yes offering revisits princess di’s role in aids crisis
8 minute read
the cast of casey and diana includes alessandro costantini (thomas), arinea hermans (pauline), gryphyn karimloo (andre), kelsey tyson (vera), katie wise (diana) and viviana zarrillo (marjorie).
in october 1991, diana princess of wales made international headlines when she visited casey house, toronto’s first stand-alone hospice for people living with hiv/aids.
at a time when misinformation and fear surrounded the virus, diana’s choice to sit with patients, hold their hands and speak with them face-to-face was both simple and revolutionary. it shattered misconceptions and offered dignity where it was most needed.
that moment is now at the centre of casey and diana, a play by canadian playwright nick green, being staged by yes theatre beginning sept. 25. the production revisits that iconic visit but it is also about much more than one act of compassion. it weaves together the lives of casey house staff and residents in the week leading up to that visit, shining a light on the resilience, vulnerability and humanity that defined those pivotal years. the play also focuses on caregivers, the unsung heroes of any health crisis. that theme is especially powerful in this performance as one of the actors is herself a nurse with experience in hospice care.
casey and diana premiered at the stratford festival in 2023 before moving to soulpepper theatre in toronto, earning acclaim from audiences and critics. its arrival in sudbury offers local audiences the chance to experience a story that is both deeply canadian and universally human.
yes theatre invited the sudbury star to sit in on a rehearsal, offering a behind-the-scenes look at key scenes from the upcoming production. the opportunity presented a glimpse into the thought and care taken when staging a play with such emotional and historic significance.
director robert mcqueen encouraged actors to explore their characters’ internal thoughts, pushing them to question the intent behind each scene and line. for this acclaimed director, dramaturge and educator, the story of casey and diana is deeply personal.
advertisement
mcqueen moved to new york city in 1980 for school, during a time when fear and uncertainty surrounded a new virus affecting the queer community.
“i had quite a few friends during that time who died,” he said. in 1985, mcqueen moved to vancouver, where the virus was starting to hit the community there.
“by the time i was 35, i had lost half of my friends,” he said. “then it kind of disappeared, i sort of buried it, when the cocktail became available in the mid-90s.”
then decades later during the covid-19 pandemic, the emotional impact of the health crisis decades before took effect on mcqueen. he would wake up during the night and write. those writings later became the real poems, a 90-minute solo performance inspired by his experiences as a young queer man living between vancouver and new york during the aids epidemic of the 1980s and 1990s. it premiered in stratford and then later was staged in new york.
“being able to write and then get on stage and tell the story of these four lives of these friends was kind of freeing in a way,” he said.
fast forward to 2023, when mcqueen saw casey and diana at the stratford festival. he was captivated by how genuine it felt.
“this viscerally is the feeling of what happened during that time, what the experiences were for the people during that time,” he said. “it tells the story of this time incredibly well.”
alessandro costantini, yes theatre’s artistic director, plays thomas, a resident of casey house. he reached out to mcqueen, whom he has long admired and respected, to direct the sudbury production.
“i thought he would be perfect,” said costantini. “i think this is one of the best canadian plays written in the last decade – it’s so powerful.”
as a young queer person, costantini said he wanted to share the story about the health crisis through a new perspective. “there are so many iconic pieces that deal with this crisis – angels in america, normal heart and rent,” he said, “and those are quite politically charged. it was about getting someone to take notice and listen. but this one was different. it gave voice to these women, when a lot of the other narratives haven’t. it talks about end-of-life care, hospice care.”
advertisement
costantini said that choosing to stage casey and diana is about honouring those who came before him—recognizing he did not experience the aids crisis firsthand but stands on the legacy of the gay rights movement, which has allowed him to live more openly with a partner today.
“it’s important for me to engage in it, understand it and to honour those ghosts and the people who are still living and went through it,” he said. “to have that intergenerational exchange is important and healthy. we do it with everything else and we should be doing it with this in our community as well.”
authenticity lies at the heart of this production, too.
“ultimately, i think no one should ever know that a play was directed,” said mcqueen. “what you do is let the people in the play own the piece. to quote william ball, an amazing american theatere-maker, he wrote a beautiful book about directing and in the last chapter he says the last act of the director is to take a branch and erase your footprint so that nobody every knew you were there.”
to get there requires retrospection and self-reflection. everyone involved in casey and diana brings something to the table.
kelsey tyson plays nurse vera in the play. costantini said he knew she would be perfect for the role, as she not only has extensive acting experience with yes theatre but works as a nurse in the community, having spent time in hospice care and the neonatal unit.
