Erik Hillar Liitoja (June 18, 1954 – June 2, 2023) was a Canadian playwright and theatre director.[1] He was most noted for his 1993 play The Last Supper,[2] which won the Floyd S. Chalmers Canadian Play Award in 1994[3] and was adapted by Cynthia Roberts into the 1994 feature film The Last Supper.[4]
Trained as a concert pianist, Liitoja founded his own Toronto, Ontario theatre company, DNA Theatre, in the 1980s.[1] His other plays have included This Is What Happens in Orangeville,[5]The Panel,[6]The Deputation,[1]Sick,[7]Poundemonium,[8]Artaud and His Doubles,[9]Phalanx,[10]Paula and Karl,[1]Wit in Love[1] and I Know and Feel That Fate Is Harsh But I Am So Loathe to Accept This.[1]
Liitoja won several Dora Mavor Moore Awards for Best Direction of a Play in the Small Theatre division, winning in 1989 for a production of Hamlet,[11] in 1991 for Sick,[12] and in 1994 for The Last Supper.[13]
Liitoja died on June 2, 2023, at the age of 68.[14]
^Liam Lacey, "Force of evil unveiled in play about murder". The Globe and Mail, January 31, 1987.
^Ray Conlogue, "Theatre Review: The Panel". The Globe and Mail, November 23, 1990.
^Vit Wagner, "The AIDS sufferer in writer-director Hillar Liitoja's confrontational drama, Sick, does not go gently into that uncertain night". Toronto Star, March 28, 1991.
^Mira Friedlander, "Poundemonium a visual delight". Toronto Star, May 3, 1993.
^Vit Wagner, "Confounding the fence-sitters: Avant-gardist unveils work in spirit of Artaud". Toronto Star, May 23, 1996.
^Vit Wagner, "Theatre shows off its street smarts". Toronto Star, June 17, 1999.
^Robert Crew, "Passe Muraille sweeps up Doras". Toronto Star, June 26, 1989.
^Geