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Astle, Robert

Robert Astle

Writer, director, teacher, producer, actor, and editor, Robert Astle was born in Alberta on April 18, 1955. In 1977, he travelled to Europe to study theatre, improvisation acrobatics, and creation at the Ecole Jacques Lecoq in Paris. He returned to Canada in 1979, and in 1982, with Jan Miller and Jan Henderson he co-founded Small Change Theatre, a theatre collective. For Small Change Theatre, he co-created, produced and performed in clown and mask shows that toured to festivals and theatres internationally.

In 1990, Astle returned to Europe to collaborate on the creation of his one-man show Heart of a Dog, with Belgian writer and director Agnes Limbos. Heart of a Dog is a dog's-eye view of Russia based on Mikhail Bulgakov's corrosive 1925 satire. This collaboration resulted in the international theatre creation company "Les Etablissements” which has toured his solo performance plays to festivals and theatres in Belgium, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Nuage Editions published Heart of a Dog in 1994, and it has been adapted and recorded for CBC radio’s "Sunday Showcase."

In 1996, Astle created his second solo show, The Hats of Mr. Zenobe in collaboration with American artist, Jim Jackson, and again with Agnes Limbos. The work had its premiere at Theatre Network in Edmonton, Alberta in February 1997, and has played in Montreal, Victoria, Colorado Springs, Whitehorse, Calgary, Kelowna, and at the Factory Theatre main space in Toronto. Nuage Editions also published it in December 1997. In the spring of 2004, Astle performed in the French translation of this play by Paul Lefebvre, entitled Les chapeaux de Monsieur Zenobe in Montreal. Mr. Zenobe's heart-wrenching story of exile, conscription, internment, and dispossession unfolds through an amazing succession of hats – from a bizarre military helmet to a miner's helmet with lamp.

In 1998 Astle moved to Montreal to teach at the National Theatre School of Canada (Playwriting) and Concordia University, Department of Theatre. He directed a new adaptation of E.A Poe’s gothic tale Masque of the Red Death at Concordia, and August Strindberg’s The Ghost Sonata for the University of Winnipeg in 2004. He also directed Marie-Antoine’s, Opus 1 for Concordia University, and the Quebec Premiere of the French author, Michael Azama’s play, Croisades at Theatre Prospero. He was the co-producer of the Wildside Festival at the Centaur Theatre in 2001, 2002, and 2005, as well as the playwright-in-residence in 2001.

Astle is the author Theatre Without Borders, profiling Canadian and Quebeçois performance artists, published by Signature Editions in 2002. His newest solo play, The Piano Tuner, premiered in Montréal in the winter of 2004, and has been published by Signature Editions. The Piano Tuner is a bizarre dialogue between Bob, a blind piano tuner, and a derelict piano, "prepared" with sounds, objects and stories from his past which Bob must confront in order to bring the instrument back into tune.

He is currently based in New York City, where he started his own boutique literary agency in 2006, then a small trade publisher called Astor + Blue Editions, now called Highline Editions.

Last updated 2020-12-15