Playwright peruses previous classifieds for a Wild Goose Chase

A new playwright delving into Collingwood’s newspaper archives for tale ideas found occasionally the fact is stranger than fiction, and at times an escaped elephant explores Wasaga Beach. 

Jan Ferrigan thought she’d be composing about the elephant in the Beach front, but a diverse animal tale caught her ideal in the funny bone: a bylaw supplying rewards for rounding up stray livestock from the streets of Collingwood, and an ad promising a drugstore treatment for a much better love existence. 

It’s possible not a Hallmark fulfill-adorable, but the two newspaper advertisements arrived with each other for Ferrigan’s romantic comedy. 

Her play, Wild Goose Chase, is the story of a youthful male, Basil, who decides to make a couple pounds rounding up stray livestock from the avenue so he can invest in the solution that promises a greater love lifetime. 

“I’m normally intrigued by stories that contain animals,” said Ferrigan, who moved to Collingwood seven many years in the past.  “It was just a pretty humorous predicament, the bylaws on their own are funny and so is livestock on Collingwood streets.”

She identified newspaper content from 1889 citing irked residents asking why there had been so lots of cows on the principal street, and noting the disturbance their cowbells were triggering. 

“It’s just form of humorous,” mentioned Ferrigan. “More than as soon as there was mention of persons discovering horses … and there ended up geese and ducks and chickens wandering about.”

A single of the local inhabitants at that time, William Very little, begun his possess pound, and men and women could provide the livestock they rounded up to him for a reward. He would put adverts to say he had the animals and their homeowners could choose them up. 

Applying all those facts, Ferrigan designed up her key character, Basil, and his love interest, Marigold Hodgson, who is the fictional daughter of the authentic Fred Hodgson, a popular architect with workplaces in Collingwood and New York. With Marigold on her way back to Collingwood from New York, Basil is nervous to be his best self by her return. 

Basil’s tries to round up wandering livestock and interact with other people on the streets added fodder for the comedy side of Ferrigan’s rom-com.  

When the perform is staged, there will not be any stay animals involved. The audience will have to arrive completely ready to use their imagination as the Simcoe Road Theatre stage requires them again to 1889 in Collingwood. 

The play will open inside a tea room at the McAuley Home, which was on the corner of Ste Marie and Simcoe Streets (the identical intersection exactly where the Simcoe Street Theatre now stands), also referred to as the Collingwood Dwelling Hotel.  

Ferrigan’s occupation is in biology and world-wide-web design. Her other creating involves non-fiction article content, generally about environmental science, and some self-revealed fiction. She enjoyed the spring playwriting workshop with Gaslight Theatre Productions. 

“It was fantastic having the assist of the instructors, who are seasoned playwrights, and then the assist of fellow classmates,” reported Ferrigan. She’s saved her script close to her chest, many thanks to the peer review she acquired in course, and not even her family members members have read through it. 

This Gaslight Tour will be a spouse and children affair, however, as Ferrigan’s spouse is section of the cast for a various play written by Anke Lex about a hearth at the Tremont Resort. 

There will be 4, 20-minute plays done on stage at the Simcoe Avenue Theatre for this year’s Gaslight Tour, an yearly creation by the Collingwood-dependent Gaslight Theatre Productions. 

Wild Goose Chase, prepared by Jan Ferrigan will be directed by Wyatt MacRae and will be carried out at the Simcoe Street Theatre along with the other a few performs concerning Oct. 23 and 29. 

The Gaslight Tour capabilities 4 performs about regional record, all inside of the topic of “old news.” Tickets offered out a number of times right after sales opened. This will be the 1st year the plays are in a theatre, as generally the Gaslight performs are done at numerous locations about city and patrons walk to each of the spots. 

You can understand a lot more about Gaslight Theatre Productions, the performs and the courses, on the web at gaslighttheatreproductions.com. Ferrigan is a person of 4 playwrights showcased in this year’s tour. CollingwoodToday will function all four in stories this week.