Hart House Theatre is a 454-seat theatre in

Toronto, Ontario Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

located on the campus of the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 ...

in the Hart House Student Centre. The theatre serves the university and the Toronto community at large. Hart House Theatre opened in November 1919. Construction was financed by the

Massey Foundation The Massey Foundation was incorporated in 1918. It is responsible for the construction of many Toronto landmarks. It was the first trust of its kind in Canada. History In 1896, Hart Massey, an industrialist who built the Massey-Harris farm equi ...

. The first artistic director was Roy Mitchell, who was there for two seasons before resigning over disagreements with the Board of Syndics. Healey Willan was music director from 1919 to 1925. The

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...

theatre has been a starting ground for many well-known actors, directors, playwrights, and designers including: Raymond Massey, Dora Mavor Moore,

Lloyd Bochner Lloyd Wolfe Bochner (July 29, 1924 – October 29, 2005) was a Canadian actor. He appeared in many Canadian and Hollywood productions between the 1950s and 1990s, including the films ''Point Blank'' (1967), '' The Detective'' (1968), '' The ...

Lawren Harris Lawren Stewart Harris LL. D. (October 23, 1885 – January 29, 1970) was a Canadian painter, best known as a leading member of the Group of Seven. He played a key role as a catalyst in Canadian art and as a visionary in Canadian landscape art. ...

, Arthur Lismer,

Wayne and Shuster Wayne and Shuster were a Canadian comedy duo formed by Johnny Wayne and Frank Shuster. They were active professionally from the early 1940s until the late 1980s, first as a live act, then on radio, then as part of ''The Army Show'' that enter ...

, and Merrill Denison.

History

Hart House Theatre is often referred to as the cradle of Canadian Theatre. It quickly became a leader in the Canadian "Little Theatre" movement of the 1920s and 1930s. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, Hart House Theatre, under the direction of Robert Gill, became an extracurricular student theatre and for twenty years turned out a new generation of stage professionals. William Hutt,

Don Harron Donald Hugh Harron, (September 19, 1924 – January 17, 2015) was a Canadian comedian, actor, director, journalist, author, playwright, and composer. Harron is best remembered by American audiences as a member of the cast of the long-running co ...

Kate Reid Daphne Katherine Reid (4 November 1930 – 27 March 1993) was an English-born Canadian stage, film, and television actress. She played more than one thousand roles, most notably onstage in '' Death of a Salesman'', in the 1980 film ''Atlantic C ...

, David Gardner, Arthur Hiller, William B. Davis,

Donald Sutherland Donald McNichol Sutherland (born 17 July 1935) is a Canadian actor whose film career spans over six decades. He has been nominated for nine Golden Globe Awards, winning two for his performances in the television films '' Citizen X'' (1995) a ...

Norman Jewison Norman Frederick Jewison (born July 21, 1926) is a retired Canadian film and television director, producer, and founder of the Canadian Film Centre. He has directed numerous feature films and has been nominated for the Academy Award for Best ...

and

Lorne Michaels Lorne Michaels (born Lorne David Lipowitz; November 17, 1944) is a Canadian-American producer, screenwriter, and comedian. He is best known for creating and producing ''Saturday Night Live'' (1975–1980, 1985–present) and producing the '' La ...

all got their start treading the boards on the Hart House stage. By the mid-1960s the theatre joined the world of academia with the creation of the Graduate Centre for Study of Drama. A new generation of students combined dramatic literature with practical theatre experience and learned from and contributed to the vibrant Toronto theatre scene of the 1970s. Today Hart House Theatre is the focal point for the performing arts at the University of Toronto. With over a thousand students participating each year in its extra-curricular season of drama, dance, music and film, Hart House Theatre continues to influence each new generation.

References

External links

Hart House Theatre

Hart House
in

The Canadian Encyclopedia ''The Canadian Encyclopedia'' (TCE; french: L'Encyclopédie canadienne) is the national encyclopedia of Canada, published online by the Toronto-based historical organization Historica Canada, with the support of Canadian Heritage. Available f ...

UofTtix
To purchase tickets
Archival papers of Frederick Coates
Art Director of Hart House Theatre in 1923-1924 and 1929–1930, held at th
University of Toronto Archives and Records Management ServicesArchival papers of Robert Gill
Director of Hart House Theatre, held at th
University of Toronto Archives and Records Management Services
University of Toronto buildings Theatres in Toronto Art Deco architecture in Canada {{Canada-theat-struct-stub