Tarragon premiere Infinity wins Dora Award
A critically acclaimed meditation on time, family and relationships by playwright-in-residence Hannah Moscovitch has landed the Tarragon Theatre a Dora Mavor Moore Award.
“I think Hannah’s one of our most accomplished playwrights, and it’s very kind of the Dora jury to recognize that,” artistic director Richard Rose said after Infinity was named Best New Play on June 22.
An expressionist play that simultaneously follows the marriage of a theoretical physicist and a classical musician, and their daughter’s relationship history, Infinity was a co-production between Tarragon and director Ross Manson’s Volcano Theatre, which originally commissioned the show. It premiered at the Tarragon in April.
“I read an article in Harper’s magazine about the history of timekeeping and thought time would be a really interesting subject for a play,” Manson said. “Back then we did a several-day-long workshop where people from different disciplines — music, theatre, dance, etc. — took turns leading improvisation, and this begat Hannah thinking about material in ways that she might not have on her own.”
Manson and Moscovitch developed the play during an eight-year period, he said. Along they way, they met several of the artists they would eventually collaborate with, including violinist Andréa Tyniec, composer Njo Kong Kie and Rose, who offered Tarragon’s stage for the production.
As a producer, you look for “something in the bones,” Rose said, noting that he was especially drawn to the script’s depiction of time, and in the play time passes “in a very real way.”
Moscovitch was unavailable for comment.
The award is the second Dora for the acclaimed playwright. In 2010 her one-act In This World won an Outstanding Production award in the Theatre for Young Audiences division.