News Stories
Beyond the boy wizard’s limelight – PUFFS offers a hilarious twist on a beloved magical world
February 27, 2024
What: PUFFS, or Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certain School of Magic and Magic When: March 7 to 16 at 7:30 pm, Opening Gala March 7, 7:30 pm Where: VIU’s Malaspina Theatre (Building 310), Nanaimo campus For seven years, a bespectacled boy wizard with a scar went to a certain wizard school and conquered evil. But this isn’t his story. This is the story of the puffs who happen to be at... Read more
Audience members challenged to identify the play written by AI in VIU performance
November 28, 2023
What: Two Truths and an A.I. When: December 6-8, 12 to 1 pm Where: Mike Taugher Studio (Building 330, Room 109), Nanaimo campus Can you tell the difference between a play written by a person and an AI? That’s the question audience members are asked during the interactive performance Two Truths and an A.I. The show is a collaboration between two classes led by VIU Creative Writing and Journalism... Read more
VIU Theatre Department presents the dark parody Collateral Damage
October 13, 2023
What: Collateral Damage, VIU Theatre Department fall play When: October 19 to 21 and 26 to 28 Where: VIU’s Malaspina Theatre (Building 310), Nanaimo campus Vancouver Island University’s (VIU’s) Theatre Department presents playwright Jackie Crossland’s Collateral Damage this fall. Collateral Damage explores and reimagines the ancient Greek myth of Medea. In the original myth, Medea’s husband... Read more
Colloquium series begins with a talk about TV shows Chewing Gum and Fleabag
September 19, 2023
VIU’s Christina Mansueti examines how comedy shows challenge and affirm contemporary feminisms. Vancouver Island University’s (VIU’s) Arts and Humanities Colloquium Series returns this fall with an engaging lineup. This season explores contemporary feminisms in two UK-based TV comedies, the history of special effects on stage and the value of failure. “For the Colloquium’s fifteenth year, we have... Read more
VIU’s Theatre Department presents the dramatic comedy She Kills Monsters
February 15, 2023
What: She Kills Monsters by Qui Nguyen – presented by VIU’s Theatre Department When: March 2 to 11 Where: VIU’s Malaspina Theatre (Building 310), Nanaimo campus Vancouver Island University’s (VIU’s) Theatre Department presents the hysterical dramatic comedy She Kills Monsters by Qui Nguyen as this year’s spring production. The play tells the story of Agnes Evans as she comes to terms with the... Read more
VIU Colloquium Series kicks off with a deep dive into the action thriller Atomic Blonde
September 21, 2022
Arts and Humanities lectures at the VIU Nanaimo campus are free and open to everyone to attend. Vancouver Island University’s (VIU’s) Arts and Humanities Colloquium Series returns this fall with three fascinating lectures. The lectures delve into the action thriller Atomic Blonde, housing availability and affordability in Louisville, and the use of songs in musical theatre. All lectures are free... Read more
VIU Theatre Professor explores a “Grotesque” Satirical Play During First Colloquium Lecture
January 10, 2022
Arts & Humanities Colloquium Series returns this spring with a thought-provoking lineup. Vancouver Island University’s (VIU’s) Spring Arts & Humanities Colloquium Series will take audience members on a journey through the theatre of grotesque, and audio media techniques and creative pathways for producers and audiences. The Colloquium Series began in 2009 with the aim of creating... Read more
Zombies and Shakespeare Collide in VIU Theatre Department's Spring Play
March 3, 2020
Theatre Department presents William Shakespeare’s Land of the Dead as its spring production, which opens March 5. To be, or not to be … a zombie? Zombies shuffle through the streets of medieval London as historical characters deal with their own human schemes and woes while trying to avoid becoming one of the undead during the Vancouver Island University (VIU) Theatre Department’s production of ... Read more
VIU Theatre Department Presents Fall Studio Show – The End of Civilization
November 18, 2019
Student actors push envelope during dark, gritty play that explores rage, murder and the actions of desperate people. What does it mean to be civilized? What happens when the limits of integrity and morality are pushed beyond the breaking point? These questions are posed in Canadian playwright George F. Walker’s Suburban Motel. In the fourth chapter of this gritty series of short plays, The End... Read more
VIU Partners with Other Guys Theatre Company to Produce Hysterical Melodrama
October 17, 2019
Ross Desprez is a VIU Theatre Department Professor and creator of SlugFest – a musical comedy set in a dystopian Vancouver Island community. What happens when slug slime is hailed as a medical miracle? The residents of a small poverty-stricken and slug-infested village begin celebrating their good fortune! But Samantha, a young crusader for the environment, is determined to stop the lucrative yet... Read more