A Brief  History of  “The World”

The National Theatre of the World is a multi-disciplinary, Toronto-based, not-for-profit theatre company that creates exciting, provocative, and instantaneous theatre through the art of improvisation. N.T.O.W. was founded in 2008, by Co-Artistic Directors Matt Baram, Ron Pederson and Naomi Snieckus with the mandate of creating new Canadian work and to encourage the theatre and improvisation communities to come together. Through the production of  four different shows, Impromptu Splendor (The Live Improvised Play), The Carnegie Hall Show (The Improvised Retrospective), The Soaps! (The Live Improvised Soap Opera), and The Script Tease Project, the company continues to bridge the gap between theatre and improvisation to this day by creating vivid, dramatic and complex full-length plays, radio dramas and inter-disciplinary variety shows.

Once established in September of 2008, N.T.O.W. began to produce Impromptu Splendor at Comedy Bar in Toronto. From it’s earliest incarnation, Impromptu Splendor has always delivered a fresh, artful and provoking spectacle brought to life in the fashion of an improvised play. The focus is on its cunning actors and their mastery of narrative and style. Shortly thereafter the company joined forces with comedic genius Chris Gibbs and began to produce a weekly meta-variety show, The Carnegie Hall Show at The Bread and Circus in Kensington Market, complete with song, circus acts, special guests and an improvised radio play, all executed with the grandeur of The Kennedy Centre Honors. In January of 2009 the cast began teaching weekly workshops to students, focusing on acting in improvisation. Those workshops are still offered to this day.

After a highly acclaimed run at The Summerworks Theatre Festival, Impromptu Splendor found a permanent home in March of 2009 when the company was invited by Artistic Director, Andy McKim to produce its monthly show at the legendary Theatre Passe Muraille. The company’s first show was improvised in the style of  Tennessee Williams with special guest Fiona Reid. Soon after, Impromptu Splendor took to the road after being invited to the Chicago Improv Festival where they performed with special guest Joe Flaherty (of SCTV fame).

The company has since performed at the Los Angeles Improv Festival, the Edmonton International Improv Festival, The International Improvisation Theatre Festival in Amsterdam, The SummerWorks Theatre Festival in Toronto, The Toronto Fringe Theatre Festival and the Supernova Festival in Halifax. Theatre Aquarius in Hamilton, The Grand Theatre in London, Ontario, and WJT in Winnipeg have invited Impromptu Splendor to perform as a part of their studio seasons. In 2010 SummerWorks invited The National Theatre of the World to present another invention, Fiasco Playhouse, which operated as a multi-disciplinary cabaret every evening the festival was running.

In May of  2011, N.T.O.W. produced The Script Tease Project  which enjoyed a week long run at Theatre Passe Muraille’s Backspace and played to sold out audiences. The show borrows from the N.T.O.W. flagship show, Impromptu Splendor with some dangerous twists added to the mix. The company asked renowned playwrights from Canada and beyond to pen the first two pages of a new play…only two (A tease). Those pages were sealed in an envelope. Each night the actors opened up an envelope (having never seen its contents before), read it cold, and completely improvised the rest! The cast finished plays started by Brad Fraser, Mark McKinney, Daniel McIvor Judith Thompson, Morris Panych, Woody Harrelson, John Patrick Shanley, Hannah Moscovitch, Linda Griffiths, and Norm Foster.

In July of  2011, with help from world class improvising friend Christy Bruce, The National Theatre of The World assembled Toronto’s most prolific comedic improvisers and created an ongoing improvised episodic packed with drama, romance, intrigue and betrayal and simply called it The Soaps! A Live Improvised Soap Opera. After a successful inaugural season at Comedy Bar, the troupe was invited to participate in the Toronto Fringe as a fundraising show for the festival where they played to sold out houses at The Bathurst Street Theatre.

The company has garnered several awards including A Canadian Comedy Award for Best Improv Troupe in 2009, 2010 and 2011. Naomi Snieckus won the Best Female Improviser Award in 2010 and Ronald Pederson won for Best Male Improviser in 2011. Upcoming in 2012 the company will produce a run at New York’s Barrow Street Theatre, teach workshops in Amsterdam and London and participate in a prestigious theatre festival in Berlin. In the future N.T.O.W. intends to further push the boundaries of what an evening at the theatre can be. The company plans to continue creating captivating live theatre through the art of improvisation and develop exciting new projects with collaborative partners like Theatre Passe Muraille and The Young Centre For The Performing Arts.