Blythe Haynes on Creative Risk, Accessibility, Emotional Safety, & Other Concerns
About This Episode
Blythe Haynes returns to Stageworthy for a wide-ranging conversation with host Phil Rickaby about indie theatre, artistic process, community, and the evolution of a Fringe hit into a feature film.
Blythe reflects on how Toronto’s theatre scene has changed since the pandemic, why she believes artists need spaces to experiment and fail, and what Canadian theatre can learn from the Edinburgh Festival Fringe model. The conversation also explores the challenges of sustaining indie work in Toronto, the importance of artistic community, and how Blythe’s own understanding of her career shifted during the lockdown years.
They also discuss the journey of An Atlas, A Necktie, and Other Concerns — the acclaimed 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival production that eventually became the filmed adaptation And Other Concerns, now streaming on CBC Gem. Blythe shares what it was like adapting the theatrical piece into film, acting while serving as a producer, and working within the unusual constraint of keeping the story confined to a single room.
The episode also touches on rehearsal room culture, emotional safety in performance, outdoor theatre disasters, the realities of producing independent work, Gangway Theatre’s long-developing project Digital Divergence, and Blythe’s growing interest in playwriting and collaborative creation.
This episode explores
- The state of Toronto indie theatre post-pandemic
- Why Fringe in Canada functions differently than Edinburgh
- Building artistic community outside traditional theatre spaces
- Turning An Atlas, A Necktie, and Other Concerns into a film
- Emotional safety and accessibility in rehearsal rooms
- Performing The Drowning Girls outdoors in near-hypothermic conditions
- The importance of process over product in artistic work
- and much more
Guest: 🎭 Blythe Haynes
BLYTHE HAYNES (she/her). Actor, Theatre Maker & Co-Artistic Director Gangway! Theatre Co. Blythe holds her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Acting from the University of Alberta, but calls Toronto home, where she is an active member of the community. For Gangway she is currently working on their play Digital Divergence, a design first creation process centring on who we are in different mediums. For her solo projects, Blythe is developing her play Uplifting Stories for Seniors, which won Second Place Winner of the Toronto Fringe 2025 24 hour Playwriting Contest. An active member of Showing Up For Racial Justice, her art practice has come to involve work with grassroots community advocacy, melding together direct action and art; she was a co-producer/performer of the political play reading community event 8 Men Speak (The Theatre Centre, 2024);
Favourite performances: The Drowning Girls (Guild Festival Theatre), An Acorn: a text for performance (impel Theatre/Oldham Coliseum) and the play-turned-short film & Other Concerns (dir. Sabina Olivia Lambert), which debuted at the Big Apple Film Festival (NYC) and the Female Eye Film Festival (Toronto) in 2024, and Available Now on CBC Gem. Honourable mentions: She has had the opportunity to work on two Thomas McKechnie projects – 12 Letters from Your Lover, Lost at Sea (zietpunktheatre), and was an anti-capitalist worm in Life and death and life and death and life (dir. Steven Hao).
Blythe is an AMY Project Board Member, and also works with the project Anchoring Accessibility (with lead artist Leslie Ting, Dr. Jessica Watkin and Macy Siu) – which “works to find ways through practice-based research to support artists in the sector to develop relational and pragmatic approaches to accessibility and confidence by creating creative tools (the protocol) and educational materials.”
Watch & Other Concerns on CBC Gem: https://gem.cbc.ca/canadian-reflections
Connect with Blythe
📸 Instagram: @blythe_haynes
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Transcript
[Phil Rickaby]
Hello, welcome to Stageworthy. I’m Phil Rickaby, the host and producer of this podcast. Stageworthy is Canada’s theatre podcast, and on Stageworthy, I talk to theatre makers of all kinds, from actors to directors to playwrights.
If they’re making theatre in Canada, I’m talking to them. Some of the people I talk to may be household names, and the rest are people that I really think you should get to know. If you’re watching on YouTube, do me a favour and like this episode, leave a comment so that I know that you were here.
And if you like Stageworthy, make sure that you hit the subscribe button and hit that bell icon so that whenever a new episode comes out, you’ll get notified that a new episode is available. If you’re listening to the audio version, make sure that you are subscribed. Search for Stageworthy in your favourite podcast app and hit the follow button.
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So if you could do that, just leave a rating and a review, I would be very grateful. Speaking of gratitude, I have a Patreon, and I can’t make this show without the people who are patrons of this show. They help me to pay for the things that I need to pay for in order to do this show.
If you would like to be part of that, and I’ll talk a little bit more in detail about that at the end of the episode, when I tell you who the guest is next week. If you think that you’d like to be a part of that, go to patreon.com/Stageworthy and become a patron. My guest this week is Blythe Haynes.
Blythe has been on this podcast a few times now, and I guess we could call Blythe a friend of the show, couldn’t we? Blythe is an actor, a theatre maker, a co-artistic director of Gangway Theatre. Blythe is also one of the producers of And Other Concerns, which is a filmed adaptation of the fringe hit An Atlas, A Necktie, and Other Concerns.
And the filmed version is now available on CBC Gem, so you can watch it right now. And so without further ado, here’s my conversation with Blythe Haynes. Blythe Haynes, thank you for joining me.
Once again, I was looking back at some of your past episodes that you’ve been on with sometimes by yourself, sometimes with other folks a few times, but rarely by yourself. So I’m glad that you’re back here. I think the last time that I had you here by yourself was just before you went off to the Edinburgh Fringe.
We were talking about watching Glory die.
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah, that’s right.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah. And you were, yeah, I mean, everything feels like a lifetime ago when you factor in the pandemic, which has changed our perception of time. But you were, I mean, you were going to the Edinburgh Fringe to do a podcast about the show that was at the Edinburgh Fringe.
And I know that when we talked about that, you talked about coming back from Edinburgh with a new sense of how Toronto’s indie theatre could operate at a higher level, marketing and planning. It’s been about five years since that time. Have you seen that happening?
Is that something you’ve seen in your own work? Or is there something that you’ve, have you seen a change?
