Ellie Moon is a Canadian-British actress, playwright and screenwriter.

Early life

Moon grew up in

Kingsville, Ontario Kingsville is a town in Essex County in southwestern Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's southernmost municipality with town status. The town had a population of 22,119 in thCanada 2021 Censusa 2.6% increase from the previous census figure of 21,5 ...

and attended

Kingsville District High School Kingsville District High School is a public high school in Kingsville, Ontario, Canada. Enrollment is 656 students. KDHS feeder schools are Harrow Public School, Kingsville Public School and Jack Miner Public School. The school is the "Home of the ...

. A dual citizen of the UK and Canada, Moon moved to England to work and study.

Career

Moon acted in theatre in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

, including productions at the

Bush Theatre The Bush Theatre is located in the Passmore Edwards Public Library, Shepherd's Bush, in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham. It was established in 1972 as a showcase for the work of new writers. Artistic Directors * Brian McDermott ...

and the

Tristan Bates Theatre Sir Alan Arthur Bates (17 February 1934 – 27 December 2003) was an English actor who came to prominence in the Cinema of the United Kingdom#The 1960s, 1960s, when he appeared in films ranging from ''Whistle Down the Wind (film), Whistle Down ...

(

Off West End Off West End refers to theatres in London which are not included as West End theatres. The term is a relatively recent one, coined after the similar American term "off-Broadway" (though without the same strict definition). It is usually used synon ...

). In the mid-2010s she moved to Toronto, where she became a member of the acting company at

Soulpepper Theatre Company Soulpepper is a theatre company based in Toronto, Ontario.Keith Garebian"Soulpepper Theatre" ''The Canadian Encyclopedia'', November 4, 2010. History Soulpepper was founded in 1998 by twelve Toronto artists aiming to produce lesser-known theatri ...

in 2016–2017. Moon performed in theatre performances of ''

A Doll's House, Part 2 ''A Doll's House, Part 2'' is a 2017 play written by Lucas Hnath. The play premiered at the South Coast Repertory, in April 2017, before transferring to Broadway at the John Golden Theatre. The play "picks up after Henrik Ibsen's 1879 play '' ...

'' at the

Segal Centre for Performing Arts The Segal Centre for Performing Arts, formerly the Saidye Bronfman Centre for the Arts, is a theatre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is located at 5170 Côte-Sainte-Catherine Road, chemin de la Côte-Sainte-Catherine, in the borough of Côte-des ...

, ''It's a Wonderful Life'' at Soulpepper Theatre Company and ''Asking For It'' at

Thousand Islands Playhouse The Thousand Islands Playhouse is a summer theatre company located in Gananoque, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1981 by Greg Wanless and a group of local actors and graduates from Queen's University including Timm Hughes, Joan Gardiner, Mo Bo ...

. Moon acted in the 2019 feature film, '' The Last Porno Show'' and in the television series ''

Pretty Hard Cases ''Pretty Hard Cases'' is a Canadian police procedural crime comedy-drama television series that premiered on CBC Television on February 3, 2021. Originally announced with the working title ''Lady Dicks'', the series was created by Tassie Camero ...

'', ''

Murdoch Mysteries ''Murdoch Mysteries'' is a Canadian television drama series that premiered on Citytv on January 20, 2008, and currently airs on CBC. The series is based on characters from the ''Detective Murdoch'' novels by Maureen Jennings and stars Yannick ...

'', ''Quantico'' and ''

The Lost Symbol ''The Lost Symbol'' is a 2009 novel written by American writer Dan Brown. It is a thriller set in Washington, D.C., after the events of ''The Da Vinci Code'', and relies on Freemasonry for both its recurring theme and its major characters. Relea ...

.'' Moon narrated the audiobook for

Claudia Dey Claudia Dey (born 1972/1973) is a Canadian writer, based out of Toronto. Education Dey studied at St. Clement's before graduating in 1991 and moving on to study English literature at McGill University and playwriting at the National Theatre ...

's 2023 novel, ''Daughter''. Moon acted in her playwriting debut, ''Asking For It'', a

verbatim theatre Documentary theatre is theatre that uses pre-existing documentary material (such as newspapers, government reports, interviews, journals, and correspondences) as source material for stories about real events and people, frequently without altering ...

play dealing with issues of

sexual consent Sexual consent is consent to engage in sexual activity. In many jurisdictions, sexual activity without consent is considered rape or other forms of sexual assault. Academic discussion of consent In the late 1980s, academic Lois Pineau argued tha ...

