The Kick & Push Festival

The Kick & Push Festival, also known as the Kick & Push, is an innovative theatre festival that takes place in Kingston, Ontario every summer. The festival was founded in 2015, and is run by the Kingston Theatre Alliance.[1] Initially in 2016, and regularly since 2019, the Kick & Push has included the Storefront Fringe Festival, a non-curated Fringe Festival administered by Theatre Kingston.

The Kick & Push Festival
LocationKingston, Ontario
Founded2015
Founded byBrett Christopher, Liam Karry, Mike Sheppard
Type of play(s)innovative theatre, immersive theatre
Festival dateJuly–August
Websitehttps://thekickandpush.com

Name

The festival takes its name from a nickname for the defunct Kingston and Pembroke Railway, fondly known as "the Kick and Push,"[2][3] which opened in 1871, and the last portion of which ceased operation in 1986.[4]

History

The first Kick & Push Festival took place in 2015, developing out of a need for summer programming at The Kingston Grand Theatre. It was founded by Brett Christopher, Liam Karry, and Mike Sheppard, under the aegis of the Kingston Theatre Alliance, a partnership between theatre organisations in Kingston to promote sector-wide development.[1][5][6] The founding partners agreed to support the festival for three years.[2]

In 2016, the Kick & Push introduced the Storefront Fringe Festival (also called the Kingston Fringe Festival)[7] as part of its programming. Since its inception, the Storefront Fringe has been overseen by Theatre Kingston. Similar to other Fringe Festivals in the region, like the Toronto Fringe Festival and Ottawa Fringe Festival, shows are selected to be part of the Fringe by lottery. As its name suggests, the Storefront Fringe has frequently used abandoned storefronts in downtown Kingston as its primary venues.[8] In 2017 and 2018, the Storefront Fringe was not part of the Kick & Push, but it was "welcomed back into the fold" for the 2019 season, and has been part of the Kick & Push since then.[9][7]

Beginning in 2019, the festival has also regularly presented performances on Cedar Island, part of Thousand Islands National Park.[1]

In 2020, despite the COVID-19 pandemic resulting in the closure of many live performance venues (including the cancellation of that year's Storefront Fringe),[10] The Kick & Push Festival continued with mainly online programming, as well as outdoor theatre.[11] The Fringe Festival returned in 2021, with performances taking place online and in two venues within the Grand Theatre that year.[12]

Shows and events

Goals

The festival began as a collaboration between several local theatre companies, with a focus on "theatrical innovation."[2] Throughout its existence, the festival has articulated a goal of developing the local theatre community, and retaining young local talent.[6][2] Following the departure of some of the festival's founding companies from the Kingston Theatre Alliance in 2017, the Kick & Push directed its focus towards providing opportunities for artists with ties to Kingston, as well as situating the city as a centre for cultural innovation.[6]

According to the festival's website, as of February 2023, the Kick & Push "aims to take the audience beyond being passive observers."[13]

Genres

Immersive theatre has been a regular part of the Kick & Push's programming since its beginning. The first two festivals featured Single Thread Theatre Company's Ambrose, a retelling of the disappearance of Ambrose Small in a small audience, immersive format taking place throughout the Kingston Grand Theatre.[14] The 2019 festival included Tales of an Urban Indian, a performance that took place on a city bus as it travelled around the city.[1]

Interactive theatre has also been featured regularly, as the festival's mandate to present innovative work. The inaugural festival featured Blue Canoe Theatrical Productions' production of A Chorus Line, which offered audience members the opportunity to "join the line" by being on stage for a portion of the performance.[15] Later festivals have included the all-ages interactive installation Tin-ja (2021),[16] a performance based around a game of Dungeons & Dragons (Roll Models, 2021),[17] as well as the theatrical board game New Societies by Re:Current Theatre (in 2022).[18]

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the festival included digital theatre as part of its programming in 2020 and 2021.[11][19]

Venues

Given that the festival was founded in order to bring summer programming to the Kingston Grand Theatre, most years of the Kick & Push have used the Grand Theatre as a performance venue in some way.[1] The festival has also used other notable Kingston locations as performance venues, including Kingston City Hall, the Screening Room,[1] and Springer Market Square.[6]

