Craig Farrish was having a bad day. His depression was getting the better of him.
He was clearing dishes at Cranewood, where he had taken a part-time job to keep busy, after retiring from a 27-year career with Correctional Service Canada due to stress-related burnout.
With a tray full of dishes in his hands, someone asked him, “excuse me, do you work here?”
Frustrated at the obvious answer given what his hands were full of, he turned to the stranger. “Yes.”
She wanted to know if he had any interest in acting.
He did not.
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Regardless, she left her number and said he should try out for a small part in a play she was directing.
Over his shift, he decided why not? His day couldn’t get worse. So he called her, auditioned and got more than he bargained for when he was offered one of the leads.
“ After she offered it to me, she then told me that I had to wear a dress. There’s a dancing scene, intimacy, like hand-holding, kissing. By that point, I was just like, ‘let’s just go with it,’ and I was all in, and just loved the whole process.”
He found the experience transformative and, after his second play, said he “got the bug for it.”
This life-changing discovery for Farrish was only possible because of Marshlight Theatre Company, a Sackville-based community theatre itself only a little older than Farrish’s acting career.
The Company
Located in a long, single-storey, red brick commercial building at the corner of Queens and Fairfield Road, it’s easy to miss. Nothing about it screams theatre and the only hint of what’s inside is a sign above the door with the company’s name and logo.
Inside the rented space, the small black box theatre has just enough room for a stage floor and 42 seats. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of possibilities, says Marshlight’s artistic director Paul Griffin.
“ We’re very lucky to have an actual space that is a theatre. It’s small, it’s cute, it’s homey. But it’s an actual theatre, with lights and sound and a black box space. And so it gives you a lot of options, a lot of ability to do whatever you want to do.”
Started in 2024, Marshlight formed in the wake of the amalgamation of two long-running theatre companies in Tantramar. One, Live Bait, was a professional theatre company that operated from 1988-2024, and the other, The Performers Theatre Company, was a community theatre company that ran from 2008-2024.
While Marshlight Theatre occupies the same location, it feels like a synthesis of the two previous companies by bringing together professionals like Griffin and amateurs like Farrish.
Fostering talent
The company also provides space for new talent.
In March of this year and last, the company hosted the New Works Festival. Featuring workshops and opportunities for playwrights and directors to test new ideas, as well as work from youth performers and other community theatre groups, it’s a unique opportunity to support the community, says Griffin.
”The idea of putting on a New Works Festival in a small town may seem like ‘well, are there many people who do this sort of stuff?’ And you suddenly discover there are lots of people who wanna say something.”
When putting on its own productions, Marshlight also wants anyone to audition or volunteer to help out who wants to, be it on the tech side or simply working the door. It’s all part and parcel of what Marshlight is trying to provide, Griffin explains
“That’s going to be our emphasis for the next little while, is putting on the work, but also reaching out and finding more people who maybe didn’t even realize they wanted to do theatre, but then having done it once or twice and are like, ‘oh, I wanna do this over and over and over.’”
Farrish is one of those people. Though he attended therapy regularly and continues to do so, he credits acting with bringing him out of his comfort zone, helping refocus his mind and providing structure to his days outside of work through practicing and learning his lines. All of which have helped in his healing journey, he says.
“It’s given me a sense of direction and purpose outside of traditional work. It’s also given me confidence to pursue work now by saying that I want to be an artist. I want to act. I want to pursue other artistic ambitions.”
What’s next?
Griffin has his eyes set on an outdoor summer production of Zomblet, a fun zombie-filled twist on Hamlet, to help drum up interest in the company during its off-season.
Farrish is set to star as Bruno in the company’s last main production of the season The Fixer-Upper. Written by Lorne Elliott and set in PEI, it sees Bruno trying to fix up and rent out a ramshackle cottage. The play opens next weekend and will run May 22-24 and May 29-31.
For more information, head to Marshlight Theatre Company’s website.
