an awkward encounter no one will forget.

"My real voice is my cry: OPEN YOUR EYES."

The Hydrophis is a Deep Sea Submergence Vehicle (DSV) that takes scientists on extreme-depth expeditions to research and explore. During a recent expedition, a rare jellyfish, Stygiomedus Gigantea, has been captured on film. It is rarely seen but thought to be one of the largest invertebrate predator...

Content warning: illness, memory loss

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

The scene takes place at a national figure-skating competition. The coach is in the “kiss and cry” section reacting to her protegée’s performance.

The orchestra prelude details a sweeping skate dance routine that ends badly for the skater (she falls, tries to regain momentum, but falls again). The skater limps onto the stage (in her guard-cov...

Content warning: verbal abuse

George and Martha have three very different versions of a difficult conversation over breakfast. The first two represent what happens in George’s mind when his wife insults him over breakfast. One is violent and reactionary, with George screaming and verbally abusing Martha. The other is more considered, as Georg...

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. This work is a meditation on the personal doubt, collegial suspicion, and sudden inspiration that can keep artists awake until the wee hours.

Content warning: mental illness

Simone has been battling undiagnosed postpartum depression, and is losing. She decides to leave, packing her bags, and her husband Marc begs her to explain. As their son sleeps in the next room, she leaves, and Marc doesn’t try to stop her.

Content warning: murder

Two women, Eunice Rose and Samantha, sit in the audience during the semifinals of a junior “Miss All-Canadian” Pageant. Eunice’s daughter is on stage doing a dance routine Eunice choreographed herself. She holds a diet coke and eats chocolate while eying her daughter and criticizing her performance. Samantha, meanwhile...

A modern retelling of the famous love story of Helen and Paris. In a hotel room, some time into their relationship, Helen and Paris’s ardour seems to be fluctuating.

Content warning: xenophobia, migration

A young child wakes up alone on the beach. They call for their mother. The sound of the waves muffles the voices of people who worry about newcomers and the effect that they will have on their society. Other voices take over - other children declaring that the child belongs with them now.

Inspired by ...

Content warning: death

Trapped and encased by an avalanche, a man thinks only of his wife and finding a way out. Meanwhile, his wife is filled with suspicion. She thinks he’s having an affair, and his silence is the proof. Between the two, Death sings of the ways it brings about disaster.

Content warning: violence, death, murder

Based on a 1960s film by the same name, this story follows two doctors, James and Sam, when an argument turns deadly.

Content warning: death, ableism

Old Merk feels his age. He will die soon. He tries to prepare Pauline, his mentally disabled adult daughter, for the inevitable. What, if anything, will she remember of him? Of the house they share? Of their life together? Will she remember her father’s love? Will she remember the embrace of home? Will she unde...

An Iranian man sits in a hotel room in Canada, writing his morning prayers.

“Hate your stupid earrings, hate your ugly shoes.” 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. Nothing is right – everything is wrong. It is a...

Partition in 1947 drives Naila’s family to the new country of Pakistan while her best friend Lolo must remain in India. In a child’s-eye view of this world event, the significant concerns for these two nine-year-olds are custody of a tin box with important valuables (“marbles and flowers and keys and rings”), and the care and feeding of a pet ra...

In a country torn by war, a woman works as a bell-ringer. There used to be many more in the tower, but one by one the bells were taken: metal for the war-machine. A man climbs the tower after hearing her play the one remaining bell. What seems at first a meeting of two lovers turns dark as the man tries to claim the bell. They need the metal for...

Two miners are making their way into the heart of the mountain. There, they discover another world.

Content warning: captivity, memory loss

Laura has been forcibly confined in a basement for years until she frees herself. She approaches a stranger on the street, wondering if the stranger remembers her, and discovers that she barely remembers herself.

A Woman and Man in bed.  Naked.  Or nearly.  The Man reads to the Woman.  Poetry by Irving Layton.  They have the house to themselves.  They are reconnecting, finally, after their youngest kid has headed off to college.  It’s a perfect night.  Until the mosquito shows up.

An estranged father and daughter re-establish their relationship after he has suffered a stroke and can no longer speak. He tries to convey to her that he loves her and is sorry for the harm he caused her. She is still too hurt from their past to see what he is trying to say. Instead, she passes the time by reading a book. He finds another way o...

Content warning: stalking

A young barista seems to know a surprising amount about one of the customers at her cafe.

A woman is being examined by various doctors.  Weakly, she sings of what she used to be.  One doctor smears lipstick on her.  She doesn’t want to go.

The piece opens in the middle of a reverse custody battle, with each party demanding the other take their son, Simon.  Carla believes her son will grow up dysfunctional without a father, and Peter claims he’ll do nothing but cry for her.  Interspersed with their fighting is the occasional instruction to Simon, indicating he’s in the room, a witn...

Content warning: death, sex work

After the tragic death of her first child, a baby daughter, Isabelle has run away to another town in Spain to escape the grief, leaving her husband Hector with a double loss. They are a working-class couple. The scene opens with Isabelle expecting a client in a seedy bordello. Hector has found her. He entreats...

