Heather Lynch
She spends her days as an advertising and media buyer with the Marketing Service at the University of Ottawa and her evenings moonlighting as a playwright. Isabelle Légaré, a uOttawa alumna from the Department of Theatre, is an infectiously passionate individual with a gift for expressing ideas.
Légaré’s first production, Stock, which she conceived, wrote, produced and directed, recently ran at the Nouvelle Scène theatre in Ottawa. The inspiration behind the piece, as she describes it, was “the amalgamation of three main concepts: my own claustrophobic tendencies, my aversion to our society’s obsession with overconsumption, and oddly, the memory of seeing a cow in a trailer being pulled by a truck.”
Légaré creates a play that takes both actors and spectators on a literal and figurative journey in the back of a cramped truck. Audiences come face to face with challenging questions about our society and the roles we play. In the end, the characters are provoked to face their own truths and are transformed as a result. Likewise, the audience members are left to consider how they, too, will change.
With only 45 minutes to present such profound themes as power, greed, deceit and overconsumption, Légaré found herself relying on skills acquired in her day job. Her approach was similar to the one she used for the latest graduate studies recruitment campaign, It Starts Here. “When producing a newspaper or magazine ad with only a couple of lines, it is essential to condense your message and ensure it is accessible to everyone. This play does the same,” explains Légaré.
Not only does Légaré effectively layer textual elements to emphasize her message that less is more, but she also reinforces this idea through external cues. These range from the small space and minimalist setting, to the recycled materials—including the programs, which are reused for each show—and the limited use of paper in the promotion of the play.
For a first production, Isabelle Légaré says that “all of her hopes and dreams for this experience have been surpassed.” We can only hope that this will mean more works from an artist for whom we can say: it started here.
