Berto_Tony_201307_PhD .pdf - University of Guelph

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gay-themed programming. As artists themselves, adjudicators’ work may also depend on a
government’s willingness to continue arts funding at certain levels. Risking political or
public displeasure by approving grants to controversial programming in such an atmosphere
may affect their own livelihood, should a backlash against arts funding in general gain
momentum.
That said, Canada Council adjudication “committee members will also be selected
with consideration to fair representation of gender, generations, Aboriginal peoples and the
cultural and regional diversity of Canada” (Canada, “THEATRE” 4). While this list may
ensure a wide variety of political perspectives in adjudication committees, it notably lacks
sexual orientation as a consideration. Furthermore, council members likely also have vested
interests in free expression in the arts, and the Canada Council claims to “support freedom
of artistic expression from control or dominance by external forces such as governments
and markets” (Canada, "Background"). This situation may make the dispensing of grants a
somewhat contentious task, one that may confront the divergent ways of considering
homosexuality that circulate in Canada. Adjudicators may favour the freedom for artists to
tell stories about homosexuals, but may also be wary of the ways in which those stories
may be told.
Given these potential avenues through which gay material may affect development,
there is no way to know exactly how the dramaturgical process and grant monies may have
shaped the expression of homosexuality in His Greatness; MacIvor does not discuss this
aspect of his process. However, as will be seen in the discussion of the dramaturgy of The
Shooting Stage and Beggars Would Ride, the ways in which homosexuality is expressed in
these plays can be important considerations in the process of the play’s development. In