Brian Drader is an actor, writer, dramaturg and artistic administrator. His plays have been produced in Canada, the United States, and Europe. Awards for his writing include the Herman Voaden National Playwriting Award for The Norbals, and the Philadelphia Brick Playhouse New Play Award for Prok. Prok was also nominated for the 2003 Governor General’s award, the McNally Robinson Book of the Year, and won the Lambda Literary Award for Drama (USA). His play Liar was a finalist in the Joyce Dutka Arts Foundation Playwriting Competition, New York, and premiered at Prairie Theatre Exchange in February of 2004. The Norbals, Prok and Liar are all published by Scirocco Drama. His short film Iris and Nathan won the National Screen Institute Drama Prize. A feature film, The Return of the Fabulous Seven, is in development with Markham Street Films, and another feature, Please Mr. Please, is in development with Full Stop Films in Toronto. His most recent play, Curtsy, was part of the On the Verge series at the Magnetic North Theatre Festival and published by Signature editions. Brian has also acted in over seventy professional theatre productions across Canada, as well as numerous films, television projects, and radio dramas. He is presently the Director of Playwriting for the National Theatre School of Canada in Montreal.

Marcia Johnson began her career as an actor and still appears on stage and on TV and film. Marcia is the 2009/10 Ontario Arts Council Playwright-in-Residence at Roseneath Theatre. The last time she received this valuable grant was in 2004 at Blyth Festival. That residency led to Courting Johanna, based on Alice Munro’s short story “Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage,” which premiered at Blyth in 2008. The script is published by Scirocco Drama. Also a librettist, Marcia wrote the short opera My Mother’s Ring, composed by Stephen A. Taylor. It was presented at the 2009 Opera to Go, produced by Tapestry New Opera and nominated for a Dora Mavor Moore Award in the Outstanding New Opera category. She continues to work with Stephen on the full-length opera Paradises Lost, based on the novella of the same title by Ursula K. Le Guin. As an actor, Marcia appeared in Andrew Moodie’s The Real McCoy at Factory Theatre in Toronto and Great Canadian Theatre Company (Ottawa), The Gladstone Variations at the Toronto Fringe Festival and on CBC’s This is Wonderland, CTV’s De Grassi: The Next Generation and Global’s da kink in my hair to name a few productions. Marcia is one of the featured Canadian playwrights at the 2009 International Women Playwrights Conference in Mumbai where she has been invited to read from her play Say Ginger Ale.

Jason Long is busy working on two new plays for young audiences: In The Club, commissioned by Quest Theatre of Calgary, and The Daily Mischief: Haunted Summer for Calgary Young People’s Theatre (a sequel to last year’s The Daily Mischief); His most recognized play for young audiences, Offensive Fouls, has toured across Canada in productions by several well respected TYA companies, including Theatre Direct in Toronto whose production garnered two Dora nominations in 2008. Jason has also co-written two feature film screenplays, Turning Paige and Walk All Over Me. He also teaches screenwriting and playwriting for adults and youth, and is a graduate of The National Theatre School Of Canada.

Hannah Moscovitch is an emerging artist who has been dubbed “an indie sensation” by Toronto Life magazine, “the wunderkind of Canadian theatre” by CBC Radio, and “irritatingly talented” by Eye Weekly. Hannah’s past writing for the stage includes her short works Essay, The Russian Play, USSR, and Mexico City, and her Dora-nominated full-length play, East of Berlin. Hannah’s plays have been produced across the country, including at the Tarragon Theatre in Toronto where she is currently playwright-in-residence, the Factory Theatre, Alberta Theatre Projects and the Magnetic North Theatre Festival. Hannah is a graduate of The National Theatre School of Canada’s acting program and she attended the University of Toronto.

Janice Salkeld primarily writes plays (StreetZone, Sarasvati Theatre 2005, I Need a Piece, North Battleford Players, 2004) but has had some poetry and short stories published in various anthologies such as Grain magazine. Before becoming a writer Janice enjoyed working as a junior high/high school teacher and as a program co-ordinator/consultant for Early Childhood Intervention Programs. She lived many years in NWT and YT before returning to her home province of Saskatchewan, where she now resides in Saskatoon.

Editor Kit Brennan is an award-winning playwright whose work has been seen across the country. She is a faculty member at Concordia University’s Theatre Department in Montreal, where she coordinates the undergraduate playwriting specialization.