“i thought how special it would be to have kelsey involved in this piece because lived experience can inform this work, and it has,” he said.
additionally, some performances will include talk-back sessions at the end of the show, where cast and crew are joined by community members with lived experience who will chat with the audience.
in the spirit of knowledge exchange, a team of staff from réseau access network sat down with the cast of casey and diana to provide further insight into what hiv looks like in modern day society, particularly in sudbury amid a housing and mental health crisis.
advertisement
majero bouman is the agency’s women’s community development coordinator and deborah josipovic is a caseworker who works with those who live with, or are at risk of contracting, hiv. both had the chance to read the play before speaking to the cast.
“it’s a well written piece and from the heart; it really navigates hiv and aids in a sensitive way,” said bouman. “what really strikes me about it, is the interrelationships of the people who are in casey house and how they are living towards death together.”
while the play takes place at a specific time in the history of hiv/aids, it was important for the team to share the local lived realities.
prevention and treatment of the virus have changed since that 1991 iconic visit, said josipovic who oversees a case load of 40 people living with hiv in sudbury. (she notes that the number of those at risk is much higher.)
today, hiv is a manageable chronic condition and if treated properly, people can live long and healthy lives. however, when it comes to those living with hiv in sudbury, the majority of whom are homeless or at risk of homelessness, the future is less certain.
consistency in treatment is key, said josipovic, so if someone stops taking medication, it impacts the way the body responds. if not taken consistently, that same life-saving medicine will become resistant to the virus. because of this, there are high rates of medication resistance in sudbury, she said.
“that’s really the struggle, to make sure once we get them on (medication), they stay on,” said josipovic. “many of our folks are migrating from one place to another, it’s hard to locate them and keep them going to the clinics.” it’s especially challenging when they don’t have a stable home, she said.
aside from medications available to treat hiv, prevention looks different, too.
advertisement
hiv prevention includes safe sex practices like consistent condom use and using pre-exposure prophylaxis (prep) and post-exposure prophylaxis (pep) medications. in addition, preventing transmission through blood means avoiding needle sharing and drug injection equipment.
“these two medications alone aren’t widely unknown to the public and especially to women,” said bouman. “women don’t identify with that as much as men do. for us, it’s about educating women that it’s for them too.”
rates of women contracting hiv is on the rise and they are contracting it through heterosexual sex, she added.
unfortunately, these medications are expensive and not covered by ohip, only private insurance and for those under 25. out-of-pocket cost for prep medication is about $500 a month.
“but we’ve managed to find loopholes and ways to get around this for some, but across ontario, the barrier is the cost, and that people don’t know (that these medications exist),” said josipovic. the clinic does offer prep through one of its doctors, however it is on a case-by-case basis. otherwise, it’s available online through go freddie and prepstart.
despite the advances in medicine since the 1990s, the stigma persists, say bouman and josipovic.
“even though the medications, and how people live with it now, are very different, the stigma persists that you die from it, that you’re dirty, that it’s your fault,” said bouman.
“there is a lot to address: everybody is at risk of hiv and people get hiv by seeking human comfort and not by making bad choices.”
both she and josipovic hope the play will raise awareness, reduce stigma and—on a local level in sudbury—echo the humanizing impact princess diana had on the global conversation around hiv.
the team is especially thankful to yes theatre for including in the program the voices of three people living with hiv in sudbury.
advertisement
“we are grateful they sought out narratives from people living with hiv here,” bouman added. “that offers the same humanizing part — that hiv is all around us, it’s not something of the past, it’s not a death sentence and people are living with it.”
more than three decades after princess diana’s visit, the themes of casey and diana remain relevant. stigma, division and the search for acceptance continue to shape society, from political polarization and racial inequities to rising concerns around addictions and mental health. against this backdrop, the play shines a light on the realities of living with hiv and the ongoing struggles tied to it. at its core, casey and diana asks audiences to consider how small gestures of empathy can cut through fear and prejudice, just as diana’s presence once did.
casey and diana runs from sept. 25 to oct. 19 at the sudbury theatre centre. for tickets, visit www.yestheatre.com.
share story
