The Magic Hour | World Premiere Aug 3 - 22, 2021

Aug 3 – 22, 2021

The Magic Hour | World Premiere

A Theatrical In-Person Immersive Experience

Presented by Electric Company Theatre, Innovation Lighting and Presentation House Theatre

“In the right light, at the right time, everything is extraordinary” – Aaron Rose

The Magic Hour is an immersive, walk-through, theatrical experience; a light-charged story of finding beauty in small moments and possibility within domestic isolation. Created and conceived by award-winning theatre director Kim Collier with playwright Kendra Fanconi, the individual experience invites you to embark on a solo room-by-room exploration of familiar, yet-transformed spaces at Presentation House Theatre. The destination of this curious and magical journey is a reflection on an unprecedented year – and a step forward into a brave new world.

Guided through scenes by rich audio, video, lighting, and stagecraft, and created in collaboration with Vancouver’s Innovation Lighting and Presentation House Theatre, Collier describes the piece as “a love song for the possibility of change in even the most static of situations”. The Magic Hour explores the routes of the imagination; the physical world meets the digital world, blending art, design, music, and text in a multi-layer mixed-media feast for the senses.

Created and conceived by Kim Collier
Written by Kendra Fanconi

Created with LJ Chinfen, Mark Eugster, Joel Grinke, Alessandro Juliani, Bryan Kenney, Brad Trenaman, Jonathan Wells.

Featuring Maiko Yamamoto

Meet The Magic Hour Creative Team

Kim Collier | Creator & Director
Kim is so happy to be in North Vancouver working with this wonderful group of artists on
Magic Hour: a show born out the imaginative mind space of COVID lockdown.
With Electric Company Kim has been the co-creator / director of a large body of work
that toured nationally and internationally including: The Full Light of Day, Tear The
Curtain, Studies in Motion, The Score, Brilliant and No Exit. Recently she directed
Angels in America (Arts Club Theatre), Romeo and Juliet (Bard on the Beach) Carried
Away on the Crest of a Wave (National Arts Centre) Kim is the recipient of the
prestigious Elinore & Lou Siminovitch Prize, four Jessie Richardson awards, Sterling Award and Ottawa Critics Award all for Direction.

Kendra Fanconi | Writer
Kendra Fanconi is the Artistic Director of The Only Animal, a 16-year-old company that is uniquely dedicated to theatre that springs from a deep engagement with place, and towards solutionary outcomes for this climate moment. She is known for her love of the impossible. Selected Credits for directing/writing: World premiere of Slime, written by Bryony Lavery, tinkers, based on the Pulitzer-Prize winning novel by Paul Harding, Nothing But Sky, a living comic book (Jessie for Significant Artistic Achievement), NiX, theatre of snow and ice, at the 2010 Cultural Olympiad and Enbridge Festival, Alberta Theatre Projects 2009, (Winner of Betty Mitchell Award and Vancouver’s Critic’s Choice Award for Innovation). Current projects include 1000 Year Theatre and Museum of Rain. Kendra leads the Artist Brigade, bringing arts and artists to the front lines of the climate movement. Kendra lives on Shíshálh land on the far-left coast of Canada, and is a farmer, a forager, and mother to two kids who are real characters.

Maiko Yamamoto | Voice of the Narrator
Maiko Yamamoto is a Vancouver-based artist who creates new, experimental, and intercultural works of performance. Many of these works are built through a practice of collaboration and include theatre projects, public art works, and performance installations. Since 2003, Maiko has been Co-Artistic Director of the Vancouver-based performance company, Theatre Replacement, founded with James Long. With the company she has created over 20 new works, many of which have toured to festivals and venues around the world. In addition, Maiko teaches performance and mentors artists for a range of different companies and organizations, both in Canada and abroad. She also occasionally works as a curator and writes about performance for a variety of publications. She holds a BFA in Theatre from Simon Fraser University’s School for the Contemporary Arts, and a Master of Applied Arts in Visual Art from Emily Carr University of Art + Design. Maiko is the 2019 recipient of the Siminovitch Prize in Directing, with James Long.

