Theatre Network

Today’s Artist Feature: Andi Fitzgerald!

Andi is a dancer, instructor and choreographer based on Treaty 6 territory in Amiskwacîwâskahikan. She has had training in various types of dance including: jazz, tap, ballet, modern, hip hop and musical theatre. Andi continues to train and study dance by attending different dance classes, dance conferences and professional development. Andi has attended conferences and classes throughout Canada, as well as Las Vegas and New York. She has also been an adjudicator for the Kalyna festival.

Andi graduated from the University of Alberta with her Elementary Education Degree and a Fine Art Minor where she specialized in dance.

Andi has taught dance classes for the City of Edmonton, continues to teach with Dance Studio’s throughout Edmonton and also teaches dance classes for Orchesis Dance Society (ODS). She is also currently an instructor with Campus and Community Recreation at the University of Alberta. She has had experience in choreographing for different shows, events and for a local music artist. She was a Co-Artistic Director with Orchesis Dance Society for almost 5 years, and has recently been appointed Executive Director of ODS.

Andi is grateful to have had and continue to have opportunities to work with and perform with many brilliant choreographers.

You can watch Andi’s Dance Variety show “Unexpected Transformation” on the following days in the Nancy Power Theatre at The Roxy:

Friday, June 12th @ 6:00PM
Saturday, June 13 @ 12:00PM
Sunday, June 14th, @ 3:00PM

Today’s Artist Feature: Sarah Dolman!

Sarah Dolman (she/her) is a dancer, choreographer, director, and arts administrator originally from Vancouver Island, BC. Now based in Edmonton, AB, she is a recent graduate of BA Drama honors program at the University of Alberta, and believes, through her movement practice, that theatre is a catalyst for collaboration, self-discovery, and body-positivity. Sarah is classically trained in all dance styles, including tap, ballet, contemporary, and hip hop, but also values improvisation and finding new ways to see staging and technical theatre. Select credits include: Executive Director (New Works Festival, 2025), President/Vice President/Risk Management Officer/ASM (MOD Contemporary Dance Company, 2023/24/25/26), Director/"The Piano Lesson" (NWF, 2026).

"Vanitas" is a type of still life painting representing the morality and transcendence of life, pleasure, and death.
This piece is an exploration of the human body as a brush on a canvas, and the various colours of life one goes through. By creating a painting live onstage, this dance asks the audience what the point of art is within our lives: What and who do we create for? And, what is worth leaving behind when we are gone?

See Sarah in Dance @ Nextfest program 3: Dance In Progress, on June 9th at 5:00pm and June 11th at 4:00pm in Lorne Cardinal Theatre.

Get your Nextfest festival pass here ⬇
www.theatrenetwork.ca/nextfest/
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Today’s Artist Feature: Agatha Lidia Chacinski!

Agatha Lidia Chacinksi, a first-generation citizen of Canada, was born 1986 in Beaver Hills House (Edmonton), on Treaty Six Territory. Despite Agatha’s love of the arts starting at age four, her career led her into psychology. Realizing she missed a vital component of practicing art in her life, she returned to her passion in 2017, pursuing a career as a self-taught artist.
Agatha is a mixed media artist, working in watercolour, acrylic, gouache, ink, coloured pencil, linoleum printmaking, and digital illustration.

"The subjects of my works for, The Chair Series, give a nod to the memories from my childhood. The vintage chairs that my mother loved and dreamt of owning. Some chairs like the ones that I fell asleep in at my elementary school library while I read during breaks. The plums that my mother and my grandmother would cook into my favorite Polish dessert dumplings. Those memories hold comfort to me and hence the chair series was born. It is a way that my heart needed to remember and to paint my roots. It was my way to heal a portion of my heart that I have been missing."

During Nextfest, you can see Lidia's work on display in the Miller Art Gallery, located within The Roxy Theatre!

You can get your Nextfest festival pass here ⬇
www.theatrenetwork.ca/nextfest/

Today’s Artist Feature: Mika Boutin!

Mika Boutin is a q***r and Métis playwright, intimacy coordinator, and director born, raised, and based in amiskwaciwâskahikan, colonially known as Edmonton. She directed her first full-length play, Morning by Simon Stephens in 2023, and later went on to direct Dog Bite Theatre Company’s inaugural production of Your Heart Is Gushing Lavender as a part of the mainstage series for Nextfest 2024.

In September 2023, she began developing TELEVANGELISTS, her first original full-length play. The piece was shaped through Ellen Chorely’s My First Play workshop and shared through public readings at Nextfest’s Playwrights’ Weekend and Workshop West’s Springboards Cabaret in 2024. Later that year, Mika was invited to bring the play to Nextfest 2025 as a mainstage production, completing a full workshop-to-production journey!

Mika’s second full-length play, bunny guts, a tonal 180 that emboldened their interest in coming-of-age stories and the myths we inherit as we grow up. Collaboration is the backbone of their practice, rooted in a creative partnership with Tori Kibblewhite, and a community of curious, generous artists who continue to uplift Mika’s voice as a playwright. bunny guts will be receiving its first full reading at this year’s NextFest!

