Come hang out with the Rumbler’s on May 25th for our Tremors Launch Party!

Get to know the artists in this year’s Tremors Festival, and share some bevvies with friends and community members, while munching on delicious tacos.

Lineup:

4:00 pm – Part 1: Reading of excerpts from a new experimental work by Elio Zarrillo (If We Be Friends)

BREAK – FREE TACOS and a cash bar!

7:00 pm – Part 2: A special cross-disciplinary presentation with Little Chamber Music of “Fantasy Vignettes” by Erin James.

Ticketing

Part 1 – If We Be Friends (PWYD tickets here)

Part 2 – Fantasy Vignettes (PWYD tickets here)

Please note: Folks can attend both events, but must book tickets separately.

About the Shows

If We Be Friends – By Elio Zarrillo

This showing of If We Be Friends (a play about queer teenhood, zines, Shakespeare and unquestionable resistance), will offer a look into the work’s set and projections design exploration process. The team has been in workshop melding and performing text and image in highly imaginative ways through live analog projection, continuing the play’s translation and transformation of play-text to zine to live theatrical performance.

Elio Zarrillo – Playwright
Stefanie Infantino – Projection Designer
Ashley Aron, Dale MacDonald, Nora Vision, Anais West – Performers

About the Artist

Elio Zarrillo spends their days making plays and poems with and for their loved ones. Originally from Treaty 1 territory, they are currently based on the unceded lands of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing & Theatre at the University of British Columbia. Recent produced works include The Outside Inn (co-written with Sharon Bajer – Prairie Theatre Exchange, Festival Antigonish), Volare (Prairie Theatre Exchange) and The Show (Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre). Other works-in-progress include PEACHES (National Queer & Trans Playwriting Unit, Theatre Projects Manitoba), LIAM and If We Be Friends.

Fantasy Vignettes by Erin James, presented by Little Chamber Music

Fantasy Vignettes is a time-traveling journey through 400 years of violin fantasias, brought to life with evocative costumes constructed specifically for each composition. From the earliest notated violin fantasia by Étienne Nau to works by Telemann, Schumann, Price, Schoenberg, and a new commission by Mari Alice Conrad that employs sewing machines and accessories as instruments, each piece explores improvisation, identity, and freedom. Erin James’ dual artistry as violinist and textile designer is woven throughout the program, culminating in an original composition and costume that stitches together and reimagines concert material to create something entirely new. Fantasy Vignettes is both a sonic and visual exploration of history, imagination, and the power of reinvention.

Erin James –  violin, concept, composition, costumes
Todd Yaniw – piano
Mari Alice Conrad – composition, narration, sewing machine + accessories

About the Artist

Erin James is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice lives at the intersection between music, visual art and text. Her musical interests range from baroque to contemporary and she thoroughly enjoys any piece that is singable or danceable. Erin is equally at home as a chamber musician, soloist, theatre artist and orchestral player and her career has taken her across Asia, Europe and North America. If all goes well, by the time you read this, Erin will have successfully obtained her Doctorate in Music. This will round out her list of qualifications including a Masters degree from the Royal College of Music in London, a Bachelor’s degree from UBC and a Diploma in Fashion Design from George Brown College.

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Rumble Theatre is proud to announce the return of Tremors Festival, a three-night bash of experimental and interdisciplinary live performance happening June 6–8, 2025. Five daring new works from across Canada converge at Progress Lab 1422, inviting you into an evening of sci-fi, fantasy, hip-hop, and the thing of dreams. With a vibe that’s equal parts theatre, community shindig, and art party, this biennial festival will light up East Vancouver with new and in-progress works by some of the country’s most exciting theatre makers.

From poetic space memes to absurdist spirits, immersive lullabies to fun dream-games, this year’s festival asks audiences to explore transitions, dreams, and the space in between.

It all kicks off with TREMOLO: Tremors Launch Party on May 25, featuring excerpts from a new experimental work from Elio Zarrillo (If We Be Friends) followed by a special cross-disciplinary presentation with Little Chamber Music of Fantasy Vignettes by Erin James.

Featuring New Works by

Cameron Peal
Christine Genier
Kern Albert & Donna-Michelle St. Bernard
Howard Dai
Paige Louter

Ticketing – How to watch shows at Tremors?

