Bring the Chaos with Random Solo Bits w/ Victoria Watson Sepejak
Channel your inner chaos and learn to create your most ridiculous, risky, and beautiful bits from the ground up! Reach down deep, discover your sweet and authentic voice, and cultivate a sustainable practice of solo devising!
This week’s workshop is $17. Pre-registration suggested to guarantee spot.
Bio
Victoria Watson Sepejak is a clown, comedian, and physical theatre artist based in Toronto. Their multi-award-winning solo show POEMS FOR GOD has been toured internationally, receiving the “Fringe of the Fringe” Award at the Orlando Fringe and “Best Solo Show” at Victoria Fringe. They were a featured clown artist at 2023’s WTFestival and premiered their duo improv show NO SLEEP with Chantal Lim at the New Zealand Improv Festival 2023.
They have trained under really attractive artists such as Isaac Kessler (1-MAN NO-SHOW), Gordon Neill (good boy), Chad Damiani (Clown Zoo), Zach Zucker (Stamptown), Ken Hall (Umbrella Academy), Gemma Soldati (Sleepyhead, The Poor Rich), Nathaniel Justiniano (Naked Empire Bouffon), and Alec Jones-Trujillo (Spiegelworld's Absinthe). They will be premiering their next solo show ANGEL, BABY at the Ottawa Fringe later this spring and can fit their entire fist in their mouth!
Play Play is a workshop series started in September 2022 by Janice Jo Lee and Oliver Georgiou with a vision to offer a variety of performance training based in clown and improvisation. We brought in guest teachers and covered an array of topics such as: physical theatre, Viewpoints, voice, contact improv, melodrama, artist statements, and more.
We encourage people of all abilities and backgrounds to join Play Play. Folks who are 2SLGBTQI+, racialized, or have different physical abilities are especially encouraged to attend. Contact Janice if you have any questions at janjolee@gmail.com.
Our workshops are held Monday nights 8-10pm at Sweet Action Theatre, in the Artscape Youngplace building, 180 Shaw Street, Unit 106.
HEALTH, SAFETY AND ACCESSIBILITY
Sweet Action Theatre has 3 HEPA filters and air conditioning. Performers may choose to wear a mask for the entire duration. Performers are asked to self-screen and stay home if feeling ill.
Sweet Action is a wheelchair accessible venue. Performers with access needs are invited to participate and contact Janice in advance (janjolee@gmail.com)
TESTIMONIALS
“The lab pushed me hard and kept me engaged throughout. Intense warm-ups and challenging ensemble exercises created a culture of hard work, risk-taking, and deep openness. It provided the opportunity to collaborate with new people, and gain new perspectives on the work. It allowed me to see my ideas and experiments in the context of other works, and to be influenced by them. The process of seeing the whole emerge from the pieces was transformational as a performer, and provided insights into developing a director's eye. I had truly succeeded in finding joy on stage--the very cornerstone of clown-based performance. Janice is welcoming, encouraging, and enthusiastic. She has created a safe space for people to be vulnerable, to take risks, and to grow. She is very receptive to new ideas and feedback, adaptable, and deeply respectful. She is amazing to work with.”-Creation Lab Participant, Spring 2023
“Janice creates magic through having genuine relationships with the artists that revolve around mutual respect, consent and honesty at every step of the way.” -Creation Lab Participant, Spring 2023
“Janice’s style of creation and discovery just works. She set up a space that was safe but also allowed us to possibly dig into some very uncomfortable territory as we explored our various “pain pieces”. A tricky task, but it worked. She knew when to interject with a different idea or approach, or to scrap something altogether when our ensemble was experimenting with different pieces. She also just sat back at times, and let us discover some things on our own; beautiful or funny or tragic things that we could weave into the show. I never felt silly (in a self-conscious way) or left out or ignored, and I’m sure that the rest of the cast felt the same way. She made sure we felt safe sharing ideas, and gave us ample opportunity to express ourselves in so many ways.” -Creation Lab Participant, Spring 2023
ABOUT THE DIRECTOR, JANICE JO LEE
“Lee has a mischievous twinkle in her eye and a marvellous spontaneity”–Now Toronto
“An iron fist in a slowly-removed velvet glove.”–Mooney on Theatre
Janice Jo Lee (she/they) is an award-winning queer multidisciplinary artist based in Tkaronto, Ontario. She is a second generation Canadian settler and twenty-seventh generation Korean. She is a folk-soul-jazz singer, songwriter, composer, sound designer, spoken word poet, actor, clown, satirist, and educator. She has facilitated Play Play since fall of 2022 at Sweet Action Theatre.
Janice is a hard femme, queer, radical, comedian, truth-teller and satirist. She is interested in using art to build flourishing communities based in justice and joy. Her work explores gender justice, antiracism, friendship, community, ancestry and the Earth. She has created theatre with MT Space, Green Light Arts, Theatre Passe Muraille, fu-GEN, lemonTree Creations, Randolph Kids, Le Project N’we Jinan, Theatre MADA and Cosmic Fishing Theatre. Recently she completed the Musical Stage Company’s Noteworthy Program for Composers and Lyricists.
Janice composed the book and music for her critically-acclaimed one-woman musical titled Will You Be My Friend (Dir. Matt White, Green Light Arts) a searing satire on cultural assimilation in Canada. She composed original music and sound for: This Is How We Got Here (Green Light Arts 2022), Shaded by Nada Abousaleh (Cosmic Fishing Theatre 2021), I Don’t Know (Theatre MADA/MT Space 2021) Dora-nominated Suitcase (Theatre MADA/Theatre Passe Muraille 2020), both by Ahmad Meree. Lee has released three albums of original music.
Janice has spoken word training with d’bi young anitafrika, Lillian Allen, bouffon/clown training with Adam Lazarus, Nathaniel Justiniano, and Deanna Fleysher, and physical theatre training with MT Space, and Fadhel Jaibi. Janice has worked as an educator for 12 years facilitating arts, anti-oppression and leadership workshops across Canada. She has facilitated anti-oppression workshops for University of Waterloo, Laurier Student Public Interest Research, Laurier Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto Faculty of Social Work, Folk Alliance International and Vancouver Poetry House. Janice has directed theatre creation programs for racialized youth with MT Space, Le Project N’we Jinan, and Randolph Kids.
In Waterloo Region, Janice Jo Lee was voted Best Performance Artist five years running from 2016 to 2020 (The Community Edition Newspaper.) Currently she is working on a new musical satire titled Man Baby and the Earth.