The festival has presented shows in secret locations (such as 2017's How We Are: Part 1: Morning After),[6] as well as vacant storefronts as part of the Storefront Fringe Festival.[8]

The festival has also included many outdoor performance venues, including several parks around the city, as well as Cedar Island, Wolfe Island,[20] and throughout Sydenham Ward as part of Cadences, an audio walking tour in the 2022 festival.[21]

Other events

Early ideas for the festival's programming included panel discussions and professional development workshops.[2]

The festival has hosted residencies for Indigenous artists, including 2022's IndigeNIICHII: Soles on Cedar program, which took place on Cedar Island.[20]

Past festivals
Year Featured Productions Ref.
2015 Ambrose (Single Thread Theatre Company); AutoShow (Convergence Theatre); A Chorus Line (Blue Canoe Theatrical Productions); Shipwrecked! (Theatre Kingston); Tale of a Town (Fixt Point);[22] Tall Ghosts and Bad Weather (The Cellar Door Project) [2][14][23]
2016 Ambrose (Single Thread Theatre Company); Beneath Our Feet (Lowlit Aerial Arts); Chicago (Blue Canoe Theatrical Productions); Overlooked (Refraction Theatre Collective); Stubborn Stone (The Cellar Door Project); The Storefront Fringe Festival; Taming of the Shrew (Driftwood Theatre) [24]
2017 Daughter (Adam Lazarus); How We Are, Part 1: The Morning After (How We Are Collective); Kid Koala's Vinyl Vaudeville: The Silliest Show on Earth; Lessons In Temperament (James L. Smith); Love Me Forever Billy H. Tender (Jesse LaVercombe); Monday Nights (6th Man Collective and The Theatre Centre); Othello (Driftwood Theatre) [25][26][6]
2018 Agokwe — Unplugged (Waawaate Fobister);[27] Beta's Baby (Outside The March); Flashing Lights (Bad New Days); The Flick (Single Thread Theatre Company);[28] Rosalynde (or, As You Like It) (Driftwood Theatre); Space Hippo (Mochinosha and the Wishes Mystical Puppet Company);[29] SwordPlay (Sex T-Rex) [30][31][32]
2019 The Harrowing of Brimstone McReedy; Kitchen Chicken (L'orchestre d'hommes-orchestres); A (Musical) Midsummer Night's Dream (Driftwood Theatre); Out of the Woods; Paddle Song; Stupidhead!; The Storefront Fringe Festival; Tales of an Urban Indian [1][9]
2020 Cyrano de Bergerac (The Lakeside Players); The Itinerary: Playtest (Outside the March);[33] Luke and the Big Circles (Ned Dickens);[34] New Societies (Re:Current Theatre);[35] Revelations[36] [11]
2021 Cedar Island Lodge (IndigeNIICHII: Soles on Cedar);[37] Mosher Island;[38] Robin Hood (The Lakeside Players); Roll Models (The ArtFolk Collective);[39] The Storefront Fringe Festival;[12] Tin-ja (Brendon Allen); Ways of Being[40] [16][17]
2022 Cadences (Théâtre Belvédère); IndigeNIICHII: Soles on Cedar; King Henry Five (Driftwood Theatre); New Societies (Re:Current Theatre); Pictures at an Exhibition (Jesse Wabegijig); Robin Hood (The Lakeside Players); The Return of the Megafauna! (Bad New Days); The Storefront Fringe Festival [20][21][18][7][41]