[Blythe Haynes]
It’s a great question, Phil. You know, I think what is interesting about your great question is that within those five years, and I think shortly after I came back from Edinburgh, it was the lockdowns. So just by virtue of that, yes, everything, everything did change.
And I think, I think in terms of like fringes as well, like talking about like the Toronto Fringe, I mean, in those five years, we’ve certainly seen some struggles, yeah, like trying to just get patrons to come see things and funding. I think that, yeah, the funding piece is kind of interesting from that. I mean, we’re all talking about it.
I think when you’re looking at the Edinburgh Fringe, and I remember, yeah, I remember having that conversation. And I still think about that sometimes about how it was a selling floor. And it, it doesn’t feel so much like that, even still, on that front.
But I have seen, I think from from like our Toronto Fringe, obviously big changes, right, like the change last year to the distillery district, which is a much more commercial district, but then also trying to spread it out a lot more over the city, which is very much kind of what what Edinburgh is doing. But yeah, I think in terms of indie, like, they do kind of space is what was what’s hitting me right now. I think kind of 2017, 2018, we were still seeing the era where like storefront theatre was there, or just like the very tail end of it.
And I think there were still only like a little tiny kind of truly indie spaces. So I think what I have an interest in is, is how do we start creating indie spaces that are not theatres, and that are maybe in our living rooms, or that are working with other other venues in the city, you know, whether that’s maybe like a movie theatre, or joining forces, maybe a little bit more as a community. I think that’s maybe the the piece that I’ve seen a shift and feel myself is that coming together as artists and kind of almost like a working labour issue, to be able to have that community that uplifts all of that.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah. One of the things that you were talking about was was how Edinburgh is sort of a selling floor. Like, you go there, and it’s almost like you’re there to try to open up Europe for, you know, performance and touring and that sort of thing.
People go to Edinburgh to get further work. And I don’t think we have that. We don’t have an equivalent here.
There is the occasional show that breaks through one at one every decade or so, that, you know, goes on to have a life outside of Fringe and becomes a thing. But there’s no there’s no opening, really, of like, ah, you were a success at the Fringe, and now here the door is open, and you can begin to be a theatre maker based on that work, unless you’ve put in I mean, it happens occasionally where somebody’s put I think I’m thinking of a few playwrights who’ve managed to parlay that. But that’s year after year after year after year of work.
We don’t have anything that’s equivalent to what happens in Edinburgh in Canada.
[Blythe Haynes]
No, no. I mean, Edmonton has like some of that, because you I think you also have a much more international community that’s going to Edmonton, because it is biggest in North America. And I think Edmonton, you also have a population that goes to see theatre.
Toronto, outside of if you know someone in a show, the population is not going to indie theatre. Yeah, they don’t even know the Fringe is happening.
[Phil Rickaby]
Well, no. And I mean, I was just talking with some folks at the Fringe about this, about the fact that like, you know, the communication in Toronto is not it shouldn’t we have that deficit of like, if I say I’m going to see a show at Fringe, the vast majority of people don’t know what I’m talking about. Whereas in Edmonton and Winnipeg, everybody knows there’s no way not to know that Fringe is on and there’s a communication barrier.
One of the things that I think the media could do better even is like talk about like, what is Fringe instead of just being like Fringe is on like, okay, what’s that?
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah, well, also, yeah, and maybe kind of going back to the selling floor is that artists preparing to go into like the Edinburgh Fringe, like I know, yeah, here, there’s like information sessions, because it’s so different about what that is. And obviously, Derek Chua is like a huge force in helping that happen. Yeah, I do think a lot of the shows don’t even have the idea though, like, I’m going to put this as work that I’ve been working on for a while.
And I think that also goes to the opportunities within the city sometimes of kind of, well, where’s the community space to try and fail before you get to the Fringe? And by fail, I mean, try things, get messy, and just have it be the process. So by the time you’re inviting folks in a Fringe atmosphere, or frankly, any sort of indie atmosphere, it’s not so, I guess, you’re still experimenting, but maybe the analogy is sort of like the idea of previews, you know, that you’re previewing the work, you’re still kind of tinkering with it, and then kind of Fringe is opening night.
I think the viewpoint is a lot more, you know, Toronto Fringe is previews, and you’re doing something no one’s ever seen before, which I think is a great, amazing energy to it. But it also means that lightning has to strike for a project to go forward from that.
[Phil Rickaby]
Oh, yeah. So many, you know, you hear about projects and, you know, it’s a success, but you never hear of it again. You know, it was the hit of the Fringe, and now we’ll never hear from it again, 10 years from now, somebody might mention it.
But it’s almost forgotten, and there’s no, but then we kind of have that problem generally, is the pathway to production, right? If you are in the traditional theatre system, you are going to, you might get your first production, and since every theatre is concentrating on premieres, you may never, there’s no, like, path to, oh, your second production of this show is going to be over here, because everybody wants to be the first.
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah, I’ve been thinking a lot, interestingly, in, like, the last, like, five years since I was thinking about Edinburgh, and maybe being a part of that experience as well. I’ve been thinking so much about, about art is process, it’s not a product. And, and when you commodify that, that, that is the most important thing.
You’re, you’re, you’re starting with a product, whereas you need to start with a process. And I think that was something for me that sounds, like, very simple, and very, yeah, of course, but I do think it is a big struggle when you’re thinking, well, I have to, I have to produce something, and not realizing that actually your life is, as an artist, that is what the process is. So, you know, whether you’re walking your dog, or you feel having a rough spot, or, you know, having a great year full of contracts, like, all of that is part of what creates the artist’s condition and perspective.
So when it’s kind of going to something that is, like, a selling floor, or sort of, like, an indie, an indie hit, I think it has to also work with your life, too. And I think that that certainly gets lost in the, in the product pipeline.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah, for sure. We were talking a little bit about, you know, five years ago. It’s actually probably closer to six years ago, maybe seven, 2019.
The last, I want, almost want to say the last quote, unquote, normal fringe in recent memory, which is 2019. That was, you know, the year before the pandemic hit, and everything sort of changed. But it was also the year that we were both in the fringe in different shows.
And the show that you were in is now a film. So I’m curious about how did, how did that, how did the film aspect of the show that was in the Toronto fringe in 2019, how did that come about?
[Blythe Haynes]
Mm hmm. Yeah, thanks so much for asking. Yeah, you know, I think, I personally think it’s an interesting story.
But I also think it’s it’s a story that is really relatable to so many people in the arts. Yeah, I mean, An Atlas, An Ecti and Other Concerns was was written by Lauren Greenwood, and directed by her in the 2019 fringe. And, you know, Phil, you and I were both in shows that won the best of fringe five or nine.
[Phil Rickaby]
That’s right.
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah. And we both went to Orangeville, played in that like, speakeasy.
[Phil Rickaby]
That I mean, that was that was probably the this. I mean, the first there was the first was like, I don’t know what a curling curling club or something. And then we moved into the weird speakeasy space, which was like, the strangest place to perform in.
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah. Yeah, the stage was like, for like, I don’t know, a three piece band.
[Phil Rickaby]
And we absolutely for a three piece band and everything, all of the seats and places where people were sitting, I think it was all velvet.
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah, I just remember that, um, that we had to like, we were shoving like a chalkboard on there. Yeah. You know, there were just so many props.
But yeah, my standout memory about was that I had, I had to exit near the end of the show and change it into some pajamas, and then reenter from like a different spot. And so it was a quick change. But the added challenge was that I had to exit out the secret, like vault door, and then change into my pajamas, like right outside of it.
And there were steps going up to the outside. And then I had to run outside, go run through the patio where people are eating dinner, in my pajama, like streaking through, and then go into the restaurant, also where people are eating, run down some stairs. And then like, listen, is it now?
Yeah, that felt a bit wild. But that’s theatre, darling. Yeah.
So yeah, how did that become a place for a film? Well, yeah, I think that actually, interestingly, I don’t think it would have become that if there wasn’t the lockdowns. Because, you know, myself and Lauren and Merton Stagg and Chantal Winters and Verona Dye, we all got really close doing that show.
You know, it was something that was very, you know, close subject matter to us. It was, you know, a young, a woman in her 30s, struggling, life’s big decisions in an escape room, and her three least helpful friends show up to try and help her get out. And then the room starts to have opinions of its own, which still is what the film is.
But we, just to be sane, we started having these weekly Zoom calls. Because, yeah, it was dark days. I mean, I think everyone had their sanity checks, right?
And I think that that opportunity of pausing, of not constantly looking towards, well, what is my next contract? And also just, frankly, the fear of, well, what happens now? Seeing so many things get canceled.
So we all really held each other in that. And it was out of these weekly Zoom calls that the idea started kind of coming around, well, what if we started thinking about these characters again that brought us together? The question I think I asked was like, what would they be doing in a lockdown?
What would Elizabeth be doing? And it just kind of evolved from there. And I think originally we thought, well, what if we did a sequel to An Atlas Anecdote and Other Concerns?
And so that was just a really interesting thing to think about. Well, what would happen to these characters in a sequel? If you saw the play, and if you’ve seen the film, I can’t say what it is now, but there is a surprise element at the end that a lot of people had a lot of opinions about.
And so kind of like, okay, well, do we make decisions about that? And how would we do that? And at the time, it was very much thinking about Zoom, right?
Because we were in that era. And so we decided we would do a sequel to the play, but do it as a web series on Zoom, because we were all still isolated. And the curiosity at that time was, how do we keep the theatricality of it?
What happens if we not try and make a web series or quote-unquote a film? What happens as theatre artists if we try and dabble in this medium? Which again, a lot of us were thinking about at the time.
And we were also really thinking about escape room games, and how would we involve an audience in that and actually have audiences playing an escape room game sort of throughout this like interactive Zoom web series? Which honestly, I still think is pretty cool. But yeah, so we ended up getting a digital Malgrat from the Canada Council of the Arts, because they were just making it rain.
Thank you so much. And so yeah, so we did get a chunk of change to start doing that. And we started to pivot towards going, okay, you know what, let’s actually film this a little more traditionally.
So no one wants to see Zoom anymore, because we started having conversations with industry people in film and also in theatre and going, because I think probably this would have been, maybe we got the grant in like 2021, maybe in the summer. And so it started to think actually, how do we not have this be a project that was like, keeping us sane? And how do we start to look at, I guess, exiting a lockdown?
And what does that mean for us? And so we ended up actually interviewing directors, which is a bit of an odd thing, because it was going to be, you know, the four of us the same cast, but Lauren wasn’t going to direct, but she was going to adapt it. So the same theatre writer for still web series at that time.
And in those interviews, it was really important for us that it retain staying in one location. That was that was the creative question that we had. And because film doesn’t do that very often, right?
You want to have cutaways, because it’s a it’s a completely different medium. But I think the same creative conceit within the theatre was like, they’re stuck in this one room, create, you know, the metaphors and the symbolism, but it needed to do that in the film. And so that was how it was going to retain its its theatre.
By having the challenge, but you can you cannot do a walk and talk, you cannot do a flashback, you have to have it be in this room. So so that was an interesting experience to kind of meet with more film directors and say, yes, but you have to do this. And eventually, we ended up Sabina Olivia Lambert was the director we ended up working with, which has a synchronicity to it, because back when we were auditioning for the play, Lauren knew Sabina through someone she was in the Second City Conservatory class with.
And Sabina filmed all of our auditions for the play and ended up helping Lauren cast the play that Sabina, you know, years later would go on to direct.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah, it’s interesting that it is an interesting constraint to put on a film to to say it’s got to take place in one space, because like you say, it’s not a thing that film does very often. In television, they would refer to it as a bottle episode, which they usually do because they spent all their money on some other previous episode. And so they can’t they don’t have the budget to go out.
It’s the bottle episode. But film rarely does that. Before you found Sabina, was there resistance to the idea of keeping it in one space?
Was there like, was it difficult to find a director who was able to go, no, I can see the vision for that?
[Blythe Haynes]
I think it was something that, I mean, it was a bit of an odd situation, too, right? I mean, which I we fully understood. There were like five of us on a Zoom call.
These poor directors are going, what? So, you know, I have a lot of that for it. But but yeah, there was.
Yeah. A lot of folks were, you know, the way that they were envisioning telling the story, which because that’s what you’re doing when you’re bringing a director on, I think, for film particularly is that. It’s going to be their project, like they become the son of the project, which, yeah, absolutely, that’s how it needs to be.
And this was a bit of this is a bit unusual. We were coming as a full creative team from the theatre having already done all this. And and so it was kind of a bit more almost like a theatre, a theatre film in a way.
And yeah, yeah. Folks were just had different ideas about it, which which were, again, within that medium, which we need to we need to put the camera, we need to have it go outside the world. And, you know, we certainly as a team talked about it, too.
We’re like, OK, like if we’re if we’re moving into this medium, does this need to change? And so had those explorations and and certainly were like, I can see why this director would want to do that and what it would add to the story. But in the end, it it creatively was the most important thing for us that we wanted a vision that was aligned with the challenge that we wanted to to have.
And I know I know personally, I’m I was super interested in what was the new thing that we could create by sort of blending mediums within that. And Sabina really came in and said, that’s why I want to do it, is because I want the challenge of of doing something a bit different. And I think also, yes, Sabina did have familiarity with the project, right?
Like she also she’d seen the play. So I think that that gave her just a really unique perspective within it, for sure.
[Phil Rickaby]
It can be difficult making that change from going from the film, sorry, the theatre version of the acting aspect. It’s a very different way of doing it. And now you’re taking the theatre actors are coming in to shoot the film and try to take those characters and make them in the way they have to be to act in film.
And also now you’re not constrained by having to dismantle everything in 15 minutes and all the constraints of a festival. What kind of changes were you making as you go into production on this?
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah, honestly, yeah. You’re so good, Phil. You know, I will say just like on the it was really funny not having to disassemble and assemble in 15 minutes, although it did kind of feel that way in some respects, because we did do a build in a in a prop warehouse in Hamilton.
We sort of inherited the building room, which was great for the budget. But, you know, like I roped my brother in and also got paint donated from my parents’ paint store to like and so I think two nights before shooting, my brother, shout out Spencer, and I and Merton went to Hamilton and like painted until one in the morning. So, you know, my brother’s drywall work was great.
And of course, we told my brother, yeah, there’ll be tons of people there to help. It was me, Spencer and Merton, you know, and like the night before shooting, we’re there till one in the morning painting, hoping it would be dry before camera needed to roll. So that’s a little bit fringed of the office.
[Phil Rickaby]
Well, you know, lying to family is certainly a fringe thing, you know.
[Blythe Haynes]
Honestly, I think there’s like two weeks ago, my brother was talking about that. Going up to see my drywall work. But you know, I mean, that said, I do think what was so interesting about the set was I mean, Hayley Pace, who you also know, was, you know, the art director.
And man, she just created something that felt like theatre. So I think what was kind of a nice thing was that I really felt like it was all there. It was all practical.
I could go and pick that thing up like I was able to play with it like it was a theatre set. So that was really comforting for me. And we certainly had more of a budget for it.
So that was great. Yeah. So I think I think yeah, that that was that was incredible to have kind of like the actual thing there and then also have a go.
This feels like a theatre set. And that’s sort of what we’re playing with. So that was nice.
You know, I mean, very honestly, like I mostly do theatre, so you love to do more film, but I just I’ve never been in the position of being like number one on the call sheet. I’ve done like I’ve done a little bit of film, but this was very much OK, great. Like it’s me every single day.
And and I think that there’s a there’s it’s just like a different pressure in film because you’ve got like, I don’t know, I think with thirty five people on set and you’re kind of like, oh, everyone’s here just for this. And I need to make sure I’m ready to deliver the goods when it has to happen.
[Phil Rickaby]
I’ve done I’ve done two two small films and was fortunate to be number one on the call sheet in both. But like I didn’t realize the weight of that responsibility until I was in it, like the fact that like, oh, no, you’re you’re because you’re in pretty much every scene, you’re setting the tone more than you think. You’re setting the tone on the set, you are so much is catering to you that like it can’t help, but not it’s a it.
Once I realized that there’s a big responsibility to being number one on the call sheet, you I think it’s affected how I look at other films as well. The stories that I hear about people on set is just because that that person dictates everyone’s happiness level in some respects.
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah. Oh, my gosh, yes. One thousand percent, yes.
I I mean, you know, I was also a producer on the film, too. So we were all producers. I had never produced a film.
I don’t want to do it again. Theatre, thank you. But yeah, I remember the first day and I was I was I was I was prepping because I think the thoughts of thing, you know, going into like a theatre rehearsal.
A lot like I do my I do my my script work, you know, I thought a lot about it, but I know that I have three weeks to to work and to find it. Whereas. I remember thinking, OK, it’s my first day on set, I we were doing a bunch of coverage, it was just me.
And I’m looking at it like the wires staking everywhere, and there’s so many people who are all there just to just to work together in this one goal. And I just got chill looking out over it. I remember Yvonne was close by and I just want to come here.
I mean, we need to remember this moment. Like this is wild. But when it came time for me just to do like this, like really emotional scene, just me, I was you know, I was so grateful for Sabina, actually, as a director, because she just, you know, she really walked me through it.
She talked me through it. And that that was a big difference. I think, you know, from from theatre.
I mean, I think that this is a scene where I I don’t like they weren’t using the audio. So Sabina like literally talked me through like but she also is like, you know what this is. And and then she actually brought like Sontel and Murphy and Yvonne like off camera to start whispering things at me to help.
And so I think that there are kind of interesting things with film that because it’s just what the camera sees to help you get into that space that maybe I would I would have like a rehearsal period to to look at, but it made it so much less daunting to to have the folks there with me. I also remember Sabina asked me she had interviews with all of us before we started filming. And I never had anyone asked me this before.
But she said, so is there anything within your life and you don’t have to be specific if you don’t want, but is there anything that you don’t feel comfortable using for for this role? Are there any places you just don’t want to go emotionally? And I never had anyone asked me that before.
