By Erin Shields
Directed by Jackie Maxwell
A Stratford Festival Commission
World Première
This production explores the effects of war, including death and sexual violence, but does not include graphic depictions. The play includes coarse language.
Everyone knows the story of the Trojan War: Trojan boy elopes with married Greek girl; angry husband tracks the lovers to the boy’s hometown; 10 years of siege warfare later, the angry husband and his posse reduce Troy to rubble. But did it have to end that way? In Ransacking Troy, playwright Erin Shields imagines a less testosterone-fuelled conclusion, in which the women of Greece—tired of waiting for their husbands to return from war—stage an intervention of historical proportions.
The 2025 Season is supported by Ophelia Lazaridis.
Production Co-Sponsors:
Marilyn Gropp
Jane Fryman Laird
Dr. Robert J. & Roberta Sokol
Anonymous Donor
Maev Beaty and Irene Poole. Photography by Ted Belton.
2025: Rachel Lynde in Anne of Green Gables and Penelope, Odysseus in Ransacking Troy. Ninth season. Stratford: Beatrice (Much Ado About Nothing), Annabelle (Wedding Band), Gertrude (Hamlet), Jane (Death and the King's Horseman), Cookie (The Front Page), Elmire (Tartuffe), Sneerwell (The School for Scandal), Sorrel (Bunny), Kate (The Last Wife), Kate Hardcastle (She Stoops to Conquer), Goneril (King Lear). Elsewhere: My Name is Lucy Barton (Canadian Stage); Letters from Max, The Great Fire (Necessary Angel); August: Osage County, Little Menace: Pinter (Soulpepper); Terminus (Outside the March/Mirvish); Wide Awake Hearts (Tarragon); over 30 Canadian premières including her co-creations Montparnasse, Goblin Market and Secret Life of a Mother (Playwrights Canada Press). Awards: Multiple Dora-winner, 14-time nominee. Film/TV: Beau is Afraid (dir. Ari Aster), Mouthpiece (dir. Patricia Rozema), Murdoch Mysteries. Online: maevbeaty.com. Et cetera: For Esmé, and all my Sirens, Witches and Queens.
2025: Clytemnestra, Iphigenia, Agamemnon in Ransacking Troy and understudy in Anne of Green Gables. 12th season. Stratford: Pisanio in Cymbeline, Morag in The Diviners, Thérèse Dubuc in Les Belles-Soeurs, Marmee in Little Women, Interpreter in All's Well…, Katherine in Henry VIII, Catalina in Mother's Daughter, Jean Louise in To Kill a Mockingbird, Cassius in Julius Caesar, Breath of Kings, Kate in The Little Years, Katherina in Taming of the Shrew, Olga in Three Sisters. Elsewhere: Bakelite Masterpiece, The Little Years (Dora Award, Tarragon); Leisure Society (Dora Award, Factory Theatre); The Last Days of Judas Iscariot (Dora Award, Birdland); Happy Place, The Gigli Concert (Soulpepper); How Do I Love Thee? (Canadian Rep); Manon, Sandra and the Virgin Mary (Buddies…). Film/TV: Frankie Drake, Salvation, Indian Horse, Cardinal, Reign, Murdoch Mysteries, Republic of Doyle. Et cetera: For my Labrador family.
2025: Paulina in The Winter's Tale and Hecuba in Ransacking Troy. 13th season. Yanna McIntosh is one of Canada's preeminent stage actors, acclaimed for her dramatic range and intensity. Training at Vaughan Road Collegiate, University of Toronto, and Harvard's American Repertory Theatre Institute grounded numerous stage highlights, among them, The Master Plan (Crow's), Ruined (Obsidian), Harry Potter and the Cursed Child (San Francisco), The Baroness and the Pig (Shaw), Hedda Gabler (Volcano), Skylight (Tarragon) and leading roles in Stratford productions of Antony and Cleopatra, Oedipus, Macbeth, Elektra, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, A Little Night Music, The Winter's Tale and Trojan Women. Recent screen credits include Slasher: Hell Motel (AMC), Beyond Black Beauty (Amazon), Good Sam (CBS); Pretty Hard Cases (Global), Sort Of (CBC). Yanna is Icil Morgan's daughter. Et cetera: To Marti, for all my firsts.
