King’s annual Infringement Festival begins

It’s the time of year when the University of King’s College Theatrical Society performs their annual theatre festival. The Infringement Festival is a quickly put together event with shorter pieces.

“It’s a lot of fun to do low stakes quick theatre,” says Jacob Millar, director of “Blackbird, Oh Blackbird,” which will be shown on Wednesday and Friday at the festival. “I have been enjoying working on my show a lot.”

This isn’t Millar’s first time directing. The 2nd year law student ran a student theatre company while he went to Queen’s University in Ontario.

“I produced a lot of shows, directed a fair number of them too,” says Millar.

Since it’s been a year since he did any theatre work, he had a desire to do it again and the Infringement Festival seemed like the perfect opportunity.

“This seemed like a pretty low commitment; it’s only a few weeks of rehearsal,” says Millar.

He wrote the play he’s directing over a year ago, but made some edits for the festival’s submission period.

“It’s a short comedy, essentially about writing,” says Millar. “It’s pretty modern, just quick fun jokes basically.”

Millar, one of a handful of Dalhousie students involved with the festival, stands out among a group that mostly includes King’s students. This year the co-ordinator and producer group is entirely made up of King’s students, which is not unusual.

Zach Greenham is one of the festival’s co-ordinators. Greenham’s role is to figure out technical needs, making sure things are safe and communicating with everyone about the “gritty show stuff.”

“It’s been pretty much King’s students with us, a very small faction of Dal students doing stuff,” says Greenham. “We have that relationship with Dal where most of us are King’s students but also taking Dal classes.”

The Infringement Festival starts on Monday, Jan. 30 and lasts until Saturday, Feb. 4, during each night at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $3 for students and $5 for general admission.