It will be a theatre free-for-all at this week's 1-act festival in Coquitlam.
Shift Theatre Society's sixth annual showcase of short plays won't be juried, meaning young playwrights, directors, cast and crew will have the freedom to exhibit anything they want.
"It's about the audience - to a certain level - taking a risk," said Shift artistic director Nick Sartore, a Pinetree secondary graduate. "But that's the magic of it.... It's a kind of fringe festival for the Tri-Cities because nobody knows what to expect."
For three days, starting tomorrow (Thursday), Shift and the Evergreen Cultural Centre will present the same original 1-act plays nightly: La Petite Paquita, Third Gender, Things That Go Bump in the Night, The Best and Boxed Hero.
Shift, which has moved its annual festival from Port Moody to Coquitlam, received a Coquitlam Spirit grant from the city last year to allow for workshopping - a much-needed boost for the producers, Sartore said.
Third Gender is penned in part and directed by Gleneagle secondary graduate Jong Lee, who closed last year's inaugural Port Moody Youth Festival with his teen angst piece, titled Bones.
Sartore himself is directing Don Nigro's work Things That Go Bump in the Night, a continuation of Seascape with Sharks and Dancer that Shift presented at CBC Studio 700 in Vancouver in April.
In that story, an aspiring novelist rescues a drowning young woman and the pair start a romantic relationship that later turns hostile.
Using the same cast, Things takes the lovers two years after Seascapes ends.
"It's a really nice follow up for folks who came out from the Tri-Cities to see that show at CBC," Sartore said.
Last year, for its fifth anniversary, the Port Moody-based theatre company branched out to Vancouver.
Shift artistic associate Adam Janusz directed Closer at The Cultch and in January, Shift put on Nate and Troy: The Next Big Things at Carousel Theatre on Granville Island.
This year's 1-act festival is (like last year) divided between the Tri-Cities and Vancouver. Last week, Shift hosted five plays at The Cultch with various theatre groups: Edge of Seventeen, Where Have All the Lightning Bugs Gone?, Remember You Are Sublime, Wild Abandon and Madeline Nudge in the Rain, Perhaps.
Sartore said the 1-act plays in Vancouver and Coquitlam are geared to each venue. And while the Vancouver productions are by more emerging artists working at a professional level, the Evergreen shows are primarily from youth.
"We wanted to make sure people who applied got in," he said. "We wanted to make the festival open to anyone to present anything they liked.
"It'll be a free for all."
Shift 1-Act Festival 6 runs June 20 to 22 at the Evergreen Cultural Centre. For tickets, call 604-927-6555 or visit evergreenculturalcentre.ca.