And, you know, it really took me aback because I at first I was just like, well, it’s my job to act, so I’ll take care of it. Don’t worry. Don’t you worry about me?
She’s like, no, no, I really want to know because it’s not going to help anyone if we go somewhere that’s not good for you. And I’m not just I mean, we shot this in 2022. I think a lot of those conversations in theatre rooms and films are happening now, but I just I just never had that.
So I felt so safe going into that space to try something new. And and we also shot it sequentially. So that’s unusual as well.
Like we went through the whole thing except for that that that one thing. But. Yeah, so I think that those two things certainly ring a bell.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah, it it’s interesting, the the the way that we approach film, I think people don’t a lot of people don’t know who aren’t in it that often don’t really have rehearsal, except for like, here’s where the camera goes, like we’re going to do we’re going to go through once for the camera and then the rest of it is up to the actors in the room. And that can be the first time you ever do that, I think is so terrifying because it’s it’s difficult to to to get your head around it. But also, I think the thing that I really wanted to ask about, because now my mind is working again, was about the way that those conversations and the safety of rehearsal rooms, the the importance of checking in each day, like as the rehearsal is going on, as the performance is going on.
A few years ago, I had a conversation about emotional bleed in the theatre. And now it’s the thing we don’t talk about and we don’t have tools to deal with it. And so one of the things that in that conversation we came up with is like.
Checking in at the end of of rehearsal period and make sure that everybody’s OK and like talking about the bleed and the things that people are feeling just to get them out in the open so that we can like deal with them. But a lot of rehearsal halls in the past have not been places where you can have those free conversations about what’s, you know, how you feel, where don’t you want to go and that sort of thing. In your experience, are those things that you mentioned, those that sort of changing?
Have you seen that in practice? Outside of this film?
[Blythe Haynes]
I have, yes. Whether it’s something that I have experienced myself or heard of other people doing. Yes.
I guess the reason I’m hesitating is that I think it just it depends so much on the room and the space that you’re in. And I think it’s it’s the it’s the people who are driving the bus. Kind of like you’re saying, like number one, a call sheet, but it also it starts it starts at the top.
And. I feel like it has to do with kind of thinking about less of the product. Of something and.
And more to do with like how something happens matters. So. If you are if you’re if you’re meeting people’s needs.
On on on a daily basis, and that can be like hearing about folks who have child care in the show or they’re bringing their baby to rehearsal or, you know, not doing like the eight hour day. Like, why do we need to do that? You know, is this stuff you’re doing in hour eight?
Is that really going to be something that’s actually going to be good? Or. I know like when I was doing I know when I was doing Drowning Girls out at Guild Festival, that was a really nice process.
And Helen really led us through something that again, sort of similar, actually saying, hey, if there’s anything that is tough for you in this, there is space for you to let us know in the room. What that is, and and I’m available to if there’s places you don’t want to talk about in rehearsal to say, hey, this is tough for me. And that was really helpful and useful because, I mean, you know, Drowning Girls is a show certainly about women who’ve been murdered by their husbands.
And and and so that was a nice experience to go through and a warm place to be.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah, I mean, you’re right. It is entirely up to the person at the top to set the tone of that room. So it is up to the director and the director has to be approachable and and and set up the room in such a way that those conversations can happen in a in a in a in a friendly way rather than a talk.
You know, we’re still hearing about toxic rehearsal halls. And so that’s the that’s the thing that I think we still like. I don’t know if we’ll ever be rid of it.
I wish we would. But it’s it’s it’s people.
[Blythe Haynes]
People are people. I do think that there is there is a piece about how we handle conflict. And something I think about a lot is a friend of mine said about something that just said, you’re just uncomfortable, you’re just uncomfortable.
So just sit and be uncomfortable. It doesn’t need to overpower someone else’s experience and we can do that now. That said, if there’s something that’s happening that is beyond that.
But I think understanding the difference between like distress and discomfort.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah. Yeah.
[Blythe Haynes]
Is something I know I’ve been thinking about a lot like I do. I work with the artist led research project Anchoring Accessibility. And I know that we were out last fall in Halifax with the Dalhousie acting students.
And I do project management with it, but yeah, it was it was interesting hearing them talk about that, actually, in terms of accessibility within within the room and then dissecting when were they just when were they in discomfort and when were they in distress? And I was like, well, that’s I mean, gosh, I wish I was talking about that in theatre school, because I think that, you know, certainly if your nervous system says I’m in distress, it means I have to shut everything down. I’m not going to listen anymore.
And really, the answer is maybe you’re just uncomfortable.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah.
[Blythe Haynes]
And that means but yeah, I think it is that listening piece and kind of like does this does this impede me in any way? And can I listen?
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah.
[Blythe Haynes]
Exactly. And I think that there’s less listening happening in general.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah. Yeah. You mentioned the drowning girls.
And I want to talk about that briefly, because you were performing the drowning girls at the Guild Theatre, which is outdoors, which means that there are certain things that are unpredictable. And, you know, I don’t know if it was the preview or your opening night where it was really cold. And the three of you are immersing yourselves in these bathtubs outside in the cold.
And the water is not going to be warm after it was when you got in. It wasn’t going to be by the end. Like, how prepared were you for the environmental factors going into this outdoor production of the drowning girls?
[Blythe Haynes]
Oh, yeah. Well, it was opening and and it was 14 degrees in August. So not prepared at all.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah. I mean, who would have thought who would have thought there’s going to be 14 degrees in August? Right.
Rude. So rude.
[Blythe Haynes]
So I took it very personally. No, I don’t think I was prepared. I remember our stage manager saying that just kind of a few hours before because it had been so hot when we were rehearsing, like, you know, we were worried about heatstroke and like red ants.
But and so I was I was prepared for that. And then and then the temperatures just started plummeting like, you know, right through and our stage manager came to us and said, so I want to talk about the signs of hypothermia.
[Phil Rickaby]
That is not the thing. That’s not the conversation you want to be happening before you get into a like a bathtub.
