History
The Union Theatre was located at 188½ Hunter Street West in a space rumoured to have been an old undertakers facility (this was the inspiration for the weekly semi-improvised show The Coffin Factory). A group of local theatre artists, including Robert Winslow, Trent University professor Ian McLachlan and members of Theatre Trent, along with other performance artists banded together to continue the work they had done in various Peterborough performance endeavors. One stated aim was finding a permanent home for Winslow's company East City Productions which originally made its home in Peterborough's Market Hall Theatre, the home of the Artspace art gallery. In a Peterborough Examiner article in July 2005, Winslow reminisced about the Union Theatre calling it "poverty theatre". Winslow went on to state, "Nobody was making anything, everyone was poor," he says. "We made all the decisions collectively, which was a real challenge, and basically ran the space." In the same article McLachlan said about the Union Theatre: "It may have been a constant struggle to survive, but the productions that came out of the Union were some of the most innovative this community has seen. "There were very exciting productions done on a minuscule budget."
The space closed its doors on Hunter Street in 1995 and moved to a new home in Peterborough in 1996 where they only remained for one year. In 2006 a group of local artists from the Union Collective began work on opening a new theatre space with the same artist-run focus. The Theatre Users Group formed in the summer of 2006 under the acronym "T.H.U.G." and later in 2007 finding a new space called The New Theatre hoping to emulate much of the spirit and ideal of the Union Theatre in its heyday.
In 2000 independent film-maker, An Kosurko, a past collective member, created a 27 minute documentary about the Union Theatre called "Re:UNION" which featured interviews with past collective members, space users, and local arts activists. The film also included footage of the space, images of past show posters, and music recorded by bands who had played at the Union Theatre in its heyday. The film takes a non-apologetic look at the ups and downs of working as a collective, paying bills, working with creative spirits and the space's meaning to the Peterborough Arts community.
Read more about this topic: Union Theatre (Peterborough)
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