LMDA has presented the 2020 Elliott Hayes Award for Outstanding Achievement in Dramaturgy to Emma Tibaldo.

The Elliott Hayes Award recognizes exemplary contributions by dramaturgs in the Americas to the conception, development and production of theatre or to educational projects in dramaturgy. Tibaldo was honored for her exemplary leadership of the Playwrights Workshop Montréal, where she serves as Artistic and Executive Director.

 

Her nominators made note of:

• her visionary, indefatigable leadership and innovative projects, putting the Playwrights’ Workshop Montréal in the forefront of developing new Canadian drama and performance, and making a small organization truly a centre for regional and national creation and development
• her outstanding leadership, trailblazing projects and extraordinary work taking care of both the micro and the macro dramaturgy of new drama creation in Montréal for over a decade
• her creating opportunities for professional development, organizing creation laboratories, and national residencies
• her being a role model for compassionate and caring leadership, who takes care not only of the projects themselves but also the people (artists as well as administrators etc.) involved
• her weaving lasting and meaningful networks between the various local and regional communities and the Playwrights’ Workshop Montréal, and taking good care of them
• her building bridges between the Francophone and the Anglophone theatre communities, thus promoting intercultural understanding
• her nurturing artists at various stages of their careers, as well as creating a wealth of opportunities for continuous professional development

In addition to collaborating dramaturgically on plays through her work at PWM, Emma has been directing new Canadian plays across the country, such as SCUM: A Manifesto by S.E. Grummett and Caitlin Zacharias, Okinum by Emilie Monnet (co-director), Miss Katelyn’s Grade Threes Prepare for the Inevitable by Elena Belyea, The Baklawa Recipe by Pascale Rafie, Refuge by Mary Vingoe, Falling Trees by Megan Coles. In 2005 she co-founded Talisman Theatre for whom she has directed award winning production That Woman by Daniel Danis, Down Dangerous Passes Road by Michel Marc Bouchard, and The Medea Effect by Suzie Bastien. She is currently working on Skin, a new performance piece with the interdisciplinary company The Bakery. She has been a guest artist at NTS and Concordia University. Emma is a graduate of Concordia University’s Theatre Department and the National Theatre School of Canada’s Directing Program. She feeds her inner (and outer) punk rocker by playing in the family band The Tibaldos.

photo credit: Bernardo Fernandez