References
  1. Hendra, Peter (July 19, 2019). "Festival returns with innovative plays in unusual places". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  2. Hendra, Peter (May 7, 2015). "Summer theatre in the city". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  3. Lennon, Danielle (July 9, 2015). "Six Questions for Mike Sheppard". Kingstonist. Retrieved March 7, 2023. The name actually comes from the old railway line that went through Kingston, it was the nickname for the line and we thought it made an awesome name, for its historic significance to Kingston but also it's something that is uniquely ours.
  4. McLeod, Susanna (June 25, 2013). "Money, girls and whisky – the K&P story". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  5. "20 questions: Brett Christopher, artistic producer for Theatre Kingston and founder of the Kick & Push Festival". The Kingston Whig-Standard. July 14, 2015. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  6. Hendra, Peter (July 21, 2017). "Kick & Push the envelope". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  7. Britton, Will (August 8, 2022). "Kingston Fringe Festival: Reviews from Venue No. 1". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  8. Hendra, Peter (April 19, 2016). "Fringe added to festival". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  9. Hendra, Peter (July 12, 2019). "There's artwork aplenty to see this week". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  10. "Storefront Fringe Festival cancelled; Domino postpones season announcement". The Kingston Whig-Standard. May 19, 2020. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  11. Hendra, Peter (August 26, 2020). "Theatre returns to City Park". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  12. "Storefront Fringe Festival returns in August, in person and online". The Kingston Whig-Standard. July 7, 2021. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  13. "The Kick & Push Festival". Archived from the original on February 26, 2023. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  14. Geddes, John (August 19, 2015). "Fine local theatre productions demand support". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  15. Lunchenski, Lauren; Safeer, Ramna (July 28, 2015). "The Kick & Push kicks off". The Queen's University Journal. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  16. Britton, Will (August 27, 2021). "The Kick & Push plays on in City Park". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  17. Talbot, Shelby (September 2, 2021). "Kick & Push in full swing". The Queen's University Journal. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  18. Britton, Will (August 4, 2022). "Kick & Push Festival's lead-off show sets high standard". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  19. "Storefront Fringe Festival returns in August, in person and online". The Kingston Whig-Standard. July 7, 2021. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  20. Britton, Will (August 17, 2022). "Festival offers pair of unique outdoor performances". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  21. Britton, Will (August 19, 2022). "Final weekend for Kick and Push Festival". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  22. "Stories from Kingston, Ontario". FIXT POINT. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  23. Hendra, Peter (September 25, 2015). "Summer theatre festival ekes out small profit". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  24. Lennon, Danielle (July 1, 2016). "Top Five Things to See and Do in July 2016". Kingstonist. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  25. Lennon, Danielle (July 21, 2017). "Guide to The 2017 Kick & Push Festival". Kingstonist. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  26. "Kick & Push Festival lineup announced". The Kingston Whig-Standard. July 4, 2017. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  27. Lin, Amanda (August 3, 2018). "The Kick and Push Festival – Agokwe". Kingston Theatre Alliance. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  28. Sterlin, Ben (July 26, 2018). "Kick & Push – The Flick". Kingston Theatre Alliance. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  29. Lin, Amanda (August 3, 2018). "The Kick and Push Festival – Space Hippo". Kingston Theatre Alliance. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  30. Hendra, Peter (July 27, 2018). "Summer theatre star attraction downtown". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  31. Hendra, Peter (August 3, 2018). "Young performers return to the stage". The Kingston Whig-Standard. Retrieved June 24, 2023.
  32. Smith, Sara (July 5, 2018). "Ultimate Guide to The Kick & Push Festival". Visit Kingston. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  33. Fung, Stephanie (September 2, 2020). "The Itinerary: Playtest seeks new ways to say good night and good-bye". Kingston Theatre Alliance. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  34. Fung, Stephanie (September 16, 2020). "In verse and over the phone – Ned Dickens' debut at the Kick & Push Festival". Kingston Theatre Alliance. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  35. Gallagher, Nathan (September 3, 2020). "Re:Current Theatre brings interactive game to Kingston's Kick & Push Festival". The Queen's University Journal. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  36. Dorey, Charlotte (November 29, 2022). "Revelations: Celebrating the end of the world". PLAY: THE BLOG. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  37. Ci, Cindy (September 20, 2021). "Re-Experiencing the Self at Cedar Island Lodge". Kingston Theatre Alliance. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  38. "The Mystical Machinery of Mosher Island". Kingston Theatre Alliance. September 22, 2021. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  39. Bartley, William (August 30, 2021). "Dungeons, Dragons, and Drama!". Kingston Theatre Alliance. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  40. Fung, Stephanie (September 29, 2021). "Through (cyber) space and time – Ways of Being". Kingston Theatre Alliance. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  41. "2022 Shows". The Kick & Push Festival. Archived from the original on March 7, 2023. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
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