Alessandro Juliani | Composer & Sound Designer
Alessandro (AJ) currently makes his living as an actor, singer, composer, and sound-designer. He has been working at these disciplines off and on for the last 30 years.
He is frequently executed, maimed, disemboweled, dismembered, immolated, petrified, crucified and/or air-locked on your favourite locally shot television programs and films. He often lends his voice to the animated programs which your kids/grandkids/great-grandkids/eccentric uncles currently binge. His work as a composer and sound designer has augmented/detracted from live performances and films seen around the globe. People have occasionally given him trophies for his work. Some of them are transparent, and others more opaque. He makes his home in Vancouver with his partner and frequent collaborator, Meg Roe, and their three children.

Matt Grinke | Assistant Sound Designer
A graduate of the Capilano University Jazz Studies program, Matt has played piano in musical theatre orchestras all around Vancouver. Favourite shows include Theatre Under the Stars’ “Hairspray”, Align Entertainment’s “Shrek the Musical”, and Bard on the Beach’s “Will Shakespeare’s Improv Musical”. Recent sound design credits include Sea to Sky Immersive's “An Immersive Christmas Carol”, and Presentation House Theatre’s “Talking Tree Stories” and "Halloween Projection Show". Matt also music directs and arranges for "The Happiest Big Band on Earth", a jazz band dedicated to playing jazzy arrangements of tunes exclusively from the Disney and Pixar canon.

Bryan Kenney | Lighting Designer
Bryan is a Vancouver based designer and has worked across Canada doing set, lighting, and projection design. He is currently employed with Innovation Lighting as one of the in-house lighting designers and project manager for live events. While live events are still on pause, he is excited and thankful to be working with such an amazing collection of artists and artist companies willing to try something new that is so reflective of the time and experiences we have all shared together. Connected - but apart.

Brad Trenaman | Lighting Designer
Vancouver: Salmon Girl (Jessie Award - Raven Spirit Dance), Redpatch (Jessie Nomination - Hardline Productions / Arts Club), Mortified (Studio 58), Baking Time and Where the Wild Things Are (Presentation House), The Events (Pi Theatre), Before Dawn (Lamondance). Toronto: Shakespeare in High Park (Canstage), CATS (NuMu Productions), His Holiness The Dali Lama (Skydome). Las Vegas: Matt Dusk (Hilton) and Menopause the Musical (Luxor). Touring: The Stepcrew, magician Ted Outerbridge, National Chinese Acrobats. Writer for Professional Lighting and Production Magazine and a member of Associated Designers of Canada. Currently pursuing a Masters in Sustainable Theatre Design at York University. www.batlighting.com

Joel Grinke | Show Control & Automation Design
Joel is a creative director, show writer, and systems designer for themed attractions and other live experiences. Currently he works for Eos Lightmedia as a Creative Technologist and writes and produces his own themed attraction projects through his immersive design agency, Sea to Sky Immersive. As a technologist Joel has designed control systems for projects ranging from interactive theatrical performances to multi-room walkthroughs, to full building synchronized interactive multimedia experiences. Joel has won a Jessie Richardson award for theatrical technology design. He’s a member of the Themed Entertainment Association and the Canadian Institute for Theatrical Technology.

Mark Eugster | Multimedia Designer
Mark Eugster is a graduate of the University of Victoria’s BFA theatre program. Always on the move, he is fascinated by the art of production and is continually working on new projects to develop a diverse perspective of the possibilities of live entertainment. Mark encourages the blending of multiple artistic disciplines by finding new and exciting ways to express himself creativity. His work has taken him from large theatres and arena concerts to site-specific performance spaces, unconventional venues, and everything in-between.

