Once Upon a Rocking Chair
New Canadian Play
Inspired by the playwright’s long standing family tradition of girls’ week at the cottage, Once Upon a Rocking Chair examines the complications between mother and daughter, the competition of young women, and the surprising secrets among sisters.
New playwright Jessica Outram is proud to announce the publication of her play Once Upon a Rocking Chair, which successfully premiered in February 2008 at StoneCircle Theatre (Ajax, Ontario). According to Executive Director Ken Bond, the run of the show marked the “second highest in ticket sales” in the history of StoneCircle Theatre despite three major snow storms. Continue reading
The Tao of the Rocking Chair
If rocking chairs could speak, I bet they would have a lot to say. When selecting a title for Once Upon a Rocking Chair, I was drawn to the idea of using a rocking chair as the play’s central image.
As per the themes in the play, it is a symbol associated with motherhood and aging. A simple chair witnesses the quiet time between parent and child, the thoughtful times as we grow older, the beautiful times on a summer’s day, and the wild times on a summer’s night. All across the world rocking chairs are centrally placed on porches, in living rooms, baby’s rooms, bedrooms, kitchens, senior’s homes, and kindergarten classes.
The rocking chair is not only an important piece of furniture, it is a rich metaphor. A rocking chair is meant to be rocked. Our lives are meant to be lived. A rocking chair can be in perpetual motion. We too can be the driving force rocking our lives forward. Continue reading
StoneCircle will have the house rockin’
Monday, February 25, 2008
By Mike Ruta, DurhamRegion.com
AJAX — Jessica Outram’s first full-length play is a family affair in more ways than one. Not only are the six female characters in ‘Once Upon a Rocking Chair’ related, they are drawn from real people the Whitby playwright turns into character archetypes.The play is set at a cottage in the small Ontario town of Britt, located about one hour south of Parry Sound. Three sisters and their daughters are spending a weekend at the cottage preparing a birthday bash for Aunt Flo.
“The idea for this play is actually inspired by a family tradition we have,” Outram says. “Mothers, aunts, cousins go up to the cottage for a girls’ weekend. I remember sitting there (on one of those weekends) thinking, ‘ we have a lot of these strong, wonderful women, archetypes of different types of women.” Continue reading
Once Upon a Rocking Chair: Buy the book!
Sunshine in a Jar Press announces the launch of its first print publication, Once Upon a Rocking Chair by Jessica Outram. Books signed by the playwright will be available during the run of the show at StoneCircle Theatre in Ajax,… Continue reading
Two World Premieres
August 16, 2007 Press Release from StoneCircle Theatre
StoneCircle presents a season of all Canadian theatre plus their innovative new play development evening.
StoneCircle’s season opens November 1st with That Summer
by David French. Poignant, touching; it is a time of awakening, discovery, innocence, heartbreak. A meditation of what endures of fleeting moments over time. When it comes to playwriting, David French is perhaps… the most celebrated in English Canada.
– Globe & Mail Continue reading
