Climate Disaster Project

Big green news! 🌿 We’re beyond thrilled to share that Neworld Theatre is the recipient of the 2026 PACT Green Award, presented by the Professional Association of Canadian Theatres (@pactinsta ) This national award celebrates theatre companies, organizations, and individuals responding to the climate crisis in creative, meaningful, and impactful ways. We were recognized for Eyes of the Beast: Climate Disaster Stories — a powerful project created in partnership with University of Victoria Climate Disaster Project (@climatedisasterproject ) and Simon Fraser University School for Contemporary Arts (@sfucontemporaryarts ). Through first-person climate disaster testimonies brought to the stage, Eyes of the Beast invited audiences to witness, reflect, connect, and imagine action together. We’re so proud of this honour, and deeply grateful to the artists, collaborators, survivors, and community members who made this work possible. This award belongs to all of us. 💚 Production photo by Hélène Cyr

We’re so proud to announce The Anthem Awards has honoured our documentary play Eyes of the Beast by selecting it as a silver winner in its Sustainability, Environment & Climate: Special Projects category. Produced by @neworldtheatre , the play brings the experience, knowledge, and wisdom of climate disaster survivors to theatregoing audiences by adapting frontline testimonies from communities across Western Canada. The Anthem Awards is the largest and most comprehensive social impact award program in the world. So this is a powerful recognition of the Climate Disaster Project and Neworld Theatre’s shared work to tell a new story about climate change that centres the lived experiences of those most impacted by our warming world.

Eyes of the Beast is honoured as an Anthem Awards Finalist! @anthemawards We’re so proud to share that Eyes of the Beast: Climate Disaster Survivor Stories has been named a Finalist for the 5th Annual Anthem Awards in the Sustainability, Environment & Climate category. The Anthem Awards celebrate work that inspires change and this recognition shines a light on the many collaborators, storytellers, and communities who made this project possible. Eyes of the Beast is also up for a Community Voice Award, chosen entirely by public support! Voting is open until October 30, and we’d love your help to lift up these powerful survivor stories. Thank you for being part of this work, and for believing in the power of art to connect, heal, and move us toward change! 🗳️ You can vote through the link in our bio!

The CSRS congratulates partners Sean Holman and the Climate Disaster Project on their $2.5 million dollar grant to train students and journalists to help tell the stories that are defining our world. We look forward to learning from Sean and the Project team during their residency at the Centre. https://news.uvic.ca/media-release/climate-professor-receives-2-5-million-grant-to-document-stories-globally/ Image: Climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of weather-related disasters, such as the 2021 Lytton Creek fire that destroyed 90 percent of the buildings in Lytton, Canada. Image credit: Climate Disaster Project/Phil McLachlan

Too often, the voices of the people most impacted by climate change go unheard. That’s why we are proud to announce the Climate Disaster Project and its partners have been awarded a six-year $2.5 million grant to amplify those voices. Our grant, From Catastrophe to Community, will see post-secondary students and professional journalists work with survivors to retell their stories. We will then share those stories as documentaries with APTN Investigates, news features with our partners at Covering Climate Now and Journalists for Human Rights, an anthology, and a travelling museum exhibition that will launch at Winnipeg’s Canadian Museum for Human Rights and the Museum of Vancouver. In doing so, we will help realize a more just and equitable climate future where disaster communities aren’t forgotten. (CDP Photo/Phil McLachlan)

Eyes of the Beast had a Preview performance last night and we were honoured to be joined by Vancouver City Councillor Mike Klassen for a moving post-show conversation. Huge thanks to Mr. Klassen for bringing care, curiosity, and thoughtful insight to our preview night. The conversation continues all week with more incredible guests shaping climate policy in BC: Thurs, June 19 – Sarah B. Henderson, Scientific Director, Environmental Health Services, BC CDC Fri, June 20 – Sean Orr, Vancouver City Councillor Sat, June 21 (7:30pm) – Denise O’Connor, Mayor of Lytton Sun, June 22 – Patti MacAhonic, Director, Electoral Area E (Chilliwack River Valley) You don’t want to miss these impactful conversations. Get your tickets through the link in our bio! 🌏