Select Intimacy Coordination credits include The Prom for Nuova Vocal Arts, Practically Perfect Pitch for Top Bunk Theatre, Ryde Like Hell for NextFest, ABBEDAM’s production of One Man, Two Guvnors, The Bin for Screecher’s Theatre, Fool’s Gold & The Spotlight’s Shadow for Light in the Attic Productions, and buanderie/boulangerie for L'UniThéâtre.

You can catch the Nexftest reading of bunny guts on Saturday, June 13, at 2:00pm in the Bradley Moss Rehearsal Hall.

Get your Nextfest festival pass here ⬇
www.theatrenetwork.ca/nextfest/

Tonight’s the night Nextfest officially OPENS at The Roxy!⁠
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We couldn’t be more excited to welcome audiences, artists and community members through our doors for another unforgettable festival.⁠
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Over the next 10 days, The Roxy will be filled with bold ideas, fresh perspectives, experimentation, storytelling and the incredible energy that comes from ’s emerging artists sharing their work with the world.⁠
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Whether you’re catching one show or spending the week immersed in the festival, thank you for supporting independent art and the next generation of creators in .⁠
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Let the festival fun begin!!! 💛⁠
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Photo by Brett Boyd⁠
SupportLocalArtists EmergingArtists

Today’s Artist Feature: Moemen Gaafar!

Originally from Alexandria, Egypt, Moemen Gaafar is an emerging writer and director based in amiskwaciwâskahikan (Edmonton, Alberta). Moemen received the Mowat Diversity Award to stage his debut play, Genesis, at the 2025 Edmonton Fringe Festival.

At Nextfest, he is presenting a reading of his show Shams by Rumi, which will also be produced at the 2026 Edmonton Fringe Festival. In the coming years, Moemen hopes to expand his practice by staging new works that delve into questions of identity, existence and the role of art in our lives.

You can watch the reading of Shams by Rumi on Sunday, June 7th, at 12:00pm in Bradley Moss Rehearsal Hall.

Get your Nextfest festival pass here ⬇
www.theatrenetwork.ca/nextfest/

Today’s Artist Feature: Lexi House!

Lexi is a Mi’kmaq student and artist from Fort McMurray. She recently completed a Bachelor of Native Studies at the University of Alberta, and is headed to Victoria in the fall to pursue a Master’s in Indigenous Governance. You may have seen her as Stacie in “According to the Chorus” at the Walterdale, as well as the St. Albert Dinner Theatre’s “Murder’s in the Heir” as Nancy. “The Bin” is her playwriting and directorial debut — it is a deeply personal play that draws on her experiences growing up in Treaty 8 territory.

“The Bin” follows Goose, a nursing student who joins her friends at their cabin for reading week. When things take a turn from the worst, Goose relies on the aid of her more-than-human relatives to make it home safely. A gory, surreal love-letter to Treaty 8 and those who call it home.

"The Bin" will be playing on the following days in Lorne Cardinal Theatre:

Fri Jun 5 @ 5 PM
Wed Jun 10 @ 7:00 PM
Sat Jun 13 @ 5:30 PM
Sun Jun 14 @ 3 PM

Get your Nextfest festival pass here ⬇
www.theatrenetwork.ca/nextfest/

Today’s Artist Feature: Amy Lee!

Amy Lee is a Canadian actor and artist from Toronto, Ontario. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from OCAD University. As an actor and artist, Amy does not limit herself to a particular medium; she enjoys exploring different personas. Amy is strongly pursuing an acting career in film, television, and the performing arts.

Amy Lee previously screened at Nextfest in 2021 with her animated film "Sara Has A Fever."

Amy Lee is the director, producer, writer, animator, and actor of the 2026 animated film “晴天 Sunny Day.” In the film, Amy is the voice actor for the character Lucy.

"晴天 Sunny Day" is an animated short film that depicts a multi-generation Chinese Canadian family. The story in the film is inspired by Amy's own family, and culture through language and food.

You can watch the screening of "晴天 Sunny Day" at the Nextfest Film Showcase on June 7th at 8:00PM in the Nancy Power Theatre.

Get your Nextfest festival pass here ⬇
www.theatrenetwork.ca/nextfest/

Today’s Artist Feature: Krissy Berkholtz!

Krissy is a Métis artist who loves creating art in Edmonton as an actor and director. Directing credits include both the writer and director of The Toothfairy (Nextfest); THERE’S A MAN IN MY CLOSET (Nextfest). Krissy was awarded with Distinction in the Arts at Victoria School of the Performing Arts. "Thank you to my lovely parents and supportive family."

You can watch Krissy’s show “THERE’S A MAN IN MY CLOSET” on June 4th at the Nextfest opening ceremonies!

Get your Nextfest festival pass here ⬇
www.theatrenetwork.ca/nextfest/
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