A professional casualty has been claimed by Drew Facey Designer. Facey says he lost 14 months’ worth of contracts in one week in March, in his practically empty East Vancouver condo.
Drew Facey, a set and costume designer in Vancouver, has designed shows for theatre and opera productions all around the world, receiving 18 Jessie Richardson Theatre Awards in the process.
Facey, 39, saw the writing on the wall and spent the last few months receiving the Canada Emergency Response Benefit while retraining in 3-D visualization. He spent hours each day, sometimes frustratingly, learning the technologies.
What Happened To Drew Facey Designer?
Drew Facey’s retirement from design is a significant loss for the theatre community and a warning sign of things to come.
Performing arts firms have canceled their next seasons – and the contracts that came with them – due to COVID-19. There’s no telling when it’ll be safe – or legal – to go to the movies again.
Facey, who is known for his good energy as well as his ingenuity, believes that the theatrical industry is weak and that independent theatre artists are particularly vulnerable.
He is continually concerned for my coworkers in these uncertain times, and he believes that the discussion about what comes next for all of us has yet to begin.
Who Is Drew Facey? Wikipedia
Drew Facey was born and reared in Kelowna, British Columbia, where he got his first Architectural Digest subscription at the age of ten. He attended Concordia University in Montreal and Vancouver, Emily Carr University of Art and Design, and Studio 58 at Langara College.
He has designed approximately 170 professional plays for a variety of organizations, ranging from The Sound of Music to Shakespearean tragedies to an opera based on Shane Koyczan’s novel-in-verse Stickboy.
Facey received a whopping seven nominations for the 2014 Jessie Awards, for example, and came away with the award for Significant Artistic Achievement for his body of work, among others.
In June, he earned the Jessie Award for Outstanding Set Design (Large Theatre) for The Arts Club Theatre Company’s Cost of Living.
Famous Works Of Drew Facey
He designed the sets for Onegin and The Matchmaker for Arts Club Theatre; The Merry Wives of Windsor (2012), The Merchant of Venice, and Timon of Athens (2019) for Bard on the Beach; and Me and My Girl for Shaw Festival.
During his career in theatre, he has received eighteen Jessie Richardson Awards; in 2014, he was nominated for seven Jessies and won four. For a body of work, he was also given a Jessie for Significant Artistic Achievement.
When the Covid-19 pandemic removed all design work in theatre for the foreseeable future, Facey quit theatrical design and relocated to Merida, Mexico, to start a new profession in interior design.