“Many years ago, Emily sent me an email saying that she had an idea and could we get together and talk about her idea for a ‘Foster Festival.’ I was working in Morrisburg at the time and I said, ‘Sure. Let’s meet.’ I didn’t know Emily Oriold at this point. We met, and this young woman said she wanted to start a festival that would do nothing but my plays. We would call it The Norm Foster Theatre Festival. I said ‘Exqueeze me?’ (Mike Myers was big back then.) Then Emily exlplained her well thought-out idea in detail. I think she might have even had a spreadsheet filled with numbers. I was impressed. Numbers always impress me. Emily said, ‘What do you think?’ I said ‘Go ahead and try it. Let me know when you get it on its feet’. I might have even called her ‘kid’. Long story short, Emily did it. She started The Foster Festival in St. Catharines. And I must say, with pride, it is pretty damned successful. Emily hires the best people. The best management team, the best actors, the best crew, the best designers. She works her tail off. She came up with the idea of doing one of my plays, ‘Outlaw’, in a barn. It turned out to be a perfect setting. A barn! I just wanted to make it known how much I appreciate Emily Oriold and the force that she is. She’s gotten so big in this theatre world, that now she calls me ‘kid’. What a nerve.” – Norm Foster, Playwright
Creative Team - Norm Foster
Playwright
Credits
Norm Foster has been called Canada’s preeminent comic playwright. He is the most produced playwright in the history of the country and he receives, on average, an astounding one hundred and fifty productions of his plays each year. It has been said that on any given day of the year, there is a Norm Foster play either in rehearsal or in performance somewhere in the world.
Halifax Chronicle-Herald columnist Ron Foley writes, “Foster’s stage writing remains one of Canada’s greatest theatrical treasures”, and The Calgary Herald describes him as “one of the funniest writers of intelligent comedy in Canadian theatre today.”
In 2017, Norm was appointed as an Officer of the Order of Canada, for his body of work. The Order of Canada is the highest civilian honour in the nation. He also received the Key to the City of St. Catharines which was presented to Norm by Mayor Walter Sendzik during the Festival’s 2018 season.
Playwright
Norm has almost 80 plays to his credit and wrote an astounding 8 plays between 2020-2022.
His plays include:
- On A First Name Basis
- Here On The Flight Path
- Halfway There (World Premiere 2016)
- Old Love
- Lunenburg (World Premiere 2017)
- Screwball Comedy (World Premiere 2017)
- Wrong For Each Other
- Come Down From Up River (World Premiere 2018)
- Renovations For Six (World Premiere 2018)
- The Writer (World Premiere 2019)
- Beside Myself (World Premiere 2019)
- 1812 (World Premiere 2022)
- Danny & Delilah (World Premiere 2023)
- The Melville Boys
- The Foursome
- Mending Fences
- The Love List
- Outlaw
- Jenny’s House of Joy
- Skin Flick
- Hilda’s Yard
- The Ladies Foursome
- Those Movies (world premiere 2024)
- Whit’s End (world premiere 2024)
He is the recipient of the Los Angeles Drama-Logue Award for his play, The Melville Boys and in 2009 he was a finalist for the Premier’s Award For Excellence In The Arts.
As an actor, Norm has toured in his play Here On The Flight Path and has extensively toured his play On A First Name Basis. He has performed in theatres across the country in such plays as Art, Strawberries in January, Waiting for Godot, and in his own plays, The Long Weekend, Mending Fences, The Love List, Skin Flick, Outlaw, Self-Help, Old Love, and The Foursome.
