Controlled Damage

The story of Civil Rights icon Viola Desmond

JANUARY 14 - FEBRUARY 2, 2025

By Andrea Scott. Directed by Cherissa Richards.
Co-Presented by the National Arts Centre

“It is so much more than a simple history lesson.” - Halifax Presents

Returning to the Scotiabank Stage in 2025 is a brand new production of Andrea Scott's award-winning play Controlled Damage in partnership with the National Arts Centre. 

Controlled Damage explores the life of Canadian civil rights icon Viola Desmond and how her act of bravery in a Nova Scotia movie theatre in 1946 started a ripple effect that is still felt today. An ordinary woman forced to be extraordinary by an unyielding and racist world, Desmond never gave up — despite the personal cost to her and those who loved her. Andrea Scott’s highly theatrical examination of Desmond and her legacy traces the impact she has had on our culture, but also casts light on the slow progress of the fight for social justice and civil rights in Canada. THE STORY Do you know the real story behind the face of Canada’s ten-dollar bill?

On November 8, 1946, Halifax business owner, Viola Desmond went to a movie at the Roseland Theatre in New Glasgow, Nova Scotia. Unaware that she was sold a lower-priced ticket for the balcony, where Black patrons were expected to sit, Viola took a seat on the main floor: the whites-only section. Although she offered to pay the one cent tax difference, Viola was dragged from the theatre, jailed, and charged. Her story would impact history forever. In Controlled Damage, award-winning playwright Andrea Scott illuminates the true story of Canadian Civil Rights icon, Viola Desmond – a woman who took a stand against racial discrimination, by taking a seat at a theatre.