[Blythe Haynes]
But I mean, you know, they they were so great. And part of it was that, you know, you’re not leaving stage for the whole show. So you can’t go warm up.
So you I will be watching you for these signs of hypothermia, but you need to be watching each other. And I don’t want anyone to be a hero here. No one’s because of not being a hero.
If you need to stop the show, we will stop the show and get you warmed up and then and then start again, which, yeah, actors still don’t like to do. I know that I was like the canary in the coal mine because I I get very cold very easily. I also have rhinos, which is technically an autoimmune where your veins response to cold and stress is are to shrink.
And so my my fingers will start to get white and numb and then like purple. I call it corpse finger and my toes do it, too. So so, yeah, I was I was kind of the the bellwether for that.
But, you know, they were so great. Like I think all the reviewers came opening night. And so it’s in all the reviews how cold it was.
And I was I remember looking out of the audience near the end and everyone’s huddled in blankets. And there I am in a dripping wet wedding dress. And, you know, I think I remember that the the hot water was put into the bathtubs.
But it was after that show that like it became part of the ritual of theatre, that the stagehands would go and pour more hot water into the tubs. I think that’s partly as well. The audience needed to feel safe, that we were OK, like they needed to know that things were OK for us as humans.
I was just seeing that was definitely for us. But I think it became something people needed to see because those showers were they did make it so that hot water was coming out of them. But the queues were so short that the tank didn’t have time to heat up.
So it was just like icy cold water every time.
[Phil Rickaby]
But I mean, it is important for an audience to know that the actors are safe. There’s nothing that will take the, you know, violent. We could do violence on stage.
But as soon as that violence becomes real, the audience is no longer there for you. Right. They’re not like they’re their attitude has changed.
They’re no longer watching the show. They’re worried about the actors. It’s the worst thing you could do is have an audience that’s worried about the safety of the actors.
So the theatre of making sure that everybody saw there’s warm water in there is is so important so that, you know, the audience that’s huddling under their their blankets isn’t thinking these girls are going to die.
[Blythe Haynes]
I mean, in the show, we’re already dead.
[Phil Rickaby]
But I mean, in the show, yes. But, you know.
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah. I mean, the hot water was for us and it and it made a huge difference. Then, you know, like adrenaline does a lot of things.
I do remember opening night. I think I was sitting on the edge of a tub and it was like a scene with like Alicia and Georgia. And and I looked down and I just saw my fingers slowly going white.
And I was like, do I need to stop the show? Then I thought, you know, I’m going to start moving again in about a minute. So we’ll give it a rest.
So I didn’t. But but it was a near thing.
[Phil Rickaby]
It’s a terrible thing to have to think about, though. Like, am I going to be am I going to be the one that stops the show?
[Blythe Haynes]
Yeah, you know, it’s true. And I think that that’s something that needs to be. Normalized not to because certainly like the whole team at Guild is like, don’t you do that, like be a part and be a part of the team and take care of yourself.
And they really encouraged us to advocate for ourselves in the in that moment. And they’re like, we’ll be watching you, too. But yeah, I think that was a really important moment for sure.
Like to to start kind of combating. That’s training that has been so embedded in our industry to just keep going, that it doesn’t matter, you could have a broken leg and still be a trooper to go on, like it’s not worth it.
[Phil Rickaby]
No, no, you’re going to do some permanent damage that way. Yeah, I wanted to ask, you know, we were talking about 2019 and we mentioned that 2019 was the year before the bad times started, you know, the year before the pandemic and all of that. And a lot of things have changed.
Theatres closed and they reopened and and the there’s a struggle for bringing audiences back and and everything that all of the theatres are going through. But I’m curious how that period of time changed you as an artist.
[Blythe Haynes]
Deep cut. Oh, gosh. Yeah.
I mean, I think if anyone said it didn’t, they’d be lying or there’s no or. Yeah. Gosh.
I think the journey that I feel that there’s like an era sort of around that is maybe starting to close out a little bit now, which is I don’t know, maybe it’s the timing of and other concerns like making it onto CBC Gem. And that feels like a bit of a. An era closer in a way for me as an artist, it it has become actually about me as an artist rather than me being an actor who’s getting work and and that means understanding what my practice is, as opposed to just what I came out of theatre school thinking that if you know that I needed to be within a certain amount of years working on massive stages or I might as well just give up or or that this very narrow prescription of what of what an actor or theatre career is. I would say I started describing myself more as a theatre maker.
And I would say that I started thinking a lot more about community and what that means as a creation circle, because I think it’s incredibly isolating to to just be working within a capitalist construct of, OK, did you get the job? Did you get the job? You didn’t get the job.
You didn’t get the job. You didn’t get the job. Or why is this happening?
Why is this not happening? And to give me my own agency over what my career is. And I would say it’s expanded into really interesting places and and different groups of people.
I think that I’ve I’ve been a lot more interested in why do we do theatre? What do theatre artists and plays do that nothing else does? And thinking about how audiences receive that and how audiences are maybe driven to act through what they’ve seen and how can we do that better or differently?
I would say that certainly working with a lot of other different artists in different disciplines, too, dabbling kind of in the like experimental music scene and writing more and and understanding that and trusting, I think, that my own experiences are going to tell the story and I don’t have to worry quite so much of of is this relevant? If I’m doing the work. The internal work, then then that will that will kind of show.
But yeah, I think community is a huge, a huge aspect going away from being separated from each other and then finding what that community is and and how that supports has been a huge thing for me.
[Phil Rickaby]
I think I think it’s a thing and it’s important, but I do think it’s still kind of missing from our our our theatre world. I remember when I was in when I was a very young actor, I didn’t know much. I was new to Toronto.
I had this idea in my head that this bar in Toronto called the Green Room was the place where all the actors would go like that must be. I was young. I was dumb.
But like it seemed like, oh, all the actors was go to the green with how disappointed I was when I went there, that there was nobody from the theatre world there. But I feel like like we don’t have places where we get together. That’s why I think the French festival becomes so important, because it’s like people people go and they can hang out and we see each other in a way that we don’t throughout the year.
