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Showstoppers

Early 1950s club Ryerson Opera Workshop composes the right melody

Ryerson Opera Workshop’s 1969 production of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.

PHOTOGRAPH RYERSONIA YEARBOOK 1969, COURTESY OF THE RYERSON UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES

RYERSON FIRST CAUGHT the acting bug long before celebrities would premiere their movies at the Ryerson Theatre during the Toronto International Film Festival.

Exceptional talent on campus found a new outlet in 1951 with the creation of the Ryerson Opera Workshop (ROW), an extracurricular group where students from all programs could live out their musical theatre dreams.

Founded by Jack McAllister, head of Ryerson’s English department at the time, ROW was designed to allow students to express their creativity and provide entertainment for the school community. In addition to acting, dancing and singing, students were also responsible for costume design, set production, lighting and makeup. The first production was a double bill of The Devil and Daniel Webster, and Down in the Valley. Despite the group’s name, ROW focused on popular musical theatre, and the repertoire included Broadway hits such as Once Upon a Mattress, Bye Bye Birdie, Snow White, The Wizard of Oz, The Beggar’s Opera and Peter Pan.

With the birth of the Ryerson Theatre School in 1971 (now the Ryerson School of Performance), there was a more formal approach to productions, resulting in a professional theatre training program. Today, School of Performance students work with award-winning faculty, in addition to many of Canada’s top artists and arts managers.

—By Antoinette Mercurio

48 Ryerson University Magazine / Winter 2019