Alison Matthews

Voice and Drama Coach

Alison Matthews is a veteran actor and voice artist with over two decades of experience in theatre, film, television, and radio. She is Head of Coaching for the Bard on the Beach Shakespeare Festival, and Interim Program Director for the Citadel Banff Professional Theatre Program. She has been a public speaking trainer and speech festival adjudicator in Western Canada for 18 years. Alison holds a M.F.A. in Theatre Voice Pedagogy from the University of British Columbia.

Barb Howard

Writing Mentor

Barb Howard has published a short story collection and four novels. She won the Howard O’Hagan Award for Short Fiction and the Exporting Alberta Award. Barb is a former lawyer and an established writing workshop facilitator who has been President of the Writers' Guild of Alberta, Writer-in-Residence for the Calgary Public Library and editor of FreeFall Magazine. She holds an MA in Creative Writing and, in 2019, completed the ICD-Rotman Not-for-Profit Governance Essentials Program. In addition to The Shoe Project, she currently sits on the Board of Directors of Calgary Arts Development and the Calgary Arts Foundation.

Caroline Adderson

Writing Mentor

Caroline Adderson is the author of four novels, two collections of short stories, as well as many books for young readers. Her work has received numerous award nominations including the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, two Commonwealth Writers’ Prizes, the Governor General’s Literary Award, the Rogers’ Trust Fiction Prize, and the Scotiabank Giller Prize long list. Winner of three BC Book Prizes and three CBC Literary Awards, Caroline was also the recipient of the 2006 Marian Engel Award for mid-career achievement.

Conni Massing

Writing Mentor

Conni is an award-winning writer working in theatre, film, and television. Stage credits include Matara and The Invention of Romance, both premiered by Workshop West Playwrights Theatre, Oh! Christmas Tree (Roxy Performance Series), and her widely-produced stage adaptations of W.O Mitchell’s Jake and the Kid and Bruce Allen Powe’s The Aberhart Summer. Conni has worked as a story editor on television series such as Mentors, The Beat, North of 60, The Adventures of Shirley Holmes, Taking it Off, and Family Restaurant. Film projects include two feature-length comedies (in development) and two short films: Invisible, co-written with and directed by Neil Grahn and Voila, co-produced and directed by Geraldine Carr. Conni has several publications to her credit, including six of her plays and a comic memoir, Roadtripping: On the Move with the Buffalo Gals (Brindle and Glass Publishing). Her writing has been recognized by AMPIA, the Academy of Cinema and Television, the Betty Mitchell Awards, the Writers Guild of Alberta, and the Elizabeth Sterling Haynes Awards. A proud member of the Playwrights Guild of Canada, Conni is currently serving as the Regional Writer-in-Residence for the Metro Edmonton Library System.

Denise Clarke

Voice Mentor

Denise Clarke C.M. is the Associate Artist of One Yellow Rabbit Theatre. In 2018 she wrote and launched The Big Secret Book, An Intense Guide For Creating Performance Theatre. She is a member of the Order of Canada and holds an Honourary Doctorate from the University of Calgary.

Denise Fujiwara

Performance Coach

Helen Rolfe

Writing Mentor

Kate Lynch

Performance Coach and Director

Kate is an award-winning actor who has worked in theatre, television and radio. She is also a theatre director whose credits include French Without Tears by Terrence Rattigan and Star Chamber by Noel Coward, for the Shaw Festival; for Theatre Passe Muraille, an all-female A Midsummer Night’s Dream, three plays by Tom Walmsley - Blood, Descent and Three Squares a Day and several seasons with the Blyth Festival. As a playwright, she wrote Early August, for the Blyth Festival, The Road to Hell, co-written with Michael Healey for the Tarragon Theatre, and Tales of the Blond Assassin for Summerworks and CBC radio. Kate has also taught at the Stratford and Shaw Festivals, the National Theatre School, George Brown, and The University of Toronto Drama Program. This is her second year being involved with The Shoe Project, an honour to work with such extraordinary women.

Katherine Govier

Founder Board Chair of The Shoe Project

@kmgovier

Katherine Govier is the author of ten novels and three collections of short stories. Her novel Creation was a New York Times Notable book of 2010. The Ghost Bush, the story of Hokusai’s daughter and collaborator, was published in Japan, the US, the UK, Spain, France and other countries. She has won The Toronto Book Award, The Engel-Findlay award for a writer in mid- career, and has been shortlisted for the Trillium Prize. She has been President of PEN Canada and Chair of the Writers’ Trust. Katherine founded and is Artistic Director of The Shoe Project, a national writing and public speaking charity for immigrant and refugee women. Katherine’s most recent novel is The Three Sisters Bar and Hotel, a story of a pioneer trail-riding family in the Canadian Rockies. She is at present completing her eleventh novel, which returns to the subject of the great Japanese printmaker and his equally-great daughter.

Leah Cherniak

Voice and Drama Coach

Leah Cherniak is an indispensable member of The Shoe Project.  As our innovative voice and drama coach for almost a decade, she has worked patiently with the participants so that they can deliver their personal stories confidently on a public stage.

Leah is an award-winning director, playwright, actor, and teacher. After receiving her BA from the University of Toronto in 1979, she studied theatre at Ecole Jacques Lecoq, a drama school in Paris. She co-founded Theatre Columbus (now Common Boots Theatre) and has been the theatre's co-artistic director with Martha Ross for over 25 years.

As a director, Leah has been associated with various Canadian theatres, including the National Arts Centre, Tarragon Theatre, Soulpepper Theatre, the Blyth Theatre Festival, and Montreal's Saidye Bronfman Centre. As a teacher, she has taught in theatre programs at the University of Toronto, George Brown College--and Ryerson University where she runs an intensive clown course. 

The Toronto Shoe Project women feel fortunate to be guided by someone with Leah's level of dedication and expertise.

Momoye Sugiman

Writing Mentor

Born and raised in Toronto, Momoye is a veteran ESL teacher with a keen interest in anti-racist education and a passion for helping newcomers nurture their creativity and empower themselves. Since the inception of The Shoe Project, she has been involved as an ESL coach, copy editor and recruiter. Momoye holds a BA in English Literature, a Certificate in Teaching ESL and an MA in Immigration and Settlement Studies. She has written various articles and edited two books featuring oral histories.

Olive Senior

Writing Mentor

Olive Senior was born in Jamaica and lives in Toronto. She has worked internationally as a creative writing teacher and lecturer on Caribbean literature and culture. She is on the faculty of the Humber School for Writers, Toronto and has taught in the writing programmes at University of Toronto, St Lawrence University, and Barnard College, Columbia University, New York. Olive Senior's work has been broadcast on both sides of the Atlantic, including the BBC Book at Bedtime and the CBC Festival of Fiction. Her short story “You Think I Mad, Miss?” was produced and performed as 'Mad Miss' by Theatre Archipelago in 2005 at Artword Theatre, Toronto. She has published novels, short stories and non-fiction. Her work has been included in the Best Poems on the Underground published by London Transport and she is a featured poet on The Poetry Archive.

Sarah Weatherwax

Voice and Drama Coach

Originally from the US, Sarah is an actor and voice teacher. She has an honours BFA in Acting from Emerson College and has done voice work on numerous shows including Crawford, Young Drunk, Haven, Heartland, Saving Hope and movies such as The Book of Negroes, Beeba Boys and Hobo with a Shotgun. Her production of Mud by Maria Irene Fornes, received four Ns from NOW Magazine, Toronto’s primary arts paper. She was the recipient of a generous grant from the Canada Council for the Arts to complete her voice teacher training with the renowned Kristin Linklater in 2003. Along with private voice/audition coaching, she's worked as an on-set acting coach and taught at various companies & schools: Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Massachusetts; Humber College Comedy Program in Toronto; Workman Arts, a company devoted to fine arts training for people struggling with addiction and/or mental illness; and Straeon Acting Studios in Toronto, Montreal and Boston.