Nightwood Theatre announces Ga-la-licious 2008 with headliners Mary Walsh and Women Fully Clothed!

’ÄúSatire is a national sport and Mary Walsh has a wicked slapshot.’Äù Maclean’Äôs Magazine

’ÄúThe five funniest women in Canada.’Äù Eugene Levy (on Women Fully Clothed)

Ga-la-licious 2008

Tuesday May 20^th, 7 p.m.

Tickets: Early Bird $75 (before April 27^th), $100 (After April 27^th)

416.944.1740 x 5 or www.nightwoodtheatre.net

at the Courthouse Lounge, 57 Adelaide Street East

Toronto, ON’Ķ Get ready for a night at the Carnival! Ga-la-licious - Nightwood’Äôs annual fundraiser, returns for its second year complete with the rock stars of Canadian comedy...Mary Walsh (from This Hour Has 22 Minutes) and comedy team Women Fully Clothed. Stand-up whiz-kid Kathleen Phillips keeps the evening trotting along as the Ring-Mistress, making sure the crazy magicians, stilt walkers, fortune tellers and other buskers are on their best behaviour.

Get ready to chow down on culinary delights from some of Toronto’Äôs greatest restaurants and cooking schools: Mangia & Bevi Resto Bar, Aphrodite Cooks and Sasi/Mangrai Thai. And thanks to GQ Spa for their generous in-kind sponsorship of Ga-la-licious 2008.

As for the auction ’Äì Nightwood’Äôs guests expect more than costly emollients and paper weights. This year co-star in your own version of ’ÄúMy Dinner with Andre’Äù by making the winning bid on exclusive, unique dinners and experiences with fascinating luminaries like Deepa Mehta, Stephen Lewis and Anna Maria Tremonti. Other goodies include: trips, spa packages, an electric scooter, unique adventures and much, much more. All proceeds from Ga-la-licious 2008 will go towards enhancing Nightwood Theatre’Äôs production and training programming.

Selected Bios:

Mary Walsh

Founded the award-winning CODCO comedy troupe of Newfoundland (1987 to 1992, CBC Television) and starred in This Hour Has 22 Minutes (CBC). In 1993 Mary Walsh was chosen to deliver the prestigious Graham Spry Lecture which was broadcast nationally on CBC Radio. In 1994, Walsh addressed the United Nations Global Conference on Development in New York. She won Best Supporting Actress at the Atlantic Film Festival in 1992 for her performance in Mike Jones' Secret Nation. She has won several Gemini Awards for writing and performing during the CODCO years on CBC Television. She was awarded the C.M. (Member of the Order of Canada) on April 27, 2000 for her services to broadcasting and performing arts in Canada.

On November 4, 2006 Mary Walsh and Ed MacDonald picked up a Gemini Award for the best writing in a comedy or variety program for their work in Hatching, Matching and Dispatching.

Women Fully Clothed

Women Fully Clothed stars Kathryn Greenwood from Whose Line Is It Anyway/This Hour Has 22 Minutes, Robin Duke from Saturday Night Live/SCTV, Debra McGrath from Getting Along Famously/Little Mosque on the Prairie, Jayne Eastwood from My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Chicago and Billable Hours, and Teresa Pavlinek from History Bites/The Jane Show.

Kathleen Phillips

Kathleen Phillips is a character monologist who has been featured on radio including CBC, television including the Comedy Network and on the web on goodmorningworld.com and YouTube. She was nominated for the 2005 Tim Sims Encouragement Award. She has performed in Toronto, Montreal, New York, Los Angeles, and the U.K. Kathleen Phillips is a founding member of The Laugh Sabbath Comedy Series at the Rivoli.

ABOUT NIGHTWOOD THEATRE

Nightwood Theatre ’Äì Artistic Director Kelly Thornton and Producer Monica Esteves.

For 28 years, Nightwood Theatre has developed, produced and toured landmark, award-winning plays by and about women. The company’Äôs tremendous work in play creation bore fruit to many renowned and acclaimed plays that are now part of the Canadian theatre canon. These include Good Night Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet) by Ann-Marie MacDonald, The Adventures of a Black Girl in Search of God by Djanet Sears, The Danish Play by Sonja Mills and over 50 other new Canadian plays by women.

Nightwood plays have won Canada’Äôs highest literary and performing arts honours, including Governor General, Chalmers, Dora Mavor Moore and Trillium Awards. Nightwood is a valued member of various communities, at a local, regional and national level. Through our youth initiatives and mentorship programs, our various festivals, productions, events, colourful history, an important mandate and an exciting fundraisers and collaborations with other organizations, Nightwood is a growing, thriving success story with an important mandate and an exciting future.

Check out these exciting shows:

An Italian Straw Hat

By Eugˆ®ne Labiche and Marc Michel

Translated by Lynn and Theodore Hoffmann

Directed and Designed by L. Garth Allen

May 1 to 17, 2008

Fairview Public Library Theatre, 35 Fairview Mall Drive

To order tickets call or click 416.299.5557 or http://www.stagecentreproductions.com/SCP_SingleTickets.htm

Dancemakers Presents: Les Angles Morts

Choreography by Mˆ©lanie Demers

May 22-24, 2008

Dancemakers

Dancemakers’Äô Centre for Creation, The Distillery District, 55 Mill Street, The Cannery, Bldg. 58, Studio 313

Call or Click 416.367.1800 or info@dancemakers.org; www.dancemakers.org