Cayle Award Spotlights
Dorothy Atabong
Born and raised in Cameroon, Central Africa and educated in the USA and Canada, Dorothy A. Atabong is an award-winning Actor-Writer-Producer-Director. She obtained a BSc. in Biochemistry from Michigan, before moving on to graduate from the Neighborhood Playhouse School of Theatre in New York City. She’s been featured in the Toronto Star, Globe and Mail, Now Magazine, BBC World Cup Magazine, ScreenAfrica, and was invited to the Women in The Director’s Chair workshop in Banff Canada. Her screenplay Daisy’s Heart won 2011 Best Low Budget Script at the Female Eye Film Festival, and in 2020 her screenplay Eye of the Veil was shortlisted for the Fade In Awards and BlueCat. Dorothy’s short film Sound Of Tears, produced under her company Ayinke Films Inc., marked her directorial debut. It has since screened at over 35 film festivals worldwide and garnered numerous nominations and awards including the Africa Movie Academy Award in 2015. Visit www.dorothyatabong.com and follow Dorothy on IG: @dorothyatabong
Jani Lauzon
Jani Lauzon is a Metis multidisciplinary actor/filmmaker/musician. She is a four-time Dora Mavor Moore nominated actress, a three-time Juno nominated singer/songwriter, a Gemini Award-winning puppeteer and an award-winning screen actress. Television guest appearances include Saving Hope, Hard Rock Medical, Destiny Ridge and Conspiracy of Silence. Her first short film “eu·tha·na·sia” continues to screen at festivals and her three independent recordings, Blue Voice/New Voice, Thirst and Mixed Blessings are available at www.indiepool.com. In 2010 she created Paper Canoe Projects to support the development and production of her theatre and film work. Along with her upcoming short film “Just One Word” she has three theatre projects in various stages of development: A Side of Dreams (on tour Summer 2016), Prophecy Fog (at the Magnetic North Theatre Festival June 2016) and I Call myself Princess (slated for production in March 2018). Jani has also been a strong advocate for inclusivity of cultural and physically diverse artists on Canadian screens.
email: jani@janilauzon.com or info@papercanoeprojects.com
Website: www.janilauzon.com, www.papercanoeprojects.com
Shannon Fewster
Shannon Fewster is a Toronto-based Producer and Creator. She recently Produced Kristal Clear, a web series about an internet celebrity who awakes on new years day to discover she’s invisible. Kristal Clear won Best Series at Hollyweb 2018 and Best Actress in a comedy. In development is The Girl Code, a web series she created with the motivation to encourage teen girls in STEM subjects by giving them comedic role models of girls who code, invent and make mischief. She was the co-producer of the web series Sudden Master [Vancouver Web Fest, Rockie Awards, Hollyweb], Producer of Divorce Photographer [Hollyshorts, CIFF, Whistler, San Jose] a short film produced with the National Screen Institute as part of their short dramatic program in 2014 and Emily [CBC Short Film Face Off] a BravoFact short film. Some of her previous credits include Associate Producer on Born To Be Blue, and Assistant Production Coordinator on Midnight’s Children. Shannon has several feature films in development. Let It Rain with New Real Films and Meelad Moaphi, Hey 45 with Morwyn Brebner, Tim Southam, Anna Stratton and Joshua Demers, and Quebexit with Joshua Demers.
Jenulla Jiwani
Jenulla Jiwani is an award winning actress, screenwriter, playwright, producer & singer/songwriter. From humble beginnings her parents immigrated to Canada from Uganda with just pennies in their pockets in hopes for a better life. Fenulla was born in Toronto and her passion and desire for the performing arts began with her first performance at the age of five in a ballet recital. She trained at the Randolph Academy for the Performing Arts and graduated in 2004. Since graduating, Fenulla launched FenStar Productions to create compelling stories that touch the human spirit, expressed through multidisciplinary mediums, and cast ethnically diverse performers. Fenulla has written and performed in six of her stage productions “Light of India,” “Bollywood Bonanza,” “The Source,” “Qalam-e Ishq (Pen of Love),” “30 Dates” and “Paul and Priya’s Wedding.” Her critically acclaimed production, “30 Dates,” toured Canada for two years performing at renowned theatres and earned her accolades in major magazines, newspapers & television. Fenulla is also a passionate singer/songwriter; in 2012, she released an 18-track album, entitled “Divinity We Are One” with performances in Canada, USA & India. In September 2014, she celebrated the 10 year Anniversary of FenStar Productions with the launch of her two films, ‘NOBODY’ and ‘BLACKBOX SHADOW,’ which have since had their World Premieres in Toronto, India, UK, and Indonesia and are slated for other festivals around the globe. NOBODY film has won several awards, recently receiving the honour of Best Overall Film at the 2014 International Film Festival for Spirituality/Religion/Visionary in Jakarta Indonesia.
