About This Episode:

In this episode of Stageworthy, host Phil Rickaby speaks with Jack Burrill, actor, director, acting coach, and Artistic Director of Unchained Theatre. What begins as a shared nerd-out over Shakespeare quickly becomes a wide-ranging conversation about why these 400-year-old plays still matter - and how indie theatre is often where their most exciting reinventions happen.

This episode explores:

• Founding Unchained Theatre during the pandemic

• Modernizing classic texts without losing their soul

• Performing Shakespeare in small, intimate spaces

• Why indie theatre matters in Toronto’s ecosystem

• Theatre as an irreplaceable live experience

• And much more!

Guest: 🎭 Jack Burrill

Jack Burrill is an actor, a director, a writer, teacher and the proud Artistic Director and co-founder of Unchained Theatre. As Jack has taken part in productions that he has both acted in and directed (often at the same time.) Some of Jack’s credits include Denise Shepard (Laramie Project), Wargrave (And Then There Were None), Sir Toby Belch (Twelfth Night), Titania/Theseus (Midsummer Night's Dream), Falstaff (Henry IV Part 1). And recently Jack will be Claudius in Hamlet. Jack was recently nominated by Broadway World for his performance as Titania/Thesus in Thaumatrope Theatres production of Midsummer Nights Dream. Jack was trained at Centennial CollegeTheatre Arts and Performance program. As well as being trained in both the Grotowski method by Ara Glenn-Johanson and the Michael Chekhov Technique by Rena Polley and Lionel Walsh, with an aspiration to be trained in more of the legendary practitioner’s methods. He hopes to continue his work and research by producing Shakespeare and learning the different approaches to the craft of acting to pass it on to future generations of actors and artists.

Connect with Jack Burrill & Unchained Theatre:

📸 Instagram: @jackieb123_______

📸 Instagram: @unchained_theatre_company___

Support Stageworthy: If you love the show, consider supporting on Patreon: patreon.com/stageworthy Patrons get early access to episodes, participate in conversations about topics to cover, and more. With three backer levels: $2, $7, and $20.

Subscribe & Follow: 🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Podchaser | Amazon Music | iHeart Radio 📺 Watch on YouTube – Like, subscribe & hit the notification bell!

About This Episode:

In this solo Stageworthy episode, host Phil Rickaby takes a deep dive into the idea of “nation-building” — and why Canada keeps getting it wrong. Sparked by post-election rhetoric around pipelines, railways, housing, and AI infrastructure, Phil argues that these are construction projects, not nation-building ones. True nation-building, he suggests, happens through culture — and specifically through the arts.

Drawing on Canadian history, from the Massey Commission to the creation of the Canada Council for the Arts, Phil traces how arts funding was once understood as a form of national defence — a way of protecting Canadian identity from cultural erasure. He contrasts that history with today’s fixation on GDP, ROI, and “bankable” outcomes, and asks what happens to a country when its soul is treated as discretionary.

This episode is part rant, part cultural history lesson, and part call to action — urging Canada to remember that theatres, music, film, and storytelling don’t just entertain us. They define us.

Support Stageworthy: If you love the show, consider supporting on Patreon: patreon.com/stageworthy Patrons get early access to episodes, participate in conversations about topics to cover, and more. With three backer levels: $2, $7, and $20.

Subscribe & Follow: 🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Podchaser | Amazon Music | iHeart Radio 📺 Watch on YouTube – Like, subscribe & hit the notification bell!

About This Episode:

In this episode of Stageworthy, host Phil Rickaby sits down with Gabrielle Martin, Artistic Director of Vancouver’s PuSh International Performing Arts Festival. Gabrielle discusses her unconventional path into arts leadership, the realities of curating large-scale interdisciplinary work, and the responsibility of presenting challenging, global performance within a local context.

This episode explores:

• Gabrielle’s journey into arts leadership and festival direction

• The role of PuSh Festival within Vancouver’s cultural ecosystem

• Curating interdisciplinary and international performance

• Audience engagement and accessibility in contemporary performance

• The realities of producing large-scale work in Canada

• Care, sustainability, and leadership in the performing arts

• And much more!

Guest: 🎭 Gabrielle Martin

Gabrielle Martin is a cultural producer and live arts curator practicing transformative experiential design in one of society’s few remaining ritual spaces. Her work prioritizes embodied criticality, imagination, pluralism, and risk. It centres the body, and is framed by social and political urgencies.

Gabrielle has a BFA in Contemporary Dance from Concordia University (Montréal), a Certificate in Dramaturgy from the Centre National des Arts du Cirque (Châlons-en-Champagne), and an MA in Arts and Cultural Management from Rome Business School.

Recently, Gabrielle has participated on curatorial and selection juries for Denmark’s CPH Stage International Days, England’s Horizon Showcase, and Canada’s Governor General’s Performing Arts Award in Dance. Before joining PuSh in 2021, she worked as Festival Manager with the Vancouver International Dance Festival. Prior to working in arts management, Gabrielle performed over 1,400 shows internationally with Cirque du Soleil’s TORUK – The First Flight and Cavalia, participated in choreographic residencies in Belgium, Sweden and France, and presented her work in the UK, US, and across Canada.

Connect with Gabrielle:

🌐 Website: https://pushfestival.ca/

📷 Instagram: @pushfestival

Support Stageworthy: If you love the show, consider supporting on Patreon: patreon.com/stageworthy Patrons get early access to episodes, participate in conversations about topics to cover, and more. With three backer levels: $2, $7, and $20.

Subscribe & Follow: 🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Podchaser | Amazon Music | iHeart Radio 📺 Watch on YouTube – Like, subscribe & hit the notification bell!