On August 8th Guild Festival Theatre will be giving the world premiere performance of Heratio, a re-imagining of Hamlet that picks up the story where Shakespeare left off, giving voice to the women and servants who are left to clean up the mess created by the intrigues of princes and kings.

Heratio is the latest play from acclaimed playwright Genevieve Adam, who has made an impact with several new works over the past decade, since returning from UK where she made a name for herself as an actor. Genevieve is part of the Creator’s Units at the Capitol Theatre in Port Hope (where her new musical Rez Gas opens August 22nd) and the Guild Festival Theatre in Toronto.

Heratio was developed through In Conversation With Classics, Guild Festival Theatre’s program for new plays.

I asked Genevieve a few questions.

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Barczablog: Are you more like your father or mother?

Genevieve Adam: My father is British and likes to leave the butter out on the counter to get nice and rancid – I’ve noticed I’m guilty of this more and more. He also used to force us to go on long walks with him, which we hated and complained loudly about at the time….and which, sure enough, I now force my own children to go on.

My mother has watched every Agatha Christie adaptation ever made and can crack a suspicious death in 60 minutes or less. She worked in a male dominated field and took absolutely no shit from anyone. She comes from a long line of women with spines of steel who took their knocks and kept on going, and I hope I continue their legacy.

BB: What is the best or worst thing about what you do?

The best part is being in control of my own writing output, and the worst part is being in control of my own writing output. There is no surer way to guarantee that my bathroom will be sparkling clean than to give me a writing deadline.

BB: Who do you like to listen to or watch?

Genevieve Adam: My kids are really into manga, and they’ve gotten me into it. I also love bardcore i.e. contemporary songs remixed with ancient instruments. You haven’t lived until you’ve heard the harp n’ bagpipes version of “Pink Pony Club”.

BB: What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

Genevieve Adam: Reading music.

BB: When you’re just relaxing and not working, what is your favourite thing to do?

Genevieve Adam: Drink coffee (I am very committed to good coffee!), go on long walks with friends, get lost in a new city.

BB: Who do you think of first, when I ask you to name the best actor ?

Genevieve Adam: I’m loving evil Hugh Grant. Alicia Vikander. The whole ensemble of We Are Lady Parts and What We Do In The Shadows. So many wonderful actors out there.

BB: What was your first experience of drama?

Genevieve Adam: Seeing a community theatre production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at 6 years old and deciding, that’s for me baby!

BB: What’s your favourite play?

Genevieve Adam: Right now I’m really interested in exploring whether a theatre play experience can actually scare an audience, so I’m obsessed with “2.22 – A Ghost Story” by Danny Robins. But I also want to shout out some Canadian playwrights I love and respect who are creating amazing work: Michael Ross Albert, Pamela Sinha, Frances Koncan, Steven Elliott Jackson, Makram Ayache, Marcia Johnson, Lili Robinson and Philip Dwight Morgan. 

BB: You have been prolific, as your bio shows several new works over the past decade. Could you talk a bit about your development and how to see Heratio in context with your writing?

Genevieve Adam: Heratio is a bit of a departure from my previous works in that there are no eff-bombs and no one having sex on a table! People do still die though, so any fans out there can take comfort that at least some things never change!

My previous works deal a lot with reframing traditionally white, male narratives from a female and First Nations perspective. Heratio is a continuation of my interest in reframing well-known classics, only this time from the point of view of women and servants. So we’re playing more with a class and gender lens: not so much obsessed with what the rich dudes are up to, but more with what the people cleaning up all the blood and making the sandwiches are scheming and dreaming about.

I also love writing period pieces, because I have a lot of fun being anachronistic and undercutting the sometimes stuffy nature of Ye Olde Shakespeare Summer Play. 

BB: You’re an award-winning playwright who received accolades for your writing. How do you feel about the way writing is received and presented in Canada, especially in Ontario?

Genevieve Adam: I had a weird experience of this early on in my writing career. I’d been to theatre school in Ontario, did the rounds on the circuit for a few years, and then went on to do my master’s in the UK. I ended up working there pretty consistently as an artist for many years, with some big internationally known companies, and when I did decide to come back to Toronto, I naively thought this experience would be respected and would open some doors for me. Instead I got a lot of feedback like: “Oh, who are you? We don’t know you. Who do you know that we know?” and “Wow, you missed out on some really formative years. You didn’t make those contacts.” And meanwhile I was also being told my work was great, exciting….but to come back in 10 years when I “knew more people.” There’s always an element of this in any hiring process, of course – but it felt cliquey and exclusionary in a very Toronto way. This scarcity mindset. In the UK – and obviously it’s a very different market, with a different history and much more government funding – artistic directors would want to meet with you if they didn’t know your work, would actively seek you out to see if you could pool resources and make a bigger pie. In Toronto it was more like: “get away, this is MY pie, I’m not sharing.”

