As the trade war rages on, CBC’s PlayME stays true to its mandate of platforming Canadian writers
iPhoto caption: Photo courtesy of the CBC.
What does Canada sound like?
For Laura Mullin and Chris Tolley, the creators of CBC’s PlayME podcast, the answer isn’t a loon call or the Tim Hortons jingle. To them, the sound of Canada is a plurality of voices, in dynamic conversation about the urgent topics of today. That’s what listeners can expect from the podcast’s upcoming season of five contemporary Canadian plays, reimagined as audio dramas and available to listeners across the world.
In an interview, Mullin and Tolley spoke to how this season has taken on new significance in the context of U.S. president Donald Trump’s erratic tariffs against Canada, not to mention his expansionist threats. “I haven’t seen the [I Am Canadian] ad for decades, and now it’s all over social media,” said Tolley, citing Jeff Douglas’ updated version of the popular 2000 ad for Molson Canadian. “I think all five of these shows really help us plant a stake in saying who we are, as Canadians.”
The new season of PlayME launches today with Hypothetical Baby, a solo show written and performed by Rachel Cairns and originally produced by the Howland Company in 2023. Known for Aborsh, her podcast about the state of abortion access in Canada, Cairns uses her own experience of having an abortion as the jumping off-point for a gripping mix of research and storytelling.
The rest of the season is a vibrant mix of comedy and drama. Jordi Mand’s In Seven Days is a comedy in which a daughter wrestles with her father’s decision to die by medically assisted means. The show had its world premiere in 2024, in a co-production between the Harold Green Jewish Theatre Company and London’s Grand Theatre. Zahida Rahemtulla’s The Wrong Bashir amps up the comedy to full-on farce: it’s about an Ismaili Muslim family whose nihilistic son is mistakenly chosen for a prestigious spiritual position. Originally produced in Vancouver by Touchstone Theatre in 2023, The Wrong Bashir had its Toronto premiere in 2024 at Crow’s Theatre.
Also a farce — though a grim one — is The Bidding War, by Michael Ross Albert. First produced at Crow’s last fall, it stages a cutthroat struggle for the last affordable house in Toronto. Makram Ayache’s The Green Line, meanwhile, is a romantic drama that interweaves two queer stories of love and loss in Beirut, spanning from the Lebanese Civil War to the present day. Nominated for a Governor General’s Award in 2024, it will be the offering least familiar to Toronto listeners: its premiere was co-produced by Downstage Theatre and Chromatic Theatre in Calgary in 2022.
“What stands out for me is that in Canada we can openly talk about [the issues these plays explore],” said Mullin. For instance, “we can have somebody like Rachel Cairns talk about abortion. Her play isn’t about whether to have the abortion or not: it’s about what it was like for her, how it was difficult to access, and why, even in her 30s, in a stable relationship, she still had the right to make her own decision… I [feel] proud that we can present that kind of piece onstage and on PlayME, and I’m thrilled that people outside of Canada are able to access that story as well.”
For Canadian listeners, the conversations in these plays may recall similar ones happening across the country, around dinner tables or on front stoops. Tolley pointed to In Seven Days as an example. His neighbourhood is made up of “about 10 houses,” he shared. “We’re all very close, and one of our neighbours opted for [medical assistance in dying]. I’m not pretending to be their best friend, but as a neighbour it had an impact on me: there were so many competing emotions. I read In Seven Days after that, and I couldn’t believe how well [Mand] had captured that complexity and those layers.”
“Jordi makes the play uniquely complicated because [the story happens] within Jewish culture,” said Mullin, who went on to point out that it’s precisely the specificity of these plays that allow them to speak to a wide range of listeners. “In The Wrong Bashir, you have 11 Ismaili people on stage,” she said. “You get to be in their living room, and understand the dynamics of that family and their culture… The issue at the heart of the play might not be something that I [can immediately grasp], as somebody from a family that doesn’t practice any religion… [but] I can relate to that family and [its] dynamics so much.”
Whether or not listeners caught the live productions of these plays, the podcast format offers a chance to savour these stories in more detail and at one’s own pace. Often, original cast members reprise their onstage roles. “The characters are deep in their bones,” said Tolley. “It brings this richness to the microphone that you would never be able to capture otherwise.”
“All five plays are so rich in their dialogue that I think you get a different appreciation,” added Mullin. “Having the actors in your ears, it’s like they’re speaking directly to you.” Contributing to the richness are in-depth interviews with the season’s playwrights, in standalone episodes released shortly after the final chapter of each play.
PlayME’s creators value this individualized listening experience — but they’re also eager to use their platform to build artistic community. They’re doing so via PlayPEN, a new series of online training workshops. Current teachers include playwright and actor Mark Crawford, casting director Dee Shipley, and musical theatre composer Kevin Wong, as well as writer-performer Aurora Browne.
By offering such a wide range of courses, “what we want to do is break down the silos that exist within these artistic forms,” Mullin explained. Tolley added that PlayPEN is a natural next step for PlayME, since “a lot of the people who follow [the podcast] also have experience in performing or writing.” New PlayPEN courses will be announced shortly, and Tolley and Mullin plan to release condensed versions of previous offerings as standalone podcast episodes, initially reserved for paid supporters of PlayME Plus.
In further testament to the national reach of PlayME’s stories and listenership, the PlayPEN courses have drawn participants from around Canada. “We had Kevin Wong’s class the other night, and I was on the call with people from Calgary, Halifax, Edmonton, Newfoundland, Toronto, Montreal — all over the place,” said Mullin.
“We want to create more community… for artists across the country.”
The new season of PlayME is available wherever you get your podcasts. For updates on new releases and upcoming courses, sign up for PlayME’s newsletter here.
Nathaniel Hanula-James
Nathaniel Hanula-James is a multidisciplinary theatre artist who has worked across Canada as a dramaturg, playwright, performer, and administrator.
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iPhoto caption: Photo courtesy of York University.
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iPhoto caption: Photo by Szymon Lazewski.
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iPhoto caption: Photo courtesy of York University.
“I think the fundamental issue is that the foundation of inequity is still intact,” says co-curator Mariló Nuñez. “If you think about when Canadian theatre was first established, the theatre we were watching and learning about was Eurocentric, Western theatre… We place everything against that [perceived] ideal. Until that changes, I don’t think we can really make a change.”
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iPhoto caption: Miriam Fernandes as the Storyteller, with Anaka Maharaj-Sandhu as Arjuna and Neil D'Souza as Krishna in Why Not Theatre’s Mahabharata (Shaw Festival, 2023). Photo by David Cooper. Set design by Lorenzo Savoini, costume design by Gillian Gallow, lighting design by Kevin Lamotte, projection design by Hana S. Kim.
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iPhoto caption: Photo by Audrianna Martin Del Campo.
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