Oct. 3, 2001:

Canada is a country of three cultures -- English, French and "first nations." Tenuously held together by a thin political thread, these cultures have often shown a tendency for violence and distrust toward another. Strife and the near-dissolution of the Confederation have been all too common occurences. But the arts -- especially the live theatre -- have been a unifying factor from the beginning of European settlement in upper North America. From the opening of Le Théâtre Neptune en la Nouvelle France in 1606, when French settlers and Micmac Indians put on a recital of choral song and music, to the Dominion Drama Festival beginning in the 1930s, in which English- and French-speaking playwrights together offered their works in Ottawa and other cities, to more recent developments such as the Newfoundland Francophone Festival, wherin the island province -- still English ruled until 1948 -- put together an event to honor its French culture, the stage has been used to develop at least the illusion of consensus in Canada's multi-cultural society. Canada has long been on the verge of splitting, with the Province of Quebec continually threatening to seceede from the confederation and the territory on Nunavut under the rule of native people, but the theatre has long been a factor in unifying Canadian culture.