About the Play:

The Fighting Season is a full-length drama by Sean Harris Oliver. This hard-hitting work looks at Canada's involvement in the Afghan war through the eyes of a Canadian field medic, a doctor and a recovery room nurse who have been sent home after being traumatized by an encounter with an injured Taliban fighter.

The Fighting Season is a searing investigation into the Afghan War through the eyes of a Canadian field medic (Kristy), an OR surgeon (Terry), and a recovery room nurse (Karine). When all three medical professionals experience PTSD following a life-changing event in the operating room of the NATO-controlled Role 3 Multinational Medical Unit at Kandahar Airfield, they are sent back to Canada for further evaluation. Through Kristy, Terry and Karine's interwoven monologues we begin to understand the contribution that Canada's medical teams made in Afghanistan, as well as the devastating impact that war has on the ones charged with saving lives. Canada's 12 years in Afghanistan may be overshadowed for some by a new wave of global crises. The Fighting Season is a painful but necessary reminder that there is no forgetting that war. More than 40,000 Canadian soldiers fought there, 158 died there. Includes supplemental materials about the conflict in Afghanistan, as well as a foreword by Dr. John H. Oliver MD, FRCSC – the author's father – whose deployment to Kandahar inspired the work.

The Fighting Season first played to sold-out audiences at the 2015 Vancouver Fringe Festival and earned a critics choice award. The play had its commercial premiere in 2017 at The Cultch in Vancouver.

Cast: 1 woman, 2 men

What people say:

"The Fighting Season is devastating… Oliver builds an empathy with realistic characters who are at times harrowing, horrific and heroic." — Vancouver Presents

"Visceral and moving, The Fighting Season shines as a fascinating study of war medics." — The Review Weekly

About the Playwright:

Sean Harris Oliver is a Vancouver based writer/actor, and the Co-Artistic Director of Hardline Productions. He is of Métis descent and, in recent years, has become one of Canada's leading Indigenous performers. He was honoured at the 2017 Hnatyshyn Foundation Indigenous Arts Awards for his contribution to Indigenous theatre in Canada.