The Kick & Push Festival
The Kick & Push Festival is an annual innovative performance festival that takes place in Kingston, Ontario. It is a professionally run month-long summer festival featuring award-winning Canadian performers and original, internationally award-winning work across alternative and traditional venues in Kingston.
Artistic Producer Liam Karry and the Kingston Theatre Alliance strive to offer something for everyone and ensure that it is always, always unconventional.
What Is Innovative Theatre?
The Kick & Push aims to push the traditional concept of what theatre is, or could be. As an audience member you may take your seat in someone’s living room instead of an auditorium, or you may be invited to get out of your seat to join in a friendly game of basketball on stage (up to you!). Whatever happens at a K&P show, it won’t be what you have come to expect from a night at the theatre.
History
In 2015, a new summer attraction launched in Kingston promising to be no ordinary theatre festival. With productions exploring the secrets hidden inside of historic downtown landmarks, audience members joining performers on stage and plays inside cars, The Kick & Push Festival demonstrated the power of immersive and site-specific theatre by engaging audiences with innovative performances.
The Festival’s unusual name pays homage to Kingston’s historic past, in particular the old Kingston and Pembroke railway. Known as the K&P line, it is affectionately remembered as the Kick and Push trail. By re-purposing the namesake, the Festival echoes the effects that the railway had on Kingston: to bring further development to the city, and connect people and communities.
The productions produced by K&P continue the Kingston connection by telling the stories of the city and using unique spaces that can only be found here, created by local artists, or artists who have a strong connection to the community. The Kick & Push Festival tells old stories in new ways and new stories in old places, giving audiences a glimpse into cultural and historical spaces. This Festival is bound to be a unique, one-of-a-kind theatre-going experience, only to be had in Kingston.
Sector Development
The Kick & Push Festival, through the Kingston Theatre Alliance, is dedicated to developing the local performance sector in Southeastern Ontario. Through the presentation of professionally paid work, Kick & Push creates opportunities for local and visiting artists to create, present, and excite Kingston audiences and artists alike. As a vehicle for sector development, the Festival provides opportunities for cross pollination between local and visiting artists, facilitates touring pipelines for productions, and ample residency opportunities for the creation and sharing of new works.