Each show is performed every night of the festival; audiences can choose between one of two tracks that run simultaneously:

Track 1

Dear Star Trek (Christine Genier)

Nod (Paige Louter)

Dream Machine (Howard Dai)

Track 2

Panoptikon (Kern Albert & Donna-Michelle St. Bernard)

Pelmet & Sables (Cameron Peal)

Dream Machine (Howard Dai)

One ticket gets you three shows (Dream Machine is experienced by the entire audience)

Can’t decide on which track? Choose “SURPRISE ME” and roll the dice when you pick up your ticket to leave it all to fate.

Want to see them all?  Attending two nights will allow you to catch all the shows.

Performances begin at 7:00 pm (but come early for the bar and games!).

Launch Party: TREMOLO

Date: May 25, 2025
Location: Progress Lab Studio
Time: Doors open at 4:30 pm
Tickets: pay-what-you-decide (each event sold separately)

• 5:00 pm – If We Be Friends by Elio Zarrillo (excerpts) 
• Break – FREE TACOS FOR ALL! 
• 7:00 pm – Fantasy Vignettes by Erin James, a concert presented by Little Chamber Music

For more information on TREMOLO please click here.

Festival Programming

Pelmet and Sables by Cameron Peal
Unceded Coast Salish Territories, MST (Vancouver, BC) 

~A brief moment that would make sense (if it could) but it can’t (even though there is effort)~

This is a play for two actors. The characters are two non-human spirits who set out to discover what it means to be human by experiencing death. For them, death is only a vague concept because neither of them can die, despite how hard they try to find out. And they definitely do try. The show is an absurd, surrealist comedy looking to express grief, life, death, and the way that language falls short of the experiences of life.

Cameron Peal – Writer, Director
Ivy Charles – Co-director
Sherine Menes – Performer
L Danger – Performer

About the Creator

Cameron Peal (he/they) is a Vancouver based (Musqueam, Squamish, and Tseil-Waututh territories) theatre artist, from the Nisga’a Nation of Northwest BC. He is currently the Indigenous Outreach Coordinator at The Cultch. His current passion is in exploring the abstract; “how can I express something beyond the boundaries of what’s literal, what’s already clear?” His work looks to blur the boundaries between art forms and genres.

To date he has worked as an actor, director, writer, dancer, in community outreach, some minor producing, and offered dramaturgical support to friends and colleagues for film and theatre from time to time. Studio 58 graduate.

Dear Star Trek by Christine Genier
Ta’an Kwäch’än, Kwanlin Dün, Tagēesh Chän ancestral lands (Whitehorse, YT)

~A teasing breakdown of Star Trek, Representation, and the promise of the Prime Directive~

Dear Star Trek. A love letter with memes. And some notes. Christine Genier takes us on a journey through the pleasures and pains of pop culture and the final frontier from an Indigenous perspective. A life long Trekkie, Christine mixes her powerful and humourous storytelling with memes in a fun, teasing breakdown of Star Trek, Representation, and The Problem with Chakotay.

Christine Genier – Writer/Performer
Jacob Zimmer – Collaborator
Nora Paton – Tech Director

About the Creator

Christine Genier (Ta’an Kwächän Council) – Poet, performer, writer, broadcaster, and language keeper – takes us on a journey through the pleasures, impact and obligations in pop culture media from her perspective as a fan and Indigenous woman.

A life long Trekkie, Christine mixes her powerful and humorous storytelling with memes in a fun, teasing breakdown of Star Trek, Representation, and the promise of the Prime Directive.”

Panoptikon by Kern Albert & Donna-Michelle St. Bernard
T’karonto; Dish with One Spoon Covenant (Toronto/Hamilton, ON)

~Lend me some sugar. I am your neighbour~

Panoptikon aims to illuminate the experience(s) of incarceration. Based on first hand accounts, the composition comprises monologue, spoken word and hip hop in a series of snapshots about isolation, aggression, softness and sandwiches.

Donna-Michelle St. Bernard – Producer, Performer, Co-Creator
Kern Albert – Co-Creator, Performer
Shanae Sodhi – Director, Producer
Makambe K. Simamba – Dramaturge
Stephon Smith – Sound Designer
Brianna Bernard – Lightning Designer
Nawa Nicole Simon – Movement Coordinator
Kareem Vaude – Performer
Nicci Pryce – Performer

Advisories/Trigger Warnings: this show contains references to violence, sexual violence, and institutional cruelty.

