“All the world’s a stage,” goes the famous quote by notorious theatre geek William Shakespeare. Metaphorically, this may be true, but the South Shore Players know better than anyone that it’s a whole lot nicer to have your very own stage.
The community theatre group has recently moved into its new home at 123 Empire Street in Bridgewater. The second-floor venue boasts a performance area with approximately 100 seats, a backstage space, and storage for costumes and props. The venue has recently opened to cast and crew for rehearsals of Locally Yours, a collection of five short plays written and directed by local playwrights. The festival will run from September 20th – 29th. This is a great chance for theatergoers to see the new venue as well as enjoy a local show.
Jon Allen, one of the founders of the theatre group, says, “We don’t have to worry about ‘Where are we going to find a spot for this? Where can we rent?’” Since its founding in 1993, the Players have rented such venues as Trinity United Church in Mahone Bay and Central United Church in Lunenburg. They worked out of a space called the Pearl Theatre in Lunenburg for approximately ten years before they had to move on. “It was a little bit like being a nomad. You had to fight for this space and that space,” Allen recalls.
This is the first time the South Shore Players will perform in Bridgewater. Bridgewater itself has not had a dedicated theatre space for several decades. In the late 1800s, it had a popular music hall whose life span only lasted six years; the venue burned in the Great Fire of Bridgewater. Records at the Desbrisay Museum show that the Empire Theatre (not to be confused with the Empire movie theatre, later acquired then shuttered by Cinplex) operated in the early 1900s, showing silent films, talkies, plays, musical performances and vaudeville acts. This theatre, too, sadly burned.
Aside from Park View Education Centre’s wonderful musical theatre productions and the occasional wrestling showdown, the town has not had much in the way of live theatre. Here’s hoping South Shore Players can change that.
Tickets for South Shore Players’ upcoming shows can be purchased at southshoreplayers.ca.
It’s wonderful that South Shore Players will now have their own space. I will definitely be going to this show of shows. I attended the last time they put on plays by local playwrights and the plays, acting, set, etc. were all wonderful.
I was a member of Bridgewater Playhouse Theatre, which put on plays from 1980 through the early 90’s, twenty-five productions in all. The company began in the began in the former Avon [?] cinema building that once stood below Town Hall. After several productions, the Town tore down the building to create some parking spaces, and that company began its own nomadic existence, including — if I recall correctly — one production at the at the old Arena. Several former Playhouse Theatre members have been active with South Shore Players. The DesBrisay Museum has a collection of Playhouse Theatre items.