In Hot Thespian Action! Robin Whittaker argues that new plays can thrive in amateur theatres, which have freedoms unavailable to professionalized companies. And he proves it with ten relevant, engaging playscripts originally produced by one of Canada’s longest-running theatres, Edmonton’s acclaimed Walterdale Theatre Associates. This collection challenges notions that amateur theatre is solely a phenomenon of the pre-professional past. In this, the first North American anthology in eighty years, Whittaker makes an important contribution to Canadian theatre studies. Plays by: Brad Fraser, Mary Glenfield, Warren Graves, Gordon Pengilly, Barbara Sapergia & Geoffrey Ursell, Trevor Schmidt, Jonathan Seinen, Scott Sharplin, Mark Stubbings, and Wilfred Watson.

Robin C. Whittaker teaches, directs, writes, and creates theatre with students at St. Thomas University in Fredericton, New Brunswick where he is Associate Professor and Drama Advisor in the Department of English and Artistic Producer and Faculty Advisor for Theatre St. Thomas. He holds a doctorate in drama from the University of Toronto’s Centre for Drama, Theatre, and Performance Studies; a masters in drama from the University of Alberta; and an honours bachelor of arts in English and Theatre from Wilfrid Laurier University. At St. Thomas University he teaches courses in directing, acting, theatre theory and criticism, and dramatic literature and has supervised students in the fields of Canadian theatre and marginalization, scriptwriting, and stage management. He has written plays produced at universities and Fringe festivals in Edmonton, Winnipeg, Waterloo, and Fredericton and directed several maritime premieres for Theatre St. Thomas, including Michel Marc Bouchard’s The Coronation Voyage, Michael Hollingworth’s Trudeau and the FLQ, and the world premiere of No White Picket Fence. He currently serves as Vice President of the Canadian Association for Theatre Research (CATR). He is editor of the new play anthology Hot Thespian Action: Ten Premiere Plays from Walterdale Playhouse (2009 AUP), and contributed the Forward to Sally Clark’s WANTED (Talonbooks 2004). He is the founding editor of STU Reviews, Fredericton’s only ongoing theatre reviewing website. Robin has written articles on a range of Canadian theatre topics, many of which are related to nonprofessionalizing (community or amateur) theatre in the “professional era”; these are found in journals such as Theatre Research in Canada and Canadian Theatre Review.

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"As a contribution to Canadian theatre, Hot Thespian Action! deserves notice, not just for the novelty of the subject, but for the perceptive commentary in the critical materials and the eclectic collection of undiscovered plays."

Nicholas Hanson