Arts & Culture

Richmond actor brings classic villain to life

By Hannah Scott, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

Published 4:24 PST, Thu December 16, 2021

Last Updated: 12:26 PST, Mon January 10, 2022

Richmond’s Avery Taylor plays the villain in this holiday season’s Metro Theatre pantomime, a retelling of the classic story of Snow White. 

“Getting to play the Evil Queen for me was something I’d always wanted to do,” says Taylor. “When I started working on the show, I started a lot with voice and with finding the queen’s voice. It was challenging, because I hadn’t used my voice in a long time.”

With help from choreographer Suzanne Ouellette, Taylor also worked with physical gesture to allow her to take on her character’s larger-than-life presence.

“Probably one of the biggest challenges for me was allowing myself to take up all that space—(my character) is very self-involved because she’s the queen, everyone bow down. I’m not like that as much, so that was kind of interesting,” she says.

Taylor, who graduated last year from Simon Fraser University’s theatre performance program, says it was exciting to be back in the theatre after the COVID-19 pandemic decimated the industry.

It was one of those things where everything changed for a period of time, and then kind of re-introducing yourself to getting to perform live theatre,” she says.

Taylor’s entry into acting came through a love of storytelling and being able to connect with an audience through narratives. She first became involved with theatre while attending McNair secondary, where she was a part of shows including Grease and a musical version of Sleepy Hollow. 

She first dipped her toe into the pantomime genre during the pandemic, when she worked remotely with a Toronto-based company for an online show. The genre originated in England and is built around songs, comedy, audience participation, and specific characters including a “dame” (female character played by a man) and a villain. 

One of Taylor’s favourite roles she’s ever played was a clown who did little mimed performances around an installation-based show at the Orpheum called Still Life Continuum. Having seen shows there before, she says she enjoyed the experience of performing there herself.

And during university, Taylor directed a show called These Shining Lives, which she says was a good introduction to the process of directing.

In the future, Taylor says she’d love to continue to play characters like the Evil Queen. She’s also interested in acting for film, which she plans to continue to pursue.

“I love theatre, and I just always encourage people to go see shows because every show is unique and different and you get all these experiences,” she says. “It’s really an awesome moment to reconnect—there’s been a lot of that. It’s very community-based, and being able to connect with people and share a laugh is at the bare bones of it.”

Director Chris Adams says Snow White lends itself well to a smaller cast, which numbers just 15 as opposed to the annual pantomime’s usual 30. When writing the script back in May, “there wasn’t just Plan A and Plan B, there was Plan A to Z.”

Instead of the audience joining the cast on stage, or actors going into the audience, the usual audience participation will be limited to a traditional rendition of “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” a game of charades, and some other elements. Despite these changes, Adams thinks the audience will still feel welcomed and involved.

The Metro theatre is located in south Vancouver, just across the Arthur Laing Bridge. Snow White runs through Jan. 3. For more information or to buy tickets, click here.

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