And I think that a third space for artists for a third space for like theatre creators is one of the things that we sorely lack, not just in Toronto, but across across Canada.
[Blythe Haynes]
Oh, my gosh. Yeah. You know, I was on something as generator was doing, see, like last month, maybe we’ll say last month they were doing like a direct a direct action, like live producing workshop.
I think I made that a word salad. But those words in some sort of order were in it. And it was it was led by by a Saudi.
And and I thought that that was a really interesting in terms of community. You know, we met at Tapa and it was and it was it was like, hey, we’re all interested in kind of the same thing. And and maybe we’re all frustrated about the same thing.
We’re all curious about how do we do this? And everyone was coming from a different place. And.
And that felt like a really cool expression of community in a bit of a third space and to be able to make those connections, but not in a way that was like. Let’s do a project that’s going to make us a lot of money and get us a lot of work. It was I have this question and I want to I want to see what it is.
But we were all coming from different places, as I thought that was that that really felt very nourishing. And I’m still thinking about it now. So, yeah.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah, I am. I do want to ask a little bit about Gangway Theatre because you are the artistic director of Gangway Theatre. And I think that was one of the first conversations we had was talking about about Gangway.
What’s the state of Gangway Theatre right now? And is there is there something in the works that we can look forward to?
[Blythe Haynes]
Oh, yeah. I mean, Gangway is something that myself and Melissa Taylor have have been working on. And so we have been working on digital divergence for gosh, I think probably since 2020.
So I guess six years now. And, you know, we’re still working on it. I think I think that like Melissa moved back to Victoria last year.
She was here in Toronto for a bit. And we, you know, I think last year we were a finalist for the Cale Churnin Equity Showcase Award, which was really great. And we’ve some really great grant support to do workshops.
Like I think in 2022, we did a five day technical workshop at TVM, which is funded by a grant as well. And and I think the thing that I’m learning with this is that it’s going to take the time it’s going to take and maybe you just have to go off and live your life to be able to come back to it. I know last summer we had a little kind of half day creation day of the vault, which was super helpful to be able to storyboard.
And I think with this project, like digital divergence is a project that came out of us being really curious of who we are in different mediums. So text message, video and in person. It came out of like a lot of our own personal experiences.
And it was written in the lockdowns. And we’ve had like a lot of really great support with that over the years. And the place we got to actually last summer, which felt so, so good was we went back and read the very first draft that we ever wrote, which at that point was five years old.
And we had sticky notes and we wrote, what did we miss that was not in draft in the current draft? And what did we feel was still present? And it was cool because we actually wrote the exact same things, which was really nice.
But the thing we ended up actually thinking about was, because it was a lot of COVID stuff in it and meet COVID media and how that played into this relationship between these two characters with live texting on stage and with video screens. And we realized that we needed to take COVID out of it. It wasn’t a COVID play.
And that it was actually hindering the story from moving forward because it was focusing on the event rather than the people in the event. And so we decided we were going to set it in the not so distant future. That really is just now.
Yeah. So I think, yeah, like, you know, we’re, I think we’re, we’re both, we got to this really pivotal point and then we both went, you know what, I think we need to live our lives and, and percolate before we come back. I think we’re hoping to this summer to kind of come back to it and, and, and see where these like design explorations have left us within it.
But I was really encouraged. I remember I heard once, like, Amy knows back in a North side of it saying that it took them seven years to write. I think universal child health, health care, health care.
Yeah. Anyway. And like, you know, babies were born and like life events.
And, and so I’m, I’m quite content to let this project that I know will have the expression it needs when it needs to have it. And when we’re, when we’re ready for it too, because I think that’s a big thing.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah, for sure. A show takes as long as it, as it takes. I’ve had shows that I wrote for eight years before I got them on their feet.
And, you know, that’s the thing that happens. They, things take the length of time. They think, speaking of writing, you mentioned earlier that you’ve been doing a bit more writing.
I don’t know that we’ve talked much about writing in, in our past conversations and you did your play uplifting stories for seniors did win second place in the 2025, 21st playwriting contest with Toronto fringe is, is writing plays something that you’ve, you’ve sort of like come to more recently, how, how, and, and, and, and what’s, yeah, that process looked like for you these days.
[Blythe Haynes]
Writing plays is something that I did as a kid for sure. And then I kind of decided that I never wanted to do that. I, you know, I kind of as a writer have a short attention span.
I’d done a lot of co-writing stuff, like with like Melissa and I’m interested in collaborative projects for sure. But like, I read a lot of poetry and like, that’s how I process, but it was something I just never really let anyone read, which, you know, I, there’s definitely an anthology that I’m, I’m feeling like I want to get out into the world this year, but, but yeah, so I mean, writing, I just was like, I can’t finish anything. Like I just can’t, but I, so that’s why the, any of the, the 24 hour playwriting contest was, was great.
I think the slight anecdote with that was I, I wasn’t going to enter. And then my friend Ellen Denny, who is a great playwright, she texted me and said, Hey, are you entering this? And I was like, no, why would I do that?
And she was like, because you write. I was like, oh yeah. Okay.
And so I did, but I think what was, what was really special about uplifting stories for seniors was that the 24 hours that the contest was happening, which Ellen didn’t even end up doing in the end. Sorry, Ellen. Actually happened while one of my really good friends, he had asked me to stay with his mother-in-law who has Alzheimer’s and they were taking care of what I stay with them while, or her while they were having a caretaker night off.
So they rented a hotel room downtown and it was early February. And so I stayed the night with Gail, who is the inspiration for the show. And I just kind of wrote down what she was saying.
And I was like, okay, great Gail, we’re writing a play, you know, and I talked to my partner about it and, and they’re like, no, it’s fine. And so what, you know, it was a snowstorm. And so it just became, you know, a woman who has Alzheimer’s and a woman who’s writing something.
