May - June 2021

The Indie Producer’s Co-op provides two students from a professional theatre school training program with a ground-level education in producing theatre.

Participants receive a two-week intensive that investigated the vital role of the producer. They learn what it took to run a professional theatre company, when to say yes or no to projects, how to develop a realistic budget, how to make sure your project stands out for grants, what factors lead to a well-attended production, and much more.

This intensive is followed by four weeks of unparalleled job training. Participants work on Theatre by the Bay’s season in a variety of capacities. In the past, these have included marketing, audience development, fundraiser development, sponsorship accrual, and production management.

The Indie Producer’s Co-op is run by Artistic Director (and inaugural Indie Producer) Iain Moggach, overseen by Leah Holder, and with assistance from Patricia Hammond. Guest instructors are also brought in to provide expertise in all aspects of theatre producing.

The Indie Producer’s Co-op is generously supported by Angela Baldwin.

Our 2021 Indie Producers were:

Isaac Pilozo and Sabrina Weinstein

Isaac Pilozo

He/Him

Isaac is a Toronto-based actor and director currently living in Alliston and graduating from the University of Toronto - St. George Campus with a major in Performance Acting and double minors in English and Equity Studies. Select acting credits from UofT's Centre for Drama, Theatre, and Performance Studies include Laertes (Hamlet), Macbeth (Macbeth), and as Puck, Peter Quince, and Philostrate (A Midsummer Night's Dream). Isaac has also held directing roles within his time as an undergraduate student, including associate directing the play I Wrote You This Letter within TomorrowLove by Rosamund Small for his fourth-year Mainstage Showcase.

Isaac hopes to one day work as a professional theatre, film, and television actor and director, and is super excited and grateful to be able to experience the world of producing theatre by working with Theatre By The Bay. As a queer person of colour, Isaac hopes to create art which will inspire current and future generations of young queer/BIPOC artists to work toward creating healing and impactful stories with authentic representation, and which celebrate the experience of queerness and being a person of colour unapologetically.

Sabrina Weinstein

She/Her

Sabrina Weinstein is a producer, director and actor finishing her fourth year of study at the University of Toronto’s Centre for Drama Theatre and Performance Studies. She has been working as a producer for the past two years, Executive Producing at The UC Follies Theatre Company, as well as co-founding and producing for Quirky Cabaret - a non-for-profit sketch comedy theatre company. As a director, Sabrina recently directed and produced a filmed adaptation of Joan Macleod’s The Shape of a Girl in association with the Centre for Drama Theatre and Performance Studies at U of T as part of their Director’s Showcase.

Favourite acting credits include Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors, The Chaperone in The Drowsy Chaperone, Imogen in Cymbeline, Jenny in The Theory of Relativity, Chorus in Agamemnon, and Cordelia in a production of Falsettos currently postponed due to the pandemic. She has been producing theatre both in-person and digitally - from brick and mortar theatres and unconventional spaces, to Zoom and Spotify. Sabrina is ready to start a career in producing, hoping to one day found and produce for her own Shadow-Cast theatre company, and is so grateful to Theatre By The Bay for taking her on as an Indie Producer.

Presented by the RBC Emerging Artist Project

March - August 2021
About the RBC Emerging Director Project

The RBC Emerging Director Project provides two emerging directors from the Simcoe County community with the opportunity to receive unprecedented training and showcasing opportunities. This program is exclusively for emerging artists who are either studying, looking to study, or are in the early stages of their practice in theatre direction.

The selected participants begin their work with flexibly-scheduled in-class training on theatre direction. They are also connected with guest directors and artists who will share their insights with the participants.

Utilizing what they have learnt, the directors put their skills into practice by collaborating on a script by a local playwright. In 2021, performances will be presented virtually and will occur in late July 2021.

The 2021 participants of the Emerging Director Project are:

Alexandra Gaudet and Keara Voo

Instructing directors are Leah Holder (TBTB Director of The Cenotaph Project, We Must Have More Men!) and Iain Moggach (TBTB Artistic Director and award-winning theatre instructor).

The RBC Emerging Director Project is supported by funding through the RBC Emerging Artist Project, the Ontario Trillium Foundation, and the City of Barrie’s Cultural Grant Program.

Alexandra Gaudet
She/Her

Alex's passion for theatre started in high school. Her interest in directing was sparked with her participation in the National Theatre School Drama Festival with her own written work, Dear Adam.

After high school she partnered with the Barrie Native Friendship Centre to write and direct Stage Three: The Wandering which was presented at the Five Points Theatre in 2018. The following year, Stage Three: The Wandering toured throughout Simcoe County high schools.

Recently, Alex is an aspiring playwright and director studying at York University. She is going into her fourth year of the Performance Creation stream with a focus on playwriting. She has begun to tackle pandemic theatre with online resources. This can be seen in the performance of The Ashley Plays in the fourth year Playwriting and New Play Dramaturgy class (available on YouTube!), and through stage managing Falling In, Walking Out in the student run playGround Festival.

She is excited to see what comes next, and is forever grateful for opportunities like the Emerging Director Project to further her growth and education.

Keara Voo
She/Her

Keara Voo is a showtune-singing, book-loving, trash-TV-binging thespian who grew up in Barrie.

Theatre stole her heart at the ripe age of 8 when she starred in her first elementary school production of Mighty Minds: The Musical, and she hasn’t looked back. Since then, she has worked both on stage and backstage for a variety of productions, most recently directing a live-streamed performance of the original 10-minute play Sometimes I Feel Like I'm Not Even Me for the OR Festival in Vancouver, BC and performing as Daphne Stillington in Knockout Theatre Company's Zoom Performance of Present Laughter.

She also has taken an interest in film, studying screenwriting at Vancouver Film School and producing “Talk It Out” – an official selection of the Montreal Independent Film Festival.

She is excited to come back home to work with TBTB and is grateful to her friends and family for their support as she chases this crazy dream of finally one day creating a show-stopping show.