In Development

On the development front, in January 2007 Studio 180 commissioned Playwright in Residence Emil Sher (Hana’s Suitcase, Mourning Dove) to write Conviction, a documentary theatre piece examining Canada’s justice system and wrongful convictions. This timely and fiercely relevant project has already received the endorsement and support of Canada’s Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted (AIDWYC).

In June 2009, we held a two-week development workshop of the piece (at its second draft stage) with director Joel Greenberg, designer Kimberley Purtell, stage manager Robert Harding and actors Barry Flatman, Jessica Greenberg, Mark McGrinder, Kimwun Perehinec, Maria Ricossa, Dylan Roberts and Nigel Shawn Williams.

Conviction Playwright’s Statement by Emil Sher

Inspired by The Exonerated, a play about death-row inmates in the U.S. who were ultimately set free in the face of incontrovertible evidence, Artistic Director Joel Greenberg approached me in 2007 about exploring similar terrain in a decidedly Canadian context. While the guilty are not put to death in Canada, the country’s judicial history is stained by the wrongful convictions of innocent individuals who have wallowed for years in prison. The names of Donald Marshall, Guy Paul Morin and David Milgaard have become synonymous with miscarriages of justice. Discussions with Joel led to Studio 180’s first commissioned play, a play that is in keeping with the searing documentary theatre the company has staged in the past. Like The Laramie Project and The Arab-Israeli Cookbook, this original work will weave several verbatim voices into a theatrical whole. We speak of justice delayed, of justice denied. In Conviction, notions of justice will be disassembled, with the audience left to put the pieces together again.