The Effect

What the Critics Have Said About The Effect:

“The Effect evokes the deliciously unsettling feeling that all of us are nothing more than bundles of chemicals in ongoing experiments” – The Guardian

“a knockout human drama” – London Theatre

“a parable for the modern age” – Harpers Bazaar

About the Show

Is it Love?
Or is it Chemical?

A dark, razor-sharp thriller by Emmy-winning writer of Succession, Lucy Prebble. The Effect dives into the chemical nature of love through the lens of a clinical drug trial. Connie and Tristan enter a study for a new dopamine-regulating antidepressant. They fall in love. Or do they? As dosages rise, desire and obsession intensify, and the boundary between genuine emotion and altered chemistry begins to blur. This provocative and timely co-production between Rumble Theatre and ITSAZOO Productions asks: If you can’t trust your heart and you can’t trust your mind—what’s left?

Content Advisory: This is a close-proximity experience. This production includes sexual content, adult language, discussions of depression and mental health, and portrayals of pharmaceutical trials.

Ticketing

Preview – $20
Artist / Discounted performances – $25
All other shows – $30 REGULAR / $40 I ♥︎ INDIE THEATRE

Click here to get your tickets!

Progress Lab is wheelchair accessible.

If you have any specific access needs or if ticket prices are a financial barrier please email: Angie at angie[at]rumble.org

Show Schedule

WEEK 1

Preview: Friday, November 7 at 7:30 pm

Opening Night: Saturday, November 8 at 7:30 pm

Discounted Evening: Monday, November 10 at 7:30 pm
Discounted Evening:Tuesday, November 11 at 7:30 pm

Evening: Wednesday, November 12 at 7:30 pm
Evening: Thursday, November 13 at 7:30 pm
Evening: Friday, November 14 @ 7:30 pm

Discounted Matinee: Saturday, November 15 @ 2 pm

Evening: Saturday, November 15 @ 7:30 pm – $30 & $40 tickets.

WEEK 2

Discounted Evening: Monday, November 17 at 7:30 pm
Discounted Evening: Tuesday, November 18 at 7:30 pm

Evening: Wednesday, November 19 at 7:30 pm
Evening: Thursday, November 20 at 7:30 pm
Evening: Friday, November 21 at 7:30 pm

CLOSING NIGHT: Saturday, November 22 at 7:30 pm

Plan Your Visit

For more information on how to get to Progress Lab 1422, please click here.

Meet the Cast & Creative Team

Paige Louter / CONNIE

Paige Louter (she/they) 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 works as a performer, writer, outside eye, and intimacy director. Paige produced The Café (ITSAZOO/Aphotic) and Sunrise Betties (ITSAZOO), produced/assistant directed Meeting (ITSAZOO/Pacific), co-produced and performed in The Wolves (With a Spoon/Rumble; Jessie Nomination: Outstanding Production) and performed in The Lonesome West (Cave Canem), Twelfth Night (Tottering Biped) and Coarse: The Brontes (Edinburgh Fringe). Year-round, they work as ITSAZOO’s Co-Artistic Producer and Currently Arts’ Operations Manager. Upcoming: solo shows God Joke Play and Nod.

Andy Kalirai  / TRISTAN

Andy Kalirai (he/him) is an actor and writer born and raised in Vancouver. He’s trained with Railtown Actors Studio and Tempest Theatre. Select credits include: Guards At The Taj (Vancouver Fringe), I & You (Tempest Theatre), Zahak: The Serpent King (The Biting School), and Gemini (Monsoon Festival) which he also wrote.

Meghan Gardiner / DR. LORNA JAMES

Theatre credits include: The Cull, The Sound of Music, Beauty and the Beast, A Christmas Story: the Musical, Blood Brothers, Paradise Garden, Evita (Arts Club Theatre), How The World Began (Pacific) The Boy in the Moon (Neworld Theatre), The Music Man, I Lost My Husband (Gateway Theatre), Dead Metaphor, Urinetown (Firehall Arts Centre) and The Last Five Years (Western Canada Theatre). Television credits include: The Flash, Family Law, The Good Doctor, Firefly Lane, A Million Little Things, Beyond, Backstrom, The L Word, Motherland, Supergirl and several Hallmark movies. Meghan is a YWCA Women of Distinction nominee and has written ten professionally produced plays.

Anthony Santiago (he/him) / DR. TOBY

Anthony is delighted to be making his ITSAZOO and Rumble Theatre debut.

Selected theatre credits include: Death and the King’s Horseman, King Lear, The Diviners
(Stratford Festival); Oliver!, Anne of Green Gables: The Musical (Gateway Theatre);
Heaven, Angels in America (The Citadel Theatre); Company (Raincity Theatre); Coriolanus, Love’s Labour’s Lost, The Winter’s Tale (Bard on the Beach); A Prayer for Owen Meany, Dark
Road, Superior Donuts (Ensemble Theatre Company)

Film & TV: Motherland: Fort Salem, Sonic the Hedgehog, SCTV

Other: Four-time Jessie award nominee and two-time winner; two-time Ovation award nominee.