2025: Hermione in The Winter's Tale and Aegiale, Helen in Ransacking Troy. 16th season. Stratford (selected): Hedda in Hedda Gabler, Shakespeare's Juliet, Olivia, Cordelia, Jessica, Rosalind; Elizabeth/Robyn (Serving Elizabeth), Ruth (Blithe Spirit), Célimène (The Misanthrope), Wendy (Peter Pan), Madame de Tourvel (Dangerous Liaisons), Gwendolyn (The Importance of Being Earnest), Laurencia (Fuente Ovejuna), Mabel (An Ideal Husband) Laura (The Glass Menagerie) Brooke Ashton (Noises Off). Broadway: Cecily in Travesties, Gwendolyn in The Importance of Being Earnest, Sally in the original Broadway company of Tom Stoppard's Leopoldstadt. Off Broadway: Beatrice-Joanna in The Changeling. In the UK: Love Me Do (Dorothy), Intimate Apparel (Mrs. Van Buren). Elsewhere: Two seasons at the Shaw Festival playing the title role in Saint Joan and Ann Whitfield in Man And Superman, Beatrice at The Old Globe, Titania and Ariel at The Shakespeare Theatre (DC) and appearances on many other stages worldwide.
(she/her)
2025: Marilla Cuthbert in Anne of Green Gables and Gaylax, Anax, Andromache in Ransacking Troy. 14th season. Stratford (selected): Maria (Twelfth Night), Sian Ap Dafydd (1939), Mollie Malloy (The Front Page), Sin (Paradise Lost), Dr. Livesey (Treasure Island), Miss Prism (The Importance of Being Earnest), Lady Anne (Richard III), Electra (Electra, The Flies), Sibyl (Private Lives) and Lady Macduff (Macbeth). Elsewhere (selected): The Antipodes, Marjorie Prime (Coal Mine); Mustard, The Small Room at the Top of the Stairs, Communion, The Fall, Humble Boy (Tarragon); Domesticated, A Whistle in the Dark, Marion Bridge (Company Theatre); Age of Arousal, The Penelopiad (Nightwood); Terminus (Outside the March/Centaur/Belfry). Film/TV: Priscilla, Hudson and Rex, Anne with an E, Titans, Ginny & Georgia. Awards: Two Dora Awards with four nominations, a Toronto Critics' Award and a Jerry.
Birmingham Conservatory, 2015/2016
2025: Psamathe, Briseis in Ransacking Troy and understudy in Anne of Green Gables. Ninth season. Stratford: Mattie in Wedding Band, Linda Lauzon in Les Belles-Soeurs, Much Ado About Nothing, Guildenstern in Hamlet, Co-host of Showstarters, Tituba in The Crucible, Death and the King's Horseman, The Neverending Story, As You Like It, Love's Labour's Lost, Hay Fever. Elsewhere: Death and the King's Horseman Radio Play (Soulpepper); Romeo & Juliet (Spontaneous Theatre); A Christmas Carol (Theatre New Brunswick); five seasons with Shaw Festival including Major Barbara, Serious Money, Ragtime, Born Yesterday; Binti's Journey (Theatre Direct); The Aftermath (Nightwood Theatre); A Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare in High Park, Canadian Stage). Film/TV: Murdoch Mysteries, Hamlet (2022), Death and the King's Horseman, Love's Labour's Lost, Hamlet, Macbeth, Timon of Athens (Stratfest@Home). Training: Birmingham Conservatory for Classical Theatre; BFA, University of Windsor. Et cetera: To my loves J, Z and S.
(she/her) Birmingham Conservatory, 2025/2026
(they/them)
2025: Dorcas in The Winter's Tale and Cur, Hecamede, Polyxena in Ransacking Troy. Stratford debut. Elsewhere: Ida Jackson in The Amen Corner, Ensemble/Dainty June understudy in Gypsy, Ensemble/Judy Haynes understudy in White Christmas, Ensemble in Damn Yankees, Ensemble in Chitra, Zoe in Bright Lights (DWP) (Shaw Festival); Jasmine/Dance Captain in BeeHive (Drayton Entertainment); Veruca Salt/Dance Captain in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, It's A Wonderful Life (Young People's Theatre); Rosa Mundi in Concord Floral, Who Are You?, Tiny Tenements of Terror (Theatre Sheridan). Film: Lead in Something Bubbled, Something Blue (Talk Is Free). Training: Sheridan College Honours Bachelor of Music Theatre. Online: @caitlynmacinnis. Etcetera: Caitlyn dedicates their debut to the women who raised them. For mom and grandma Norma. Big love to the Festival and the artists, I stand on the shoulders of giants.
