Our successful Stage2 program features outstanding visiting companies, in-house productions by the Festival Antigonish Young Company and a series of Showcase Evenings spotlighting young artists from the community.

The inspiring true story of Canadian Airforce Squadron Leader Ted Aplin and his efforts to help rebuild the shattered lives of Jewish refugees in the displaced person camp at Bergen-Belsen in post-World War 2 Germany.

Set amidst the doomed men and rotten ideals of Stalinist Russian, The Russian Play is a bleak, bittersweet and darkly ironic ode to the dangerous joys of love. The storyteller recounts the tale of a Russian peasant girl named Sonya, the "foolish mistakes" of her youth, and the story of the love affair that led to her ruin.

This award-winning gem offers a profound exploration of love and relationships, whisking the audience away to the romance and intrigue of Stalinist Moscow.

""HIGHLY RECOMMENDED...incredibly powerful with breathtaking emotion…A Must-See." - Toronto Star

Two monologues - A Bed Among The Lentils and Miss Fozzard Finds Her Feet - two seemingly ordinary women. With his customary powers of observation, comic timing and exquisite turn of phrase, Bennett charts the boundary between laughter and tears.

The title is commonplace cool parlance among the thirty-something partying crowd who are lampooned with hilarious and merciless accuracy by this comedy trio who have themselves been there, thrown up on the t-shirt and lived to tell the tale.

These three comedians have worked together many times over the past two years in shows which have brought them world acclaim (in their own minds). This will be their third season at Stage 2 and the best yet. So if you don't want to support local theatre, that's okay, they don't mind. Just don't come crying to the management when your pet goes missing.

This award-winning play follows the true story of a band of Irish expatriates in Massachusetts, and their scheme to sail the whaling ship, Catalpa, to the notorious colonial prison in Fremantle, Australia, to free six Irish Fenian Prisoners. While the story takes place in 1875, we watch it unfold through the eyes of Matt Kidd, a present-day screenwriter. Stung by yet another rejection, Matt attempts to reignite his belief in his Catalpa screenplay by performing the story all alone in his bedroom.

Young playwright Lindsay Kyte enjoyed a great success in Stage2 last season with her autobiographical play, Toronto Adventures. Her new project is based on a fascinating and significant chapter in Nova Scotia's recent history.

Tompkinsville, situated in Reserve Mines, Cape Breton, was the first cooperative housing unit in North America. The play tells the story of The Antigonish Movement which evolved from the pioneering work of Father Moses Coady and Father Jimmy Tompkins in the 1920s as a response to the poverty afflicting farmers, fishermen, and coal-miners.

Tompkins and Coady used adult education and group action to instigate major social change and a key member of their team was Joe Laben who was Lindsay Kyte's great-uncle and used to read her bedtime stories! The Antigonish Movement paved the way for the creation of the world-renowned Coady International Institute at Saint Francis Xavier University. This is a great Antigonish story with global reach!