, after the

sexual harassment Sexual harassment is a type of harassment based on the sex or gender of a victim. It can involve offensive sexist or sexual behavior, verbal or physical actions, up to bribery, coercion, and assault. Harassment may be explicit or implicit, wit ...

charges made against

Jian Ghomeshi Jian Ghomeshi (born June 9, 1967) is a Canadian broadcaster, writer, musician, producer and former CBC personality. From 1990 to 2000, he was a vocalist and drummer in the Thornhill-based folk-pop band Moxy Früvous. In the 2000s, he became ...

, inspired by an experience in Moon's own past, and much of which involved performers reading transcripts of interviews that Moon had conducted with various people about the issues, at Crow's Theatre and

Nightwood Theatre Nightwood Theatre is Canada's oldest professional women's theatre and is based in Toronto. It was founded in 1979 by Cynthia Grant, Kim Renders, Mary Vingoe, and Maureen White and was originally a collective. Though it was not the founders' o ...

in 2017. Moon wrote ''What I Call Her'', which premiered in 2018 at Crow's Theatre and ''This Was the World'', which was performed in 2020 at

Tarragon Theatre The Tarragon Theatre is a theatre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and one of the main centers for contemporary playwriting in the country.

. Moon wrote the screenplay for, and starred in, the 2022 feature film ''

Adult Adoption Adult adoption is a form of adoption between two or more adults in order to transfer inheritance rights and/or filiation. Adult adoption may be done for various reasons including: to establish intestate inheritance rights; to formalize a step- ...

'', which was directed by

Karen Knox Karen Knox is a Canadian director, actor, and writer. She is the show runner of ''Slo Pitch (web series), Slo Pitch'', and ''Homeschooled'' on CBC Television, CBC, which she wrote, directed, and starred in. She received the DGC Award for Best Dir ...

and premiered at the

Glasgow Film Festival The Glasgow Film Festival is an annual film festival based in Glasgow, Scotland. The festival began in 2005. By 2015, the festival had seen audience figures top 40,000 for two consecutive years. It is now considered one of the top film festivals ...

in 2022. The film follows Rosy (Moon), an adult former foster child who was never adopted and turns to an online service in search of a parent figure. Moon was a playwright-in-residence at the

Tarragon Theatre The Tarragon Theatre is a theatre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and one of the main centers for contemporary playwriting in the country.

for several years.

Reception

Simon Houpt, writing for ''

The Globe and Mail ''The Globe and Mail'' is a Newspapers in Canada, Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in Western Canada, western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of more than 6 million in 2024, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on week ...

'', called Moon's ''Asking For It'' a "sly, intelligent piece of documentary theatre". Martha Schabas, writing for ''The Globe and Mail'', wrote ''What I Call Her'' was "something between insufferable and incredible", noting that "The real marvel here might be how good Moon is at getting under our skin. Her writing demands a kind of interpolation. ... e way this intensity manipulates our understanding of the material, not to mention how it plays upon our sympathies, is the mark of some serious art." Carly Maga, writing for the ''

Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and part of Torstar's Daily News Brands (Torstar), Daily News Brands division. ...

'', said that "Moon has something to say, and she's going to say it loud and fast. With some sculpting and restraint, she'll be a force". ''Adult Adoption'' was named a ''Globe and Mail'' Critic's Pick and was later featured as one of their “favourite films of 2023".

Bibliography

Plays

*''Essential'', 2020 *''This Was the World'', 2020 *''What I Call Her'', 2018 *''Asking For It'', 2017

Film

*''

'', 2022

Publications

* ''Asking For It and Other Plays: Asking For It and What I Call Her'' (2020)

Other

Moon created the Secret Shakespeare Series in 2016.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Moon, Ellie Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 21st-century Canadian dramatists and playwrights 21st-century Canadian actresses 21st-century Canadian women writers Canadian women dramatists and playwrights Canadian stage actresses Canadian film actresses 21st-century Canadian screenwriters Canadian women screenwriters 1990s births