Full Creative Team Credits:

Kim Collier Creator & Director
Kendra Fanconi Writer
LJ Chinfen Scenic Designer
Jonathan Wells Scenic Designer
Alessandro Juliani Sound Designer & Composer
Matt Grinke Associate Sound Designer
Joel Grinke Show Control & Automation Designer
Bryan Kenney Lighting Designer
Brad Trenaman Lighting Designer
Mark Eugster Multimedia Designer

Maiko Yamamoto Voice of the Narrator

Jessica Han Production Assistant
Charlotte Alexander PHT Production Assistant

ECT Staff

Clayton Baraniuk, Artistic Producer
Carmen Aguirre, Core Artist
Kim Collier, Core Artist
Kevin Kerr, Core Artist
Jonathon Young, Core Artist
Jennifer Swan, Associate Producer
Mark Eugster, Technical Director
Sindy Angel, Producing Coordinator
Valeria Ascolese, Marketing & Communications Coordinator

Innovation Lighting Staff

Steve Matthews, Producer
Bryan Kenney, Lighting Director
Jon Gyory, Project Manager

Presentation House Theatre Staff

Kim Selody, Artistic Director
Andrea Loewen, Managing Director
Abigail Bueno, Administrative and Box Office Manager
Giselle Clarke-Trenaman, Production Coordinator/Facilities Manager
Doris Pfister Murphy, Communications Lead
Manami Hara, Director, Applied Theatre Arts
Brad Trenaman, Technical Director
Kaeden Atkinson, House Technician

BOOK YOUR TIME SLOT

$27/Solo* | $44/Tandem*

*Important Booking and Ticket Information

Experience Hours:

Tuesday to Friday – 3:30pm to 8:30pm (last entry)
Saturday and Sunday – 12:00pm to 9:30pm (last entry)

Ticket Pricing: – $27 Solo / $44 Tandem*

*Tandem tickets are for two individuals in one household bubble only. The Magic Hour is designed as a solo experience, and some aspects of this experience may be diminished or not possible during a Tandem walk-through.

Admission to The Magic Hour is by timed-entry, and must be booked in advance online or by phone at (604) 990-3474 during regular box office hours – Tuesday through Thursday, 10:00am – 4:00pm
Walk-up tickets on site may not be available, booking online or by phone in advance is strongly recommended.
The Magic Hour starts on time and latecomers may need to wait until another available time slot to enter the experience.
Photography and capturing of video during the experience is discouraged.
Please choose your date and time carefully.
Tickets are non-refundable.
Change of date or time requests are subject to availability and may incur an additional change fee.
For any ticket related enquiries contact PHT Box Office at 604-990-3474 or boxoffice@phtheatre.org

Tickets for this walk-through experience are booked in 30 minute increments.

Tuesday to Friday – 3:30pm to 8:30pm (last entry)
Saturday and Sunday – 12:00pm to 9:30pm (last entry)

In-person at Presentation House Theatre
333 Chesterfield Ave, North Vancouver

More about The Magic Hour Experience

Created in early 2021, and originally intended to premiere in late April, The Magic Hour was developed with the global pandemic in mind, both creatively and practically. After a year of cultural sacrifices, return to the theatre safely, and be enveloped by this electrical storm of a show. Timed individual entry slots and isolated rooms support public health measures, while also creating a personalized experience, unique for each person that walks-through. The Magic Hour is a show for you and made with you – just you, and only you.

While the show is specifically designed for an individual audience member, a tandem experience can be booked within your household bubble but may impact certain elements of the installation experience.

Questions? Check out The Magic Hour FAQs

Accessibility Note

The Magic Hour is a walk-through event that includes three short flights of stairs. As such, it may not be accessible to individuals who use mobility devices. Audio and recorded spoken word feature heavily in the show and are not captioned within the experience. Visual elements are often not described. To discuss opportunities for access to the content, please contact info@electriccompanytheatre.com

The Magic Hour would not have been possible without the generous production support of:

Arts Club Theatre Company | Great Northern Way Scene Shop | Studio 58, Langara College

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The Magic Hour | World Premiere
Aug 3 – 22, 2021

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