BB: In August Guild Festival Theatre present the world premiere of Heratio, described in the press release as  “a bold re-imagining of Hamlet that picks up the story after Shakespeare’s ending.”   Please tell us more

Genevieve Adam: Heratio is what happens if you took Game of Thrones but made it Downton Abbey. We pick up right where Hamlet left off, only this time, the action doesn’t concern the princes and kings. We focus on two servants, mopping blood off the floor, worried about their job security now that there’s been a regime change, jockeying to manoeuvre themselves to better advantage in a changing world. Throw in some political scheming, a murder mystery, a broken heart, and a ghost or two, and you get a funny, whimsical, but hopefully moving story about navigating grief, loss and identity. 

Our log line is “What if nothing you thought you knew about Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” was true?”, but we’ve crafted the show so that you don’t need to be a Hamlet scholar to understand the action (although there are some juicy easter eggs in there for the real Hamlet aficionados!)

BB: As I recall Hamlet ends with a lots of bodies on the stage. Is Heratio as bloody as Shakespeare?

Genevieve Adam: There may be some mirroring of that original high body count, yes……

BB: What characters will we see in Heratio? 

Genevieve Adam: You’ll get to meet a lot of behind the scenes folks at Elsinore: the servants, the kitchen staff, the “below stairs” who lived through Hamlet and had to clean up its aftermath. In terms of OG Hamlet characters, I can definitely confirm the presence of Horatio and Fortinbras, and some other fan favourites may make an appearance as well!

BB: I see in the press release that Heratio was developed through In Conversation With Classics, Guild Festival Theatre’s program for new plays. Please talk about that experience. 

Genevieve Adam: I knew the ADs of the Guild Helen and Tyler through having worked with them before. They approached me about joining the inaugural playwrights unit and of course I said yes! I really love working with both of them, and they’re doing incredibly fun, high-quality work at the Guild, so it was really a no-brainer. And then when I found out who the other members of the unit were – Keith Barker, Thomas Morgan Jones, and Azeem Nathoo – I doubled down every harder. These are all folks with impressive playwriting and theatre experiences under their collective belts, and I jumped at the chance to work with them. We would meet at regularly scheduled times via zoom, read each other’s works in progress, offer our thoughts and encouragement. Writing is such a solitary business, so it was incredible to feel that there were other pilgrims along on my writing journey, walking the same road, cheering each other on to keep going. 

BB: Tell us about the GFT production of Heratio.

Genevieve Adam: It is literally a dream cast: Janelle Hanna, Phoenix Fire, Rashaana Cumberbatch, Philippa Domville, Jack Davidson, and Siobhan Richardson.

Nancy Anne Perrin is making everyone look gorgeous on beautiful sets, while Sean Meldrum is creating an original soundtrack and Adam Walters is lighting the team. Helen Juvonen is directing, and Hamlet is one of her subjects of special expertise, so I am doubly blessed!

And it all takes place in the beautiful Greek Theatre in the Guild Park and Gardens.

BB:  In 2025 Canadian culture seems precarious. We hear “elbows up”.  I want to thank you and GFT for doing your part, although we may forget the importance of local culture, employing local talent. 

Genevieve Adam: I really see an appetite for this – people want to see local talents creating stories made here on these lands, telling our stories, in all the diversity and scope that this implies. Audiences are no longer content to let other countries and cultures dictate what “good” theatre is and what they should be watching (although I enjoyed Hamilton as much as anybody!) We may not always be sure who we are as a nation and as a culture, but we’re exploring and discovering and redefining this identity constantly through our arts, and that’s something to celebrate.

BB: Could you offer any advice to Canadians writing for the stage?

Genevieve Adam: Be persistent! Submit to every festival and competition and writing retreat you can. Go to openings and meet people. You need people to get to know your work and want to work with you. Until they do, apply for all the grants and self-produce. Repeat for 10 to 15 years (kidding not kidding!)

BB Do you have any influences / teachers you want to acknowledge

Genevieve Adam: All the amazing people who have encouraged me and cheered me on throughout the years. Special shout out to my dear friend Patrick Conner, whose tireless friendship and faith in me led me to become a playwright in the first place.

Thank you!

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Discover more about the playwright at her website.

Guild Festival Theatre present the world premiere of Heratio, preview August 7th, running August 8- 24 at the Guild Festival Theatre. For tickets & info click here.