Mr. Speaker, tomorrow is World Theatre Day, created in 1961 by the International Theatre Institute. Every year, an internationally renowned artist releases a message to mark this day. These artists have included Robert Lepage and Michel Tremblay.
In Quebec, this year's message is from Suzanne Lebeau, a playwright who specializes in youth theatre and a recipient of many international awards. Here is an excerpt from her message:
These are times of crisis, and public support is being cut back...And yet... We have never seen a new generation as courageous...invading private and public spaces to reach out to these audiences. By the twos, the fours, the dozens, theatre artists bring alive and make vibrant lobbies, passageways, seats that are upright and hard. Temporary in the means that it receives, temporary in how it reinvents itself night after night, as temporary as life and daily moods, theatre is definitive in expressing the need that we have to speak and to share.
We must support the theatre; it feeds our souls.