Birmingham Conservatory, 2024
2025: Perdita in The Winter's Tale and Hermione, Menelaus, Chryseis, Cyclops in Ransacking Troy. Third season. Stratford: Grace Harkaway in London Assurance, Twelfth Night, Juliet understudy in Romeo and Juliet, Lise Paquette in Les Belles-Soeurs, Cordelia understudy in King Lear. Elsewhere: Lucky by Marie Barlizo (rEvolver); Hermia in A (Musical) Midsummer Night's Dream (Driftwood Theatre); Lucky in FEARLESS by David Yee (fu-GEN Theatre); Olivia in Twelfth Night (Theatre Erindale). Film/TV:Eli Roth's Be Mine, 13: The Musical, Titans season 4, Daughter Dearest, ReGenesis. Audio/Voiceover: Anne of Green Gables. Playwriting: twice blessed (fu-GEN Theatre). Awards: Joseph-Armand Bombardier SSHRC Award (University of Toronto); Douglas Campbell Award (Stratford Festival); Dora Mavor Moore Award (Stratford Festival). Training: Birmingham Conservatory, 2024; Theatre and Drama Studies with Sheridan College; University of Toronto (MA). Online: www.marissaorjalo.com, @MarissaOrjalo. Et cetera: Gratitude always to Carlos Bulosan Theatre and fu-GEN Theatre.
2025: Appears in The Winter's Tale and understudy in Ransacking Troy. Fourth season. Stratford: Diana in Casey and Diana, Lady Macbeth in Macbeth, Maggie in Bunny, Joyce in Possible Worlds. Elsewhere: Electra in Orestes (Tarragon); Cathleen in Long Day's Journey Into Night, Debbie in The Real Thing, Emily in Our Town, Mary Snow in Salt-Water Moon (Soulpepper); Nellie in Floyd Collins (Patrick St. Productions/Talk Is Free); Carol in Oleanna (Sweetline Theatre). Film/TV: Anne Boleyn in Reign (CW). Series lead: Leslie Bennett in Republic of Doyle, Murdoch Mysteries (CBC). The Tudors (Showtime/CBC), Hudson & Rex (CityTV). Training: National Theatre School of Canada. Awards: Canadian Screen Award nomination: Best Actress in a Dramatic Series, Republic of Doyle. Jessie Award nomination: Best Supporting Actress in a Musical, Floyd Collins. Online: Instagram: @krystinpellerin. Et cetera: Big love to my beautiful family xo.
2025: Director of Ransacking Troy. Third season. Jackie is a celebrated Canadian director, artistic director, dramaturge and teacher. She has directed for theatres across the country including the Stratford Festival (Paradise Lost, The Changeling), Tarragon, Citadel, Soulpepper, Canadian Stage, Mirvish, Theatre Calgary, Coalmine and Centaur, Montreal, as well as several theatres in the United States. Jackie served as Artistic Director of the Shaw Festival for 14 seasons, 2002-2016. She directed over 25 productions there. She also created a new performance space to include and promote provocative contemporary plays in Shaw's programming. It has since been named the Jackie Maxwell Studio Theatre. Jackie was AD at Factory Theatre from 1987-1995. She has been awarded the Order of Canada, the Order of Ontario, two Honorary Doctorates and has received two Dora Mavor Moore awards for Direction.
2025: Set and costume designer of Ransacking Troy. Fourth season. Stratford: Set designer of King Lear, designer of Paradise Lost and costume designer of The Changeling. Elsewhere (selected): Set and costume design: Othello (Royal Shakespeare Company); Paradise Lost (Centaur Theatre); The Humans (Citadel Theatre/Canadian Stage); London Road, The Other Place (Canadian Stage); Sense and Sensibility (Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre); Chimerica (M.T.C./Canadian Stage); The Applecart, Playboy of the Western World, White Christmas, Gaslight, Holiday Inn, Ladykillers, Grand Hotel, Saint Joan, Sweeney Todd (Shaw Festival). Costume design: Queen Goneril and King Lear (Soulpepper Theatre); Junk, Watch on the Rhine, My Fair Lady (Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.); Secret Garden, Cabaret (Shaw Festival). Set design: Desire Under the Elms (Shaw Festival).
2025: Head of Design for the Stratford Festival and lighting designer of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The Winter's Tale and Ransacking Troy. 21st season. Stratford (selected): Chicago, Richard III, Billy Elliot, Little Shop of Horrors, Birds of a Kind, Rocky Horror, The Music Man, The Tempest, Guys and Dolls, The School for Scandal, Macbeth, A Chorus Line, Hamlet, The Sound of Music, Oedipus Rex, King Lear, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Othello, Fiddler on the Roof, The Matchmaker, Twelfth Night. Elsewhere: Piaf/Deitrich (Mirvish); Bluebeard's Castle (COC, 2022); Così Fan Tutte (Israeli Opera, COC); Il Trittico, Jenufa, Maria Stuarda, Albert Herring (Pacific Opera Victoria); A Doll's House Part 2 (RMTC/Mirvish); Kiss Me Kate, Beautiful, Grease (Drayton); The Humans (Citadel/Canadian Stage); A Word or Two with Christopher Plummer (CTG/Stratford, Los Angeles); Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Sideways (La Jolla Playhouse); Chimerica (RMTC/Canadian Stage).
