The Artists

The Company

Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia is North America’s leading family audience theatre company, located in the small, rural town of Windsor, Nova Scotia, Canada. Each year, Mermaid Theatre presents more than 400 performances for over 200,000 spectators in venues of all sizes. Since 1972, Mermaid Theatre has been creating realistic stage adaptations of iconic children’s storybooks that integrate puppetry, moving objects, original music and memorable visual effects, touring their shows for children throughout the world.

The Creative Team

Jim Morrow

Director, Set Designer, Puppet Designer and Narrator

Jim Morrow is Mermaid Theatre’s artistic director as well as a performer, designer, teacher and mentor. He is the creator of many of Mermaid Theatre’s celebrated productions, including It’s OK To Be Different; The Rainbow Fish; Goodnight Moon & The Runaway Bunny; Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?; Guess How Much I Love You & I Love My Little Storybook; and the award-winning productions of Swimmy, Frederick & Inch by Inch and The Very Hungry Caterpillar & Other Eric Carle Favorites. Morrow’s contributions to the community, both as an artist and mentor, have earned him the Nova Scotia government’s highest award for artistic achievement, the Portia White Award; the Order of Nova Scotia; and the International Performing Arts for Youth’s Mickey Minor Award. He earned a doctorate in humanities from his alma mater, Acadia University. Morrow was born in Grand Falls, Newfoundland, and lives in Lower Avonport, Nova Scotia.

Danny Everson

Writer and Creative Producer

Danny Everson holds an M.F.A. in producing from the California Institute of the Arts and a B.A. in music from the University of Tampa. With a career spanning nearly a decade in the Theatre for Young Audience sector, Everson has served as both an arts executive and a creative producer. Additionally, he has written more than 60 episodes of television and film content for children and young audiences. He is Mermaid Theatre’s executive director and creative producer for MermaidTV.

Kate Church

Character Designer

Inviting viewers into a world of storytelling and introspection, Kate Church’s figurative work is an artful play of cloth, clay, wire and found objects, with the figures themselves sparking curiosity and provoking contemplation. As viewers immerse themselves in Church’s imaginary world, they are encouraged to reflect on universal human experiences of humor, yearning and a search for purpose. During her time as a textile and costume associate with Mermaid Theatre, Church discovered her natural affinity for her distinctive figurative work. She is proud to have created figures for Cirque du Soleil, which they commissioned and sold in their shops and at their shows around the world. Holding a B.F.A. from the Rhode Island School of Design, Church offers intensive workshops a handful of times each year. She describes her work as “sculptural puppetry,” figures that combine movement and life with detail and line. Church sees her characters as her muses, presenting her work in the hope that people might discover something for and about themselves.

Chris Luedecke

Composer

“Old Man Luedecke” is the stage name of two-time Juno Award winner and Polaris Prize nominee Chris Luedecke, a celebrated Canadian folk singersongwriter known for his high-energy banjo-driven stompers, touching guitar ballads and dry humorous stories. A longtime resident of rural Nova Scotia, Luedecke emerged from Halifax’s DIY folk scene in the early 2000s. He has released critically acclaimed albums produced by Steve Dawson and folk legend Tim O’Brien, and recorded everywhere from Nashville’s Butcher Shoppe to his hand-built cabin in Nova Scotia. His songs—like “I Quit My Job” and “The Early Days”—trace the beauty and struggle of everyday life with warmth and charm. Luedecke has toured widely across North America, Europe and Australia. In 2022, he received an honorary doctorate from King’s University in Halifax for his cultural contributions.

Joshua Van Tassel

Sound Engineer and Soundscape Designer

Joshua Van Tassel is a sideman, producer, composer, podcast producer, sample maker and sonic landscaper. He regularly performs the work of some of Canada’s best songwriters, such as Great Lake Swimmers, Amelia Curran, Sarah Slean, Donovan Woods, Rose Cousins and David Myles, among others. Van Tassel and his studio, Dream Date Studio in Toronto, have worked on albums for The Good Lovelies, Nico Paulo, Sarah Slean, David Myles, KIRTY, Justin Rutledge, Christine Bougie, Megan Bonnell and more. He has been nominated for and won numerous East Coast Music Association, Juno and Nova Scotia Music Week awards.

Location - Windsor, Nova Scotia, Canada

Nova Scotia is a Canadian province located on the eastern seaboard of North America. Roughly 360 miles (580 km) long but not more than about 80 miles (130 km) wide at any point, the province comprises the peninsula of Nova Scotia, Cape Breton Island (separated from the mainland to the southwest by the narrow Strait of Canso), and a number of small adjacent islands. Nova Scotia is one of Canada’s Maritime Provinces (along with New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island), and both its past and its present are tied closely to the maritime life of fishing, shipbuilding, and transatlantic shipping. The cultural life of Nova Scotia is rich and varied, reflecting both the cultural diversity of its people and the strong sense of its past. Traditional aspects of Scottish and Acadian culture are particularly vibrant. A number of provincial organizations do much to encourage cultural and artistic development.

SOURCE

Mermaid Theatre's Mission

Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia’s mission is:

To introduce to family audiences, at home and abroad the excitement of innovative performing and visual arts
To promote the art of puppetry through live performance, digital programming, and instruction
To serve as cultural ambassadors for Windsor, Nova Scotia, and Canada
To provide a touring and digital showcase for Atlantic Canada’s artists
To encourage literacy, storytelling, and the love of reading

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