History of Expand the Canon
Founded in 2012, Hedgepig Ensemble, initially a producing organization, went gone through many phases to advocate for gender equity in classics. In 2020, Hedgepig began Expand the Canon, and officially became Expand the Canon in 2025.
2024
A year of monthly readings with 9 national partners
As we continue to focus on getting these under-sung classics to new audiences, we expanded our ‘season’ – we featured one play from our 2023 list each month. 8 of those 9 months featured readings of the plays – which we did with 9 partner theaters across the country.
NYC Partners: Classic Stage Company, Fiasco Theater, INTAR, The Acting Company, and Irish Repertory Theater
Virginia: American Shakespeare Center
California: Bay Area Drama
Chicago: Midsommer Flight
Washington: Island Shakespeare Festival — who also produced a full production of Aphra Behn’s The Lucky Chance in their summer season.
Our Reading Committee and Research Committee stayed strong and active, helping to produce the 2024 Expand the Canon List, which features short and one-act plays! This year’s curation team: Triza Cox, Gagarin, Kalina Ko, Emily Lyon, and Skye Pagon.
2023
As many plays as Shakespeare
We put out our fourth Expand the Canon list – totaling 36 featured writers (as many plays as Shakespeare!). The curation team grew and changed, with now 5 curators at the helm: Shannon Corenthin, Gagarin, Kalina Ko, Emily Lyon, and Skye Pagon.
We produced two staged readings featuring our ensemble of associated artists – a spring reading of Hannah Cowley’s A Bold Stroke for a Husband (2020 List), directed by Emily, and a fall reading of Lesya Ukrainka’s The Stone Host (2022 List), directed by new staff member Triza Cox.
As our curation team grew, and theaters began emerging more actively from the pandemic, so too did our impact. Island Shakespeare Festival committed to producing at least three years of Expand the Canon plays – starting with A Bold Stroke for a Husband, directed by Hedgepig Artistic Director Emily Lyon. Across the country, there were also productions of Las Pascualas (2022 List), A Bold Stroke for a Wife (2020 List), and more. To have a clearer sense of who was reading and accessing these plays, we launched our subscription service – helping us track how many artists and companies we’re serving while making this work possible.
2022
Expand the Canon becomes the cornerstone
In January 2022, Mary Candler stepped down from her role as Artistic Director and hired three leaders to take over the company: Emily Lyon as Artistic Director, Corri Oster as Managing Director, and Shannon Corenthin as Director of Production. Hedgepig also joined the Shakespeare Theatre Association, and attended their first conference in Pennsylvania where they made great connections.
Amongst the new leadership, and with success around this deeply necessary work, Hedgepig declared Expand the Canon to be its core focus. Our shift was from production company towards advocacy – where partnerships would be our main means of production.
We received our first NEA grant of $10,000, so the program was able to “expand.” We continued our Reading Committee, and with the brilliant suggestion from Skye Pagon, launched a Research Committee. Scenes from each play from the 2022 ETC list were professionally filmed to share over digital platforms. These were directed by Aneesha Kudtarkar, Emily Lyon, and Raphael Massie. Our fall festival featured bi-monthly “Loose Canon” casual come-as-you-are readings, with partner companies: The Sol Project, Island Shakespeare Festival, and Ma-Yi Theatre Company. These were held either in Brooklyn bars or via Zoom over the course of five months. The final piece of the 2022 Expand the Canon Festival included two panel discussions: “What is a Classic?” and “What is Being Produced?” Panelists included Melody Brooks (New Perspectives), Karen Ann Daniels (Folger Theatre), Danny Marin (Con Limon Productions), and Jill Rafson (Classic Stage Company).
We wrote an article published in American Theater Magazine, about the importance of translations in expanding our understanding of classics –– and supporting theatrical translations is a major element. Find that article here.
In celebration of its tenth anniversary, Hedgepig held its first “gala” type fundraiser, known as The Canon Ball, at Irondale in Brooklyn.
2021
Expand the Canon grows – and we explore creating new work
We continued our Expand the Canon added a reading committee of 30 readers to the Expand the Canon project, brought Kathy Bischoping on as a research associate for the project, and continued with our curator team from 2020. We created the festival in September in a hybrid format, partnering with Classical Theatre of Harlem, Ma-Yi Theatre Company, and The Sol Project on 3 virtual readings - which we paired with in-person watch parties in Brooklyn.
Our podcast, This Is A Classic! The Expand the Canon Theatre Podcast, launched online and featured one play per episode.
We commissioned Regina Robbins to develop a new play based on Mercy Otis Warren’s 1770s play, The Ladies of Castile. We held an in-person devising workshop for this project directed by Jo’Lisa Jones, dramaturged by Emily Lyon, and featuring Skye Pagon, Terra Chaney, Jory Murphy, Rafael Jordan, Jordan LaRoya, and Monica Rounds. That fall, we held a reading of the play, entitled War & Mercy, alongside our Expand the Canon festival.
The ensemble kept training online, and occasionally ventured out to in-person gatherings as the world began reopening. However, many of our members had left the city, or planned to leave soon. We closed 2021 with a Halloween production in the parks. Directed by Skye Pagon and produced by Rachel Schmeling, this was the ensemble’s first fully-devised production.
2020
Expand the Canon launches!
2020 marked a moment of re-orientation as we redefine the north star for the organization. It was also an extremely challenging year as the pandemic closed theaters suddenly. Yet, we persisted.
We launched the first Expand the Canon list, curated by Emily Lyon, Mary Candler, Skye Pagon, and Shannon Corenthin. It felt like the apex of our values: uplifting the voices of women in classic theater by declaring them as classics themselves. While for years we’d explored the traditional canon with femme folks at the helm, this crystalized our goals for the future of classics.
We announced the program in what had to shift to be an online announcement… in March of 2020. We spent the year reading and researching to choose our first 9 plays, and featured 4 of them in a virtual festival of readings in partnership with The Classical Theatre of Harlem, Ma-Yi Theatre Company, and American Players Theatre. We received excellent press from American Theatre, The New York Times, Playbill, and Token Theatre Friends.
Our ensemble pivoted to the changing year and times. We kept doing our monthly trainings, but they were now held on Zoom. We launched an anti-racism accountability group and engaged outsider trainers to further our work dismantling white supremacy within our company.
We also hosted a virtual cabaret in October entitled, “The Pursuit of Joy,” and finished the year with a virtual, episodic take on Little Women, adapted by Brooke Viegut, and featuring Desiree Baxter, Rachel Schmeling, Madeline Egan Addis, Ashley Kristeen Vega, and Samanthia Nixon.
2012
The Origin Story
Co-Founders Mary Candler and Gwendolyn Kelso met while pursuing their MFAs at The Shakespeare Theatre Company (DC). While there, they were struck by the power of an ensemble of artists who trained and grew together. Upon moving to NYC, Gwendolyn and Mary experienced both a strong desire among artists for a deep ensemble experience and a distinct void of female leadership in classical theatre.
On a blustery night in 2012, Mary and Gwen squirreled away in Prospect Lefferts Gardens, hiding from the raging winds of Hurricane Sandy. For 3 days, they drank coffee, imbibed cocktails, and chatted through their artistic experiences, ambitions, and the state of the world. By the time the MTA was running again and Mary returned home to Harlem, the unshakeable dream of a theater company had formed. In 2012, Hedgepig Ensemble Theatre was created to fill the void of female leadership in classical theater and provide a fulfilling ensemble experience in NYC. Fact: Neither Mary nor Gwen knew how to run a theater company nor produce a show. Over the first 3 years, the trial and error method prevailed alongside endless discovery of what Hedgepig could and should be.