The Mulgrave Road Show

Mulgrave Road Theatre’s beginnings go back to 1976 when Robbie O’Neill was awarded a Canada Council grant to write and produce a play about Mulgrave, Nova Scotia. Formerly a centre of commerce with a CNR ferry terminal linking the mainland to Cape Breton Island, the town had fallen on hard times after the Canso Causeway opened in 1954. Wishing to convey the sense of a proud community and country in decline, The Mulgrave Road Show looked at Guysborough County, whose residents were left with a choice between "going down the road" or "going on the dole", a choice reflected in the song that gave the theatre its name. Charles Bruce’s poem "The Mulgrave Road" was written in 1951.

If they stay they stay, if they go they go.

On the Mulgrave Road it’s a choice you make.

There’s an axe in the stump and a fork in the row.

Or a bag to pack and a train to take.

O’Neill, soon joined by Michael Fahey, Gay Hauser, and Wendell Smith, together co-wrote and performed The Mulgrave Road Show, the first of many works of collective creation to emerge from Guysborough. Although the group was not at that point dedicated to the idea of starting a co-op, per se, a co-operative nevertheless emerged as a result of this initial project, and in 1978, the Mulgrave Road Co-operative Theatre was formally registered and incorporated "to carry on, on a co-operative basis, the operation of a theatrical company for the benefit of the members, to provide employment for actors and others interested in these objectives, and to provide theatrical awareness, which will assist in the social/economic development of eastern Nova Scotia, primarily Guysborough Co." Located first in Guysborough, then Sunnyville and finally Canso between 1979 and 1985, the Society purchased old Guysborough Fire Hall in 1984 to provide a permanent home for the Mulgrave Road Co-op Theatre.

With a vision of creating theatre from the ordinary lives of local people, in a similar tradition to Ontario’s Theatre Passe Muraille, the Mulgrave Road Theatre Society was established in 1980, with a goal of achieving democracy in the workplace. Mulgrave Road theatre has earned the reputation as an establishment that has fostered a tradition of creating, developing, and producing original works inspired by the Atlantic Canadian experience, and as a professional touring company; the company has constantly striven to make theatre accessible to communities throughout the province, to audiences urban and rural, by performing first-hand, acclaimed works by Atlantic Canada’s respected playwrights. Mulgrave Road Theatre is well known throughout the country... works originating from Mulgrave Road are often produced at other theatres in Canada. While productions on the roster have included Robbie O’Neill’s much loved play Tighten the Traces, Marguerite McNeils' An Island Woman, Catherine Bank’s Three Storey, Ocean View, and Mary Vingoe’s adaptation of Sheldon Currie’s The Company Store, and Mary-Colin Chisholm’s Safe Haven. Works that have been produced at other theatres have included Frank Macdonald’s Assuming I’m Right, Daniel MacIvor’s Marion Bridge, Carol Sinclair’s Idyll Gossip, Cindy Cowan’s Beinn Bhreagh and Michael Melski’s Caribou.

While Artistic Directors have included over time, Robbie O’Neill, Gay Hauser, Michael Fahey, John Dartt, Gary Vermier, Chris Heide, Jenny Munday, Allena MacDonald, Lorne Pardy, Emmy Alcorn, and Philip Adams, the management of the organization has evolved over time; the co-op dissolving after a consensus reached by the members in 1994. The company has continued a tradition of support for regional playwrights by offering writers the opportunity to create new works in the inspiring and supportive environment of the Mulgrave Road Theatre Centre.

At present, facilities at Mulgrave allow playwrights to work towards the creation of first draft pieces where they may benefit from development workshops. While Mulgrave Road’s facilities in downtown Guysborough house the company’s administrative offices, a technical workshop as well as a multi-purpose room, for rehearsals, studio space, writing workshops, special events, and meetings, are offered to artists. Many works originating at Mulgrave Road have been produced in theatres throughout the country.

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