Arne MacPherson

Arne MacPherson is a Winnipeg-based theatre artist.  Saskatchewan- born and Edmonton-bred, he received his Bachelor of Fine Arts (Acting) from the University of Alberta in 1985, and moved to Winnipeg in 1991. 

Arne has directed over thirty productions in Winnipeg, in both professional and student settings.  Favourite shows include The Walworth Farce (Incompletely Strangled), Sunday in the Park with George, (Gallery Works), Strike! The Musical (Workshop West Theatre, Edmonton), The Threepenny Opera (The Manitoba Theatre Centre and Shakespeare In the Ruins),  Stretching Hide  (Theatre Projects Manitoba), Head, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Tempest (Shakespeare In the Ruins), Magical Mystery Munsch (Prairie Theatre Exchange), Unity (1918) (PTE School).  

Arne performed the title role in Shakespeare’s Dog  at the Manitoba Theatre Centre and the National Arts Centre in Ottawa.   He played Hamlet, Richard III, Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet, Malvolio in Twelfth Night, and Antonio in The Merchant of Venice for Shakespeare In the Ruins,.  At Prairie Theatre Exchange he appeared in Unity (1918), Fox, and InQuest, at Theatre Projects Manitoba in Encore and Prok, and at the Winnipeg Jewish Theatre in Way to Heaven, Talk, The Father and Lenin’s Embalmers.

He has taught many courses at the PTE school for teens and adults over the past decade.  He taught the PTE Young Company for nine years, working on Unity(1918), Seven Stories, DNA, and Blue Heart among others. 

At the 2009 Winnipeg Fringe festival, he performed with his partner Debbie Patterson and their two kids Gislina and Solmund in Patterson’s play Molotov Circus, which was re-mounted for the Summerworks festival in Toronto. 

He is a member of the Curatorial Committee and the board of nuna(now), an Iceland-Canada art convergence.  In association with nuna(now), Arne  co-created with a group of Icelandic and Canadian artists a multi-disciplinary performance work called The Island, which was shown in Reykjavik and Winnipeg.