Northern Light Theatre (NLT)

Northern Light Theatre was founded in 1975 by Scott Swan and Allan Lysell as Edmonton's first lunch-hour theatre company. Northern Light Theatre (otherwise known as NLT) performed in the Edmonton Art Gallery Theatre weekdays at noon lunch box performances for $2. In the first season, 75/76, NLT presented 18 one-act productions, including musical revues, classics, and Canadian plays both old and new.

Throughout the 70s and 80s, the company produced an astonishing number and variety of plays every year, showcasing the work of local playwrights like Jim De Felice alongside dramas by GB Shaw and Brecht, taking on musical comedy, prairie drama, children's theatre and classics with never-flagging verve. In the summer of 1980, As You Like It and A Midsummer Night's Dream played in repertoire under a huge tent on Connors Hill giving Edmonton its first taste of Shakespeare in the Park.

The NLT mandate, re-written in 1994, emphasizes the importance of "provocative scripts - language-rich texts that are dark, poetic, funny...". As NLT celebrated its 25th anniversary in 1999/2000, it had established a reputation as an alternative theatre dedicated to development and innovation.

Over the past few years, NLT has further defined themselves as a company concentrated on embracing and promoting local Edmonton talent. Under the creative imagination of the current Artistic Director, Trevor Schmidt, Northern Light Theatre is dedicated to produce intimate and affecting work that speaks to the modern audience of the urban human condition, the failure to find security and the loss of the dreams held by all for love and happiness.

©2006 NLT -11516 - 103 Street Edmonton, AB T5G 2H9
780.471.1586 or nlt.publicity@telusplanet.net Site design: Woodward Design