Andrea Scott
Andrea Scott is a professional playwright & producer who after completing a year in the Obsidian Theatre Playwright Unit saw her play Eating Pomegranates Naked accepted into SummerWorks where it won the RBC Arts Professional award, named Best Ensemble, and Outstanding Production. She was commissioned by Mixed Company Theatre to write Frenemies, a TYA play which toured in 2014 shortly thereafter. Her playBetter Angels: A Parable won the SummerWorks award for Production in August 2015 and was recognized as Outstanding New Play, Outstanding Ensemble, Outstanding Direction (Nigel Shawn Williams) and Outstanding Production by NOW Magazine. Better Angels: A Parable had its US debut at the Athena Festival in Chicago in December 2015. Her second TYA play, Princesses Don’t Grow on Trees, debuted in April debuted at Solar Stage in April and she is currently in the Natural Resources Playwright’s Unit at Factory Theatre working on new play, ‘All Most Be Longing’. Andrea is a CAEA, ACTRA, PGC, DGA member who recently graduated from the inaugural Artist Producer Training Program run by STAF/Theatre Ontario.
email: andreammscott@hotmail.com
Web: www.callmescottyproductions.com
Twitter: Call Me Scotty@andreammscott
Jenn Forgie
Jenn is a professional actor, writer and mentor of Métis, French Canadian and Scottish, Irish descent. She is deeply interested in issues of identity and belonging, with a focus on the full embodied belonging first to ones’ Self and Body, as is explored in her current and first play, Seven Pieces. She began developing Seven Pieces as a member of Native Earth Performing Arts 2-year development program in the Animikiig Creators’ Unit. In 2019, Jenn received multiple Ontario Arts Council Recommender Grants and a Canada Council for the Arts grant under the Creating, Knowing and Sharing: The Arts and Cultures of First Nations, Inuit and Métis Peoples – Short-Term Projects for a series of development workshops engaging the artistry of several Indigenous actors, vocal and movement artists to further develop Seven Pieces. In February 2020, Jenn was accepted into Stratford Festival’s first Script Incubator programme for creators of new work and is also a participant in Theatre Passe Muraille’s BUZZ Development Program with Artistic Director, Marjorie Chan as her dramaturge. An excerpt of Jenn’s play was recently published in Understorey, Issue 16: Diverse Stories of Women on Stage.
Aisha Evelyna
Born to Canadian parents of Caribbean descent, Aisha Evelyna (she/her) is passionate about bringing stories of the underrepresented to the forefront of our social purview. She is an actor, writer, and filmmaker, who holds a BA with specialized honours in Theatre from York University
As an actor Recent Film/ TV appearances include the comedy series The Influencers Streaming on Amazon Prime, Slo Pitch on Out TV, and CBC’s Workin’ Moms.
In 2019 Aisha was nominated by Premiere Online Magazine for Canadian Black culture “ByBlacks.com" as Black Canadian Filmmaker of the year for her work on her second short film SHOEGAZER. ShoeGazer, which she wrote and starred in, has screened at numerous Oscar and CSA qualifying festivals, such as HollyShorts, RiverRun, and most notably winning a special jury prize at Canadian Film Fest. ShoeGazer is now streaming on CBC Gem.
Susanna Fournie
Susanna is an actor and emerging playwright. On screen she appears regularly on SyFy’s hit show Being Human, and upcoming in CBC’s feature Still Life. Her writing has been awarded by Tarragon Theatre, the Toronto Fringe Festival, and most recently an Honourable Mention in the Herman Voaden National Playwriting Competition.