We open Eyes of the Beast TONIGHT and we’d love for you to join us! Running June 19–22 at SFU Goldcorp Centre for the Arts Eyes of the Beast Written by Sebastien Archibald, Gavan Cheema, and Kelsey Kanatan Wavey Original concept by: Alen Dominguez and Sean Holman Director: Chelsea Haberlin* Associate Director: Kelsey Kanatan Wavey* Sound Designer: Mary Jane Coomber Projections Designer: Candelario Andrade Assistant Director: Samantha Li** Stage Manager Mentor: Jasmin Sandhu Stage Management: Maddy Woodley** Assistant Stage Management: Sunny Lee** & Jessica Kwon** Costume Designer: Carissa Toledo** Adapted from the original costume design by: Donnie Tejani Lighting Designers: Patrick Maka** & Mars de Menezes** Set Designers: Keju Jiao** & Georgia Turner** Adapted from the original set design by: Christian Ching Production Manager: Jasmine Chen Technical Director: Jamie Sweeney Associate Technical Director: Edison Cheung** Assistant Associate Technical Director: Sarah van Wouw** Performers ** Megan Battad, Oliver Fusio, Maralee Joyner (Understudy), Lachlan Harris-Fiesel, Sara van Gaalen, Michael Waddell, Ruby Wu * The participation of these Artists are arranged by permission of Canadian Actors’ Equity Association under the provisions of the Dance•Opera•Theatre Policy. ** SFU School for the Contemporary Arts student A Neworld Theatre production, in partnership with the Climate Disaster Project, in association with the SFU School for the Contemporary Arts, and supported by Simon Fraser University. Photo by @cstuyt

“I was crying, and I never really cried at work. You can’t even take a moment to acknowledge this person passed. You couldn’t call family to be with them, hold their hand. I remember seeing a family member just standing in the hallway. And I’m literally running, gunning it across the hall to go to a different room and can’t even talk to them. I think that’s honestly the hardest part. We have to lose our humanity in order to try to save other people. We’re all very distraught by that. People were suffering and you can’t hold their hand. I can’t be there in their last moments. For me, it’s a thing of the idea that someone died alone. Like literally alone. I have a lot of co-workers and they helped me with that.” - emergency room worker Anonymous, 2021 Western North America heat wave Anonymous’s testimony is featured as part of Eyes of the Beast, a documentary play produced by Neworld Theatre about the extreme heat, fires, and floods that impacted Western Canada in 2021. Click on the link in our bio to purchase tickets to the play, which runs from June 18-22 at the Goldcorp Centre for the Arts (The Tyee Image/Nora Kelly)

Neworld Theatre, in partnership with the @sfucontemporaryarts and the @climatedisasterproject , proudly presents the Vancouver premiere of Eyes of the Beast — co-created by Sebastien Archibald, Gavan Cheema, and Kelsey Kanatan Wavey. Performance Details * Duration: 90 minutes (including intermission and facilitated talkback) * Location: Goldcorp Centre for the Arts, Fei and Milton Wong Experimental Theatre * General Admission $10 Performance Dates: * Wed, June 18, 2025 at 7:30 pm (Preview) * Thurs, June 19, 2025 at 7:30 pm * Fri, June 20, 2025 at 7:30 pm * Sat, June 21, 2025 at 2 pm & 7:30 pm * Sun, June 22, 2025 at 2 pm Adapted from the award-winning journalism of the Climate Disaster Project, an international newsroom at the University of Victoria, this documentary theatre production pulls from hundreds of testimonies of people across Canada who have lived through climate change together. Every performance will be followed by a facilitated talkback, featuring a BC or Vancouver political leader, who will engage with the audience and reflect on ways to support impacted communities. Tickets linked in our bio! 🎟️

A warmer world is a more traumatic world. Because weather-related disasters are becoming more frequent and severe, we are more exposed to death, serious injury, and other traumatic events. That's why we're honoured to be sharing our work at today's Climate Storytellers' Summit about the need for new humanistic forms of journalism to help communities and individuals recover from those traumas. Presented by the High Meadows Environmental Institute at Princeton, the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media, and My Climate Story, the summit showcases the work of 20 of the best climate storytellers in the world.

Today, the @cajournalists announced Eyes of the Beast, the documentary play the Climate Disaster Project and @neworldtheatre co-created with survivors across Western Canada, has been selected as a finalist for its 2025 awards in the environmental and climate change category. The play honours the experiences of those survivors during the extreme heat, fires, and floods of 2021 and included talkback sessions where audiences and invited politicians could discuss how to help climate-impacted communities in the future. This is the first time the Canadian Association of Journalists has selected a collaboration between a newsroom and a theatre company as an award nominee. The play was adapted from first-person testimonies prepared in the classroom by students at the @uvicwriting , @ubcjournalism , @kpu_journalism , @mrulife , @macewanu , and @firstnationsuniversity . Premiering at Victoria’s @phoenixtheatreuvic in September 2024, the play will open at Vancouver’s Goldcorp Centre for the Arts in June 2025. (Neworld Theatre Photo/Helene Cyr)

Today, on World Theatre Day, we’re celebrating our incredible partners at @neworldtheatre . The company’s managing director Alen Dominguez and artistic director Chelsea Haberlin (pictured here beside Climate Disaster Project managing editor Aldyn Chwelos and founding director Sean Holman) led the adaptation of our testimonies to create Eyes of the Beast: Climate Disaster Survivor Stories, a documentary play about the experiences of British Columbians during the extreme fires, heat, and flooding of 2021. We premiered the play at the University of Victoria’s Phoenix Theatre in September 2024. And we’ll be bringing it to Vancouver in June 2025. We can’t wait to see you there. (Neworld Theatre Photo/Kimberly Ho)