2025: Composer of Ransacking Troy. Third season. Stratford: A Wrinkle in Time, Paradise Lost. Elsewhere: Deanna has sound designed and composed original music for over 100 stage and screen productions across Canada, the U.S., and the U.K. with companies including Soulpepper, Tarragon, Canadian Stage, Prairie Theatre Exchange, Neptune Theatre, Grand Theatre, Shaw Festival, and many others. Recent highlights include Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (Mirvish/Neptune), The Darkest Dark (YPT), and The Importance of Being Earnest (Citadel). Proud member of IATSE ADC 659. Film/TV: Gray; The Nature of Things; Relax, I'm From the Future. Awards: Two Dora Awards (five nominations), Pauline McGibbon Award, SOCAN Foundation Award. Online: @deanna.h.choi. Et cetera: For Kim Renders who directed my first Erin Shields production and showed me a life in theatre was possible.
2025: Composer and sound designer of As You Like It and sound designer of Ransacking Troy. 15th season. Stratford: More than 25 productions since 2009. Elsewhere: Designs for Mirvish, BIBT, Soulpepper, Shaw, Canadian Stage, Tarragon, NAC, Blyth Festival, RMTC, Theatre Calgary, GCTC, Nightwood, Modern Times, Aluna, Crow's and many others. Film: Plain View, 7A, Blood Harvest, Hero.Traitor.Patriot, Alegra & Jim, Robert's Circle. Training: Studied composition with James Tenney, Honours BA, York University. Awards: Six Dora Awards for Sound Design and Composition. Et cetera: Started as a songwriter with a four-track tape machine and still endlessly fascinated with the storytelling possibilities of layered sound. Online: thomasryderpayne.bandcamp.com, xeno-canto.org/contributor/NWXCLJYBDK.
2025: Choreographer of Ransacking Troy. Stratford debut. Elsewhere: Treemonisha: A Musical Reimagining (Choreographer, Harris Theatre, US Première); Three Sisters (Choreographer, Soulpepper Theatre/Obsidian Theatre); Treemonisha: A Musical Reimagining (Volcano Theatre/Luminato Festival/TOLive); Russian Play, Victory, 1837: Farmer's Revolt (Movement Director, Shaw Festival); Serving Elizabeth (Director, Theatre Aquarius); Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (Movement Director, Soulpepper/Obsidian Theatre); TEDxToronto Speaker (TED Talks). Film/TV: Canada's Got Talent: Million Dollar Season (Choreographer, CityTV); Pretty Hard Cases (Choreographer, CBC); Rocky Horror Picture Show: Let's do the Time Warp Again (dancer, FOXTV); Camp Rock 2 (dancer, Disney). Training: George Brown College. Awards: Arts Awards - John Holland Awards, Dance Educator of the Year, 100 Accomplished Black Women, Best Contemporary Dance Act. Online: www.esiemensah.com.
2025: Assistant set and costume designer of Anne of Green Gables and Ransacking Troy. Stratford debut. Elsewhere: As designer: Heathers the Musical, The Lightning Thief (Storybook Theatre), Stone Soup and Festive Favourites (Calgary Opera), Clue, The Frozen Deep (Calgary Young Peoples' Theatre), Fairground (Shaw Festival). As design assistant: 1922, Chitra, The Importance of Being Earnest, Too True to Be Good, Gaslight (Shaw Festival). Training: National Theatre School of Canada, Production Design and Technical Arts.
(she/they)
2025: Assistant lighting designer of As You Like It, Annie and Ransacking Troy. Stratford debut. Elsewhere: Lighting Designer: Killing Time: A Game Show Musical (Mixtape Projects), Cymatix (Citadel + Compagnie), TEASE (Crows Theatre), Ursa: A Folk Musical (The Uncommon Folk Collective), Insert Clown Here (Parlous Theatre), ECHO (a front company). Assistant/Associate Lighting Designer: Fall For Dance North 2024, PUS (Road Trip Collective), Trayf (Harold Green Theatre), The Ballad of Stompin' Tom (Capitol Theatre), Spring Mix 2024 (Citadel + Compagnie). Training: Toronto Metropolitan University, Performance Production and Design (BFA). Canadian Green Alliance 2024 Green Mentorship Recipient. Online: mathildakane.com.
TOM PATTERSON THEATRE To find out more about all our theatres, please visit the Theatre Maps & Guides page.
Need Help?
Box Office hours
Ticketing FAQs Visit FAQs Membership FAQsCare Commitment