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Myspace Codeswww.volcano.caRoss Manson is an actor, director, and translator, and the founding Artistic Director of Volcano ("The best independent theatre company in Toronto" - NOW Magazine, go to www.volcano.ca
). Ross's company, Volcano, is a multiple award-winning, internationally acclaimed independent theatre company based in Toronto.As a director, Ross has staged nearly 20 shows for Volcano, which have earned 31 Dora nominations (Toronto’s Stage awards), 11 Dora wins, The “Best of Edinburgh†award (Carol Tambor Foundation), an Edinburgh Fringe First award, 2 Governor General award nominations (Canada), the Amnesty International Freedom of Speech Award shortlist (Edinburgh Festival), the NOW People’s Choice Award (Summerworks Festival, Toronto), and a Chalmers’ National Play Award (Canada). Ross has been nominated for Dora awards in both Acting (once) and Directing (three times) - winning in the latter category, and is also the winner of a Harold award for arts community service, and a KM Hunter Award for excellence as an emerging theatre artist. Ross has also directed for CanStage (Canada’s largest not-for profit new-works theatre company), Overall Dance (in Toronto and at the Canada Dance Festival), Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania; and the Blyth Festival. Upcoming directing work includes productions of Goodness at the Svenska Teatern in Helsinki and the Magnetic North Festival in Vancouver in 2008, a production of The Four Horsemen Project that will visit Vancouver (PuSh festival) and Victoria (Intrepid Theatre) in 2008, and a devised production based on Antigone for Theatre du Pif in Hong Kong in 2009.As an actor, Ross has appeared in film, television, radio, and in leading roles at over 20 theatres across Canada and the US. He has played the title roles in such plays as The Government Inspector, The Elephant Man, and Peer Gynt. He has played in both Shakespeare and in new work. He has appeared in premiere productions by playwrights Brad Fraser, George F. Walker, David Young, Wendy Lill, Michael Redhill, Anne Chislett and Joanna Glass, among others, and in the Canadian premieres of internationally acclaimed works such as Our Country’s Good, Dancing at Lughnasa, A Map of the World and Cherry Docs (a play he commissioned). He has worked for such directors as Ireland’s Joe Dowling, England’s Jonathan Miller and Braham Murray, and Canada’s Richard Rose and Daniel Brooks.Ross has translated three plays from German: Woyzeck (staged in 1993); The Third Land (staged in 1994 by Volcano) and, currently underway, The Caucasian Chalk Circle (a project led by Richard Greenblatt, with new music by John Millard).Ross is also the founder of Go7 – the Arts Pass; a subscription and marketing organization for independent theatre, music and dance that was in place in Toronto from 1995 to 2003. He ran an eclectic new works cabaret called Short Stuff at various bars around Toronto from 1994 to 2004. More recently, he co-founded, with playwright Jason Sherman, the Wrecking Ball: a political theatre initiative designed to bring a political point-of-view more fiercely onto Toronto stages( www.thewreckingball.ca ).Finally, Ross is part of the programming team for ARCfest – Canada’s first social justice arts festival.He currently splits his time between Toronto, and Philadelphia.