Content warning: fire, death

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. Both were fighting a fire, and met as part of the bucket brigade. Janna proudly reminds him he saved everyone that night, but this isn’t true. Grandpa confesses that a wo...

Agnieska and Sumana share a night together after meeting in a bar. The night, however intimate, has vastly different meanings to each woman. While Sumana is brimming with the excitement of a first chance at love, Agnieska is haunted by memories of her romantic past.

The next morning, Agnieska wakes early and admires her new lover Sumana as sh...

A woman and her grown son are leaving their home. It’s time for bed, but the boy insists they play his favourite game one last time. Begrudgingly, the mother agrees. They 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 ag...

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.

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

Content warning: gun violence, death, mass shooting

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.

Content warning: child sexual abuse, incest, death, murder

Judith and Daniel, long estranged siblings, are brought together by the passing of their father. Time has passed, but it seems like Judith hasn't changed at all. Daniel kills his sister when she wants to resume their childhood sexual relationship.

While out on a hunt for a new mate, The Queen of the Amazon Ants and one of her subjects find themselves under attack.

The Queen wears low cut, tight-fitting army fatigues that accentuate her shapely thorax and abdomen, and a pair of black calf-high combat boots. The Queen also has two large antennae growing out of her head because she is an ...

Content warning: war, the Holocaust, concentration camp

As soldiers march outside their room in Terezin, a teacher tries their best to inspire a student, despite the horrid conditions. The student is unable to escape into her imagination.

The scene is divided into two sections: a tense argument between mother and child, and a tender aria for the mother as she finally reveals a painful truth to her son about the prolonged absence of his father.

A farmer lovingly takes care of his brown cow, not knowing he and the cow have met before in past lives, once in the 18th century and again in the 20th.

Content warning: death, murder, violence

This opera explores the interior realm of a woman’s response to a crisis. The Laurels plays with audience assumptions and expectations; it is well into the piece before we realize the stranger is not the person he appears to be. While it is important that Laurel’s understanding of the Stranger is consi...

As the waves crash against the shore, two religious brothers go for a walk. The conversation is dominated by the older brother, and heavy with implication. The younger one announces his wish to leave the order, and is asked if his father’s death has something to do with this decision. The younger brother is furious; he could have spoken to his f...

Content warning: sexual violence

Based on the testimony of the 17th-century painter Artemisia Gentileschi on her rapist and instructor Agostino Tassi, we are given a snapshot of violation, confusion, and the oppression of women.

A boy is sitting through the longest sermon ever on the most boring subject ever: purity. He didn’t sleep well the night before, and so convinces himself that he can close his eyes during the sermon without much trouble. But it doesn’t take long for the priest’s longwinded comparison of venial sins to tablecloth stations to blur and distort as t...

Content warning: death, war

During a war, two women talk over the phone. They panic as they watch the town elder march down the street, telegram in hand. His message always carries horrible news: the death of someone’s son. Both of the women almost unwillingly hope some other family gets the telegram. Anyone but them.

In truth, the telegra...

Content warning: death, incarceration, interrogation, suicide, torture

A translator at a secret prison for suspected terrorists witnesses extreme torture and death of detainees. She leaks the information to news broadcasters, but the government covers it up as a hoax. Her supervisor begs her to say nothing more about the things she has seen -...

The night before her birthday, an aging Queen Elizabeth I catches an intruder in her boudoir. It turns out to be none other than her arch-nemesis Grace O’Malley, Irish pirate and chieftain, come to reclaim her seized ship and her trampled rights. A comedic opera about power and politics, destiny and desire, and how hard it is to be a woman at th...

Charlie is performing in a show, and while backstage receives an unexpected visit from the Virgin Mary. Mary has news for Charlie: he is pregnant with the son of God. The little messiah has come to fulfill a prophecy - will armageddon strike the earth, or will forgiveness once again save it all?

Content warning: sexual harassment, violence, fire

A northern land, the end of winter. A cold, dusky pre-dawn on the edge of a mountain; across the valley roars a mighty waterfall. In this valley there are two farms, one poor - owned by Runa, a single woman - and one rich, owned by Olaf, who wishes Runa for his bride.

Olaf proposes to Runa...

Content warning: death, murder, drowning

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.

Content warning: black-out drinking

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

Based on "The Handless Maiden," a mythic story found in cultures around the world, and a continuation of the events in Me and You (Madonna of the Wilderness).

After seven years of wandering, the girl (now known as Madonna) has regained her hands through loving self-sacrifice. She’s returned to the cabin of her childhood, where her journey beg...

Content warning: misgendering, intersex discrimination

A meditation on the discrimination intersex athletes face from their peers. A 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 some 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.

Content warning: death, infanticide, murder

A rumble of hooves. A family is fleeing, but the baby is slowing them down. The mother is forced to choose between her husband and her child. She chooses the husband and tries to get the baby to sleep before letting it go over a waterfall. At the last minute, the baby awakes, and the mother’s grief ...