And, and it became this sort of, I don’t know, magic realism, alternate universes, who takes care of us as, as we’re getting older about relationship structures and community and yeah. And they ran out into the snowstorm and it ended up winning second place, but that kind of felt like the cherry on top because I wrote this thing that became this, this tribute to this, this woman, but also my grandma, but also caretaking and, and I think how our world is structured and to take care of each other and also not to take care of each other. So I finished actually a second draft of that this January and yeah, I’m, I’m looking to do a workshop with it.
[Phil Rickaby]
Nice. Second drafts are my least favorite thing. Second revisions, they’re like the worst.
They’re literally as a, they’re not the worst, but as a writer, they’re my least favorite part of the process.
[Blythe Haynes]
You think you’ve ruined it. You’re like, great. I think I just ruined it.
[Phil Rickaby]
Well, no, but yeah, because the, the, the, when you’re writing your first draft, it’s all magic. It’s like, I’m, all of these things are flowing. It’s coming in.
I’ve got it all down. And then you finish it and then you start fiddling with it and you’re like, no, but it wasn’t better before.
[Blythe Haynes]
Totally not. I took comfort and I was like, okay, great. I’ve got this like Frankenstein version and, you know, I, I did a reading with the first draft with like, you know, mirrors and deers, and they had some great feedback.
And so I incorporated that, but, but I took comfort going, you know what? I’ve always got the first draft. It didn’t go somewhere.
So I can always go back to that. And that I think was a comfort. And honestly, like what Melissa and I did with that digital divergence, that was certainly part of a process of going, okay, I can always go back and go, okay, but I can lift that section back in again.
Like, it’s not gone. It’s just, you have to go through, like, you know, I call it my, when I’m in rehearsal, my shitty actor phase, like, which is usually about mid rehearsal where I’m like, I’m the shittiest actor in the world. Great.
And I think you have to go, I have to go through a shitty writer phase.
[Phil Rickaby]
Yeah. No, I mean, it is part of the process. I think, I think that every project I’ve ever worked on, regardless of where I’m at in it, whatever, whether in the playwright, whether I’m acting in it, whatever the role, there’s a point in the process where I think everybody just sits down and says, is this shit now?
Did we just create hot garbage? Rob, maybe. Maybe.
I mean, you, you, you don’t know. And that’s, that’s the thing is, and I always have so many copies of each version, like every time, every time I’m like, okay, this version is done. Backup that copy is sitting over here so that if I did ruin it, I can go back.
And like you say, I can Frankenstein this old part in, but storage space gets expensive.
[Blythe Haynes]
Phil, don’t at me. So true. We’re going to be okay.
We’re going to be okay.
[Phil Rickaby]
It’s going to be fine. It’s going to be fine. It’s going to be fine.
I’ll clear some space. I’ll delete some other things eventually. Yeah.
Yeah. Are you, are you able to talk about the Doras and being a juror?
[Blythe Haynes]
I don’t know. I don’t know. I, it’s, it’s common knowledge who we are.
Like we’re on the website. Like it’s not as good.
[Phil Rickaby]
I mean, cause really the, the, the, the thing, the only thing I really wanted to ask about was like, what is, what is being a juror for the Dora Mae Remore awards? Like, is it, is it a whirlwind of, of seeing so many shows that you could barely remember what you’ve seen or what, what is that? What is that?
What is it like to be on the jury that’s selecting these shows?
[Blythe Haynes]
I think what I can say is that it does very much feel like serving my, my theatre community in, in a way. I mean, it is, it’s a volunteer gig and I’m grateful to be able to see so much because sometimes it is a whirlwind for sure. And, you know, I think that what is really cool is being able to see the breadth of what’s happening in the city and to, to see so many different shows and artists and be introduced to some that maybe I didn’t know about.
And I would say for me as an artist, it’s a value because I, I’m looking at these things and, and learning myself, I think watching other people’s work, like that’s, that’s how we all work together as a community is we’re always seeing what people are doing and being inspired by what they’re doing or going, Oh, you know, I guess I really, I really think this. And so in, in, in my artwork, this is my, this might be how, how I do it. But I think I’m just so impressed that people are, are putting work out there, especially in coming out like the lockdowns.
And, and I, I just, yeah, I’m, I’m, I’m impressed by our community that we are here and we’re doing it and the passion within which everyone is, is, is tackling it. So yeah, I think in summation, it’s like, yeah, it’s a lot of shows. And also I think that if you have an opportunity to do it, it’s, it’s, it’s really worthwhile to do it and to be a part of our community that way.
[Phil Rickaby]
For sure. For sure. I’m just as we, as we, as we close here, I think I want to remind people, you mentioned that and other concerns is on CBC Gem, but that Canadians can access Gem pretty much for free and have a, have a watch of, of that show.
And, and if they were lucky enough to see that at the, at Toronto Fringe in 2019, they might remember back to what that was like, but mostly I just want to say thank you Blythe for joining me. I really appreciate you coming on the program.
[Blythe Haynes]
Thank you so much, Phil, for being so generous with your time and having just a wonderful discussion.
[Phil Rickaby]
Thank you for listening to this episode of Stageworthy. I will tell you in just a minute about who my guest is next week, but first let me tell you a little bit more about my Patreon because I can’t do this show without the people who’ve chosen to back me on Patreon. They are the reason why I can afford to do this show because even though the podcast is available to you for free, it costs money to make a podcast.
It costs money to have a website to host the audio files that can be distributed to all of the podcast listening places. It costs money to have editing software. And there are all these little incidentals like transcripts, which I’ve added to the show page on every recent episode.
And I’m working on the back catalog, but there’s over 400 episodes. So that’s going to take a little bit of time, but all of that does cost money. And without the backing of my patrons, I wouldn’t be able to do it.
If you want to be one of the people that helps me to make this podcast, please go to patreon.com/stageworthy and become a patron patrons get early access to episodes. We have conversations about issues that and things that are happening in the world of theatre and just talk about theatre in general. So if that’s something that interests you, please go to patreon.com/stageworthy and become a patron. My guest next week is playwright, producer and actor Chantel Winters. Chantel and I, we have a great conversation about theatre about writing about so many things. And Chantel is also a producer of an acorn.
And so we’ll hear a bit of her perspective on that next week. So tune in next week for my conversation with Chantel Winters.