Much love to my Beloved wife Alexis and my kids James and Nya-Manet

Jiv Parasram/ DIRECTOR

Jivesh Pararam (He/Him) is an award-winning multi-disciplinary artist, and facilitator of Indo-Caribbean descent. His work has toured Nationally and Internationally. Jiv is the founding Artistic Producer of Pandemic Theatre, and became the Artistic Director of Rumble Theatre following three years as the Associate Artistic Producer at Theatre Passe Muraille. He was a member of the Cultural Leader Lab with the Banff Centre and Toronto Arts Council. His public service work has included collaborations with the Ad Hoc Assembly, The Canadian Commission for UNESCO, and as an advisor to the National Arts Centre. His current cultural practice centres decolonization through aesthetics. As both a creator and a dramaturge Jiv has been involved in the development of numerous new plays and creation projects, several of which have gone on to be nominated for a Governor General’s Literary award in Drama. 

Lisa Goebel (she/her) / INTIMACY DIRECTOR

Select credits: choreographer/intimacy director for Bright Star (GTP/Mirvish), The Dark Lady (Bard on the Beach), A Doll’s House (Arts Club), and Pride & Prejudice (Western Canada/Gateway). Associate movement director/intimacy director for Choir Boy (Arts Club), and intimacy director for Die Fledermaus (Vancouver Opera), Yaga (Touchstone Theatre), and Waitress (Arts Club). Lisa is a certified intimacy director through Intimacy Directors and Coordinators and is a graduate of Studio 58.

Jack Goodison / TD & SOUND DESIGNER

Jack (He/Him) is a Technical Director and Sound/Video Designer who originates from the UK, now living in Vancouver. He works to create an atmosphere that immerses the audience into the world of the show, letting them escape reality and lose themselves in theatre. He has worked all across the UK and now designs on the ancestral and stolen lands of the Squamish, Musqueam and Tsleil-Waututh nations. 

Select TD/design credits include: Theatre Conspiracy (Himmat), Rice and Beans Theatre (Peace Country), Pi Theatre / Seizieme Theatre (Polygraph), Rumble Theatre (Las Pasiones de Don Pasquale; Chochito Rey; A Tavola), Axis Theatre (Where Have All the Buffalo Gone), Douglas College (The 39 Steps; Jane Austen Action Figure; Orlando; Mad Forest), Vancouver Opera (The Pearl Fishers).

Christine Quintanta (she/her) / COSTUME DESIGNER

Born in Los Angeles to a Mexican-American father and a Dutch-British-Canadian mother, Christine is now a grateful visitor to the unceded lands of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh people. Christine is an actor, playwright, and (very) emerging costume designer. For Rumble Theatre, she has served as co-playwright and costume designer for Shakespearean telenovela Chochito Rey (workshop production) and co-creator of Good Things To Do (digital tour).  For ITSAZOO Productions, she has been a faithful audience member for every show in Vancouver.  Thank you to her mentor Laura Fukumoto, and her fashion designer mom Kim Brower for their inspiration and support! Christinequintana.ca 

Monica Emme / SET, PROPS, PROJECTION DESIGNER

Monica Emme (she/her) is a set designer, props and puppet creator, and general maker, currently based in Vancouver.  Monica holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Toronto Metropolitan University and a diploma of Stagecraft and Event Technology from Douglas College.

Some favourite credits include: Set design: Every Day She Rose (Zee Zee Theater), Snow White (Carousel Theatre for Young People), Hadestown Teen Edition, & Newsies Jr. (Arts Umbrella); Production design: The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Arts Umbrella); Props: Peace Country (Rice & Beans Theatre), In My Day (Zee Zee Theatre), & Stuart Little (Carousel Theatre for Young People).

Find Monica at www.monicaemme.com

Phil Miguel (he/him) / LIGHTING DESIGNER

Originally a health care worker for the FVRD for over a decade, Phil decided to take his life in a slightly less dramatic direction and began his career in theatre. Over the most recent decade he has been a designer, director, actor, and producer in Vancouver spawning two theatre companies (Clockwork and Cave Canem) with multiple acclaimed and nominated productions. His past designs include lights for the best production nominated Lonesome West with Cave Canem Productions, set for Gramma with Pacific Theatre, and props for Wakey Wakey with Pacific Theatre. As production manager he enjoys learning how to create reconstructable pumpkins and sanskrit scrabble tiles and trying to figure out how to make things concurrently water and fire proof.

Maria Zarrillow (they/them) / STAGE MANAGER 

Maria Zarrillo (they/them) is a queer, non-binary Arts Manager with a background in organizational leadership, producing, stage management, advocacy, and research. They have worked with a variety of companies and communities in these capacities both locally and nationally. In addition to their freelance career, Maria is the Managing Director of Rumble Theatre. Maria is a graduate of Studio 58’s production program, the University of Winnipeg with a major in Theatre & Film and a minor in Human Rights, and has a Master of Arts in Justice Studies from Royal Roads University. Maria’s research looks to Queer Utopian Theory as a framework for addressing systemic inequities in the Canadian performing arts sector.