About the Creators

Donna-Michelle St. Bernard aka Belladonna the Blest is an emcee, playwright and agitator. Her playwriting is focused in the 54ology: The First Stone, Diggers, Give It Up, The Smell of Horses, Just Now, Click Click, Cake, Sound of the Beast, A Man A Fish, Salome’s Clothes, Dark Love and Gas Girls. Other offerings include theatre for young audiences, opera libretti, collaborative works and weird reflections. As director, she has worked on The F Word (Cheesman/Miranda), Our Fathers, Sons, Lover and Little Brothers (Simamba), Job’s Wife (Nolan), Oops! (Feld). DM is currently an associate artist at lemonTree Creations, artistic director of New Harlem Productions. She is co-editor with Yvette Nolan of the Playwrights Canada Press anthologies Refractions: Solo and Refractions: Scenes, as well as editor of Indian Act: Residential School Plays.

Kern Albert is a poet, emcee and actor. Originally from Trinidad, Kern comes to Toronto by way of London, England and Brisbane, Australia where he spent time both among the colonizers and the native Aboriginals. He has lent his world-worn gaze to the stage as an actor in The Dutchman (lemonTree), Prison Skin (New Harlem). As a playwright his works include The Last Pig in Afghanistan and Roominhouse (with DM St. Bernard). As a vocalist, Kern ran with hip hop ensemble The Dope Poet Society, then with Seeds Sown, followed by a stint as a drummer with the Awakening. He has been known to operate lights, build sets and offer dramaturgy.

Dream Machine by Howard Dai
Unceded Coast Salish Territories, MST (Vancouver, BC) 

~In this world, dreams are your currencies and imagination is your most useful tool; the more you dream, the richer you are! But is it all as simple as it seems?~

This show is heavily inspired by Taiwanese variety / game TV shows. Through the gesture and form of a lottery draw, the work seeks to explore the parallel between immigration and gambling: The process of immigration, the immigrant’s wish for their children, and the sacrifice they have to make. It is an immersive experience that will directly summon the audience’s dreams and aspirations that may be present in their life, or have long forgotten about. I want to curate a space where players meet each other through their dreams, and uplift each other with their ambitions.

Howard Dai – Creator, Performer

Featuring: Alexa Fraser, Cindy Kao, Hannah Meyers, Pascal Reiners, Jessica Wong, Stephanie Wong, & Conor Wylie.

Advisories: audience participation/interactive elements.

About the Creator

Howard Dai is a Taiwanese actor and theatre artist based in so-called Vancouver whose work has been seen across Canada. His performances and creations have existed in theatre, films, public spaces, Zoom screens, Google Sheets, automated phone calls, interactive websites, and virtual reality. He was most recently seen onstage in Halifax, Ottawa, and Stratford. Howard was mentored by Charles Douglas in movement and performance capture. He is a member of the Five Blessings Collective, an associate artist with rice & beans theatre, and holds a BFA in Theatre Performance from SFU School for the Contemporary Arts (www.howarddai.com)

Nod by Paige Louter
Unceded Coast Salish Territories , MST (Vancouver, BC) 

~An immersive theatre experience to lullaby your brain, caffeinate your heart, and manifest your dreams. Hopefully they’re nice ones~

I am drawn to creating work that has a seed in my own life but that grows into something bigger and weirder that can delight, arrest, transform, and sometimes challenge.

I’m deeply interested in experimenting with processes that are responsive to my shifting health and energy capacities, and how that can positively impact the quality of my work and the way an audience experiences it.

I’m also interested in poking at the idea of comparative suffering, and how we can better support both the people in our lives who are struggling daily with health issues such as fatigue, and those who might just be having a really bad day after a sleepless night. I think there’s room for both!

Paige Louter – Creator/Performer
June Fukumura – Dramaturg
Shona Struthers – Sound Designer/Composer
Phil Miguel – Lighting Designer
Karen Hines – Outside Eye

Advisories/Trigger Warnings: upsetting dream content, quick lighting changes.

About the Creator

Paige Louter is a queer theatre creator and producer based in so-called Vancouver. She holds an MA in Drama and Theatre from the University of Galway, and is pursuing an intimacy direction practice alongside her work as a dramaturg, performer, and writer. Credits include producing The Café (ITSAZOO/Aphotic) and Sunrise Betties (ITSAZOO), and performing in Twelfth Night (Tottering Biped) and Coarse: The Brontes (Sarah Deller). Year-round, they work as ITSAZOO Productions’ Co-Artistic Producer and Currently Arts’ Operations Manager. Upcoming: solo show God Joke Play and assistant directing Meeting (ITSAZOO/Pacific Theatre/Neworld Theatre.)

The post Tremors Festival 2025 appeared first on Rumble.

Programmed works will be performed as part of a shared festival bill at a one-ticket event that takes the form of an ‘art party meets night market.’

Audiences will be able to see half of the entire festival programming each night. Artists are expected to perform only once per night. 

While presentations are not expected to be “complete” they should be in “performance mode.” Even if that performance mode is a bit rough.

Another way of describing the stage of development that projects being showcased at Tremors should be at is:  ‘able to – and seeking to engage an audience’.

Works are performed on one of two stages:

Semi-Public (Outdoor Cabaret stage)

A converted garage playing to a tented parking lot. The Semi-public stage is well suited to pieces with smaller casts or solo performances, and works using direct address forms such as story-telling, monologue, spoken-word or stand-up.

Semi-Private (Indoor Black-box stage) 

Our indoor creation studio. The Semi-public stage is very versatile and well suited to pieces experimenting with form – particularly those seeking more control over lighting and sound elements.

Key Dates

Shared Residency period (optional): May 19th – 25th, 2025
Tech period: May 26th – 29th, 2025
Performance Dates: May 29th – June  8th, 2025
Festival Location: Progress Lab 1422, Vancouver, BC, CAN (Unceded MST)

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION: SEPTEMBER 15th 2024  11:59PM PST

Submissions are welcomed from individuals, collectives, and organizations.

What We Provide

• Presentation fee (generally between $3,000 – $6,000 CAN depending on scale and scope) 
  • Please Note for Out of Town artists: We are unable to provide Travel funding above the presentation fees. However, we will be happy to support you in travel applications to National, Provincial, and Local granting bodies in any way we can. 
• Letters of Support/Confirmation as required. 
• Presentation space including technical services and equipment
• Calling Stage Management
  • Meaning we can call cues based on a cue list once we begin the tech process, however do not provide stage management during rehearsals off-site.  
• Marketing and Publicity services
• Box Office and Front of House services
• An archival of your performance at the festival (single camera) for future use. 
• (Optional) Residency space leading up to the festival for rehearsals and other uses.
• (Optional) Mentorship on grant writing/revenue development, producing, and long term project management.

How To Apply

Please email applications (in a single PDF if possible) to jiv[at]rumble.org no later than 11:59 PM PST. September 15th 2025.

Applications should include the following information:

Essential application requirements: 

• An artist statement introducing yourself or your collective and the project you are proposing (ideally maximum length of 2 pages single spaced.)* 
• Additionally, we require: 
  • A list of collaborators on your project
    • Either names and bios (if confirmed) or number of collaborators and roles (if unconfirmed). 
  • Relevant production or development history of the project you are proposing.
    • For example, if it was developed through a residency with another organization, or if you held a reading or showing yourself. 
  • Whether you have a preference between a semi-public or semi-private space? 
  • Whether you have any conflicts, or limitations in your availability between May 19th  – June 8th 2025

Support Material: 

• It is recommended that you submit at least one item of support material. This can include: 
  • Additional material about the project you are proposing
  • Archivals, Script excerpts, and other materials of the project and its development to date.
  • Past examples of work from you, and your collaborators. 
    • In the case of submitting past work, it’s helpful if you let us know how you think it relates to your application and the project you are proposing for Tremors. 
• Support material length guidelines: You may submit as much support material as you like, however the committee will only be required to read up to 10 pages, and watch/listen to up to 12 minutes of recorded material. So it is advisable to provide time codes, and page ranges that you would like us to prioritise. 

Optional application requirements (that are very helpful for us, and appreciated.)

• A short description of your objectives in presenting at Tremors (if known).
  • Essentially – what questions are you looking to have answered, or what questions are you asking yourself in the development of your project.
• Any known technical information you can provide us
  • For example, if your project requires projection, or installing a significant set item. 
• Any community connections you have, or are seeking to make
  • For example – if you are making a piece about harm reduction, are their organizations you are already connected to? Are there organizations you would like to be connected to that we might be able to help with? 

PLEASE NOTE: If you have not received a confirmation of receipt on your application within two weeks of submission, please follow up to confirm that it has been received.

*Regarding the 2-page maximum length Artist Statement and Project Description: We recognize that some projects may require a longer description, particularly if they are working in a form that requires additional cultural or historic context. In these cases, it is ok to go over the page limit. That said, brevity is still appreciated where possible. 

QUESTIONS? Please see our Frequently Asked Questions on the sidebar of this page. For any other questions please email jiv[at]rumble.org

About Tremors

Occurring once every two years, the TREMORS festival has been a major component of Rumble’s programming for some time. The exact structure of the festival has shifted over the years, adapting to what we see as the current needs in the Independent theatre and performance sector in the city of Vancouver, BC (unceded MST).

Originally, Tremors was a presentation series evolving out of ‘The Young and the Restless’ series which showcased full-length projects by Emerging collectives.

Next, Tremors focused on training –  producing three full-length productions of existing scripts executed by groups of emerging artists receiving mentorship from established artists.

Most recently, Tremors has shifted its model to utilize its platform to provide an intermediary showcase opportunity of short works or works-in-development for artists – where work is ready to engage an audience – but it is also still early enough that it may continue to to change based on what is discovered. In this way, artists don’t have to go ‘all the way to premiere’ to start to understand how a project functions with a live audience. Some Tremors projects continue on to full development – others may end at the festival. Both are great – our intention is to allow the space for experimentation in a supportive and relatively low-stakes situation. 

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The Headless Cowboy is a rockabilly satire merging music and performance with the visual strengths of theatre, dance and video bringing a fresh, comedic look at a heart-breaking tragedy in a multi-disciplinary performance by three of Alberta’s most sought-after artists. The Headless Cowboy explores the nature of belief in a compelling tale. The titular Cowboy seeks revenge against Dead Man who shot off his head and kidnapped his girl – Cry Baby. Meanwhile, the alien Ginger with Knives is collecting sperm samples to start a human petting zoo.

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SaBooge transports us beyond the seas to the sun-parched tedium of Hobart Town, an infant colony farther from civilization than the moon. When a traveling naturalist discovers the colony’s incredible secret, a convict mother and her extraordinary son break their silence, taking on the local gentry, its fundamentalist bigots, and the naturalist’s earth-shattering claim, in an attempt to save the lives they have worked so hard to keep hidden. Fathom is a mesmerizing and engrossing tale of expectation and tragedy set in colonial Tasmania, a god-forsaken land that time and progress have long forgotten.

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Legoland is the story of the infamous Lamb siblings, extradited to Canada after a brutal attack on one of America’s most beloved pop stars. In this award-winning production, the duo gives a presentation of the harrowing odyssey at their high school. A contemporary Vaudeville routine with ukulele, puppets and gangster rap.

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Darkly comic and playfully irreverent, Tiny Apocalypse scrutinizes the surreal banalities and submerged hysteria of office life in a world shaped and monitored by surveillance.

Garnered six Jessie Richardson Theatre Award nominations and a win for John Webber in the category of Outstanding Lighting Design.

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Minimally staged, with an intimate audience/performer relationship and a live musical score, Penny Dreadful is a tale of revelation and love in the age of syphilis.

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“This show made me laugh, it made me cry and it made me think. I’m So Close…is filled with controlled chaos, wonderful physicality, clever comedy, emotional poignancy and a sense of reality and grounding that only comes from experienced and talented performers. Brilliant.” – Plank

Winner of the Spotlight Award at the Summerworks Theatre Festival

Steve finds himself plunged into the fast-paced world of billion dollar business in his desire to make the world a greener place. His success propels him to dive more and more into his iPhone and to drift further and further away from his wife Stella. I’m So Close… is a heartbreaking love song, droned out by the hum of the technological landscape that is bringing us together and pushing us apart.

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