Realwheels Theatre

Realwheels Theatre invites Vancouver’s, Canada’s, and the world’s most compelling creators to explore the complex and nuanced experience of disability with them.

Prioritizing the development of live performance by artists who identify anywhere on the full spectrum of disability, Realwheels Theatre works with established theatre-makers, emerging voices, and curious community members alike. For those looking to move from the community to the professional sphere, the company offers The Academy: a three-year training program specifically designed to prepare disability-identified artists for full and satisfying careers in creation and performance.

From professional productions to training to community engagement, Realwheels Theatre’s work challenges long-held stereotypes of representation. The company’s stories do not tokenize. They do not explain or justify the lives of people with disabilities or disabled people; and their characters are not symbols of loss, or triumph, or anger, or patience. Their characters do not offer tidy lessons in acceptance or perseverance. Instead, Realwheels Theatre invites artists and audiences to come with them as they discover new ways to tell stories that are as rich, full, and varied as they are.

This is not only true of Realwheels Theatre’s performance-ready work, but also of its creative processes. At Realwheels, each new project is as individual as the artists who make it, which means building access needs for both audiences and artists into every work from the very beginning of its development. The company asks how it can offer access not only as a fundamental necessity, but as an invaluable creative tool in its own right.

Over its 20-year history, Realwheels Theatre has worked with hundreds of artists and hosted thousands of patrons. But at the heart, Realwheels is a company of three—managing co-artistic director Shawn Macdonald, co-artistic-director Adam Grant Warren, and company producer Jordyn Wood. Its small size means big focus. The company takes its time on a select few projects that it really believes in. And they invite their audiences to join them at every step because they understand how important it is to be involved, engaged, and valued—to be fully seen and heard—on stage and off.