Blackout

In February 1969, hundreds of students occupied a computer centre at what is now Montréal’s Concordia University to protest the mismanagement of a racism complaint lodged by Caribbean students against their biology professor. When an agreement to end the occupation fell through, riot police were called in, resulting in widespread damage, a mysterious fire, and nearly a hundred arrests. Created and devised by some of Montréal’s most prolific artists, Blackout re-examines the events that led to the occupation and protests, asking how race relations have changed in Québec and Canada.

AUTHOR

Tamara Brown

Lydie Dubuisson is a playwright, director, and curator from Tiohtià:ke/Montreal. She studied theatre and graduated with distinction from Concordia University. Her work examines intersectionality, dystopian reality, collective memory, and multilingual creative processes. Dubuisson wrote Quiet/Silence (2018 Discovery Series, Black Theatre Workshop and Maison de la culture NDG), Sanctuary/Sanctuaire (Black Theatre Workshop and Théâtre Aux Écuries), and Sharing Our Stories, Telling Our Lives (Teesri Duniya Theatre). She is currently writing a play about the Shelburne riots.


AUTHOR

Mathieu Murphy-Perron

Mathieu Murphy-Perron is an award-winning producer, playwright, and director. He is the co-founding artistic director of Tableau D’Hôte Theatre. He served as co-idéateur of all the company’s projects, alongside co-founder and former artistic director Mike Payette, from 2005–2016, before moving forward with his singular vision for the company after Payette’s departure. Playwrighting credits include Journey to Exodus, Return to Sender, PrAgression, Blackout, and En Pointe, an episodic bilingual series of 20+ short street plays staged since the pandemic. His directorial aesthetic is heavily focused on heightened movement, physical humour, ensemble work, and imagery of collectiveness, resistance, and defiance.


Reviews

Blackout is a work that isn’t afraid to be political, or to take sides, or to make difficult calls.”


“It is an education, an ambitious portrait of fury and a really fun, triumphant work of art.”


Awards

There are no awards found for this book.
Excerpts & Samples ×

STUDENT 2

At the beginning the plan was we would… you see, usually we would never enter the rooms at all, we were not allowed in. But if the police moved in we were… we were to go into the computer room and we thought the police wouldn’t come in after us because they wouldn’t– the Administration wouldn’t want the computers damaged… by the police coming in. The plan was that we would stick close to the computers… we believed that the computers would not be touched, so… it would be the safest place for us because the machines would protect us… the machines… and if the police came in and they started… slamming us around, it would be clear that it was them who bashed the computers, not us. We felt… safer with the computers.

ENSEMBLE quietly repeats “We felt safe with the computers” until end of scene.

STUDENT 4

We felt we’d be more safe with the computers. As long as they remained unharmed by us, we would be unharmed by the police.

Lawyer turns into JUDGE

Guilty. Guilty of conspiracy to commit mischief by destroying and damaging computers. Guilty of conspiracy to commit mischief by occupying the computer centre of the University. Guilty of conspiracy to commit mischief by causing danger to life through fire. Guilty of conspiracy to commit arson by setting fire to the computer centre.

Reader Reviews

Details

Dimensions:

160 Pages
8.40in * 5.40in * .60in
.44lb
200.00gr

Published:

May 16, 2023

ISBN:

9780369104168

Book Subjects:

DRAMA / Canadian

Featured In:

All Books

Language:

eng

No author posts found.

Related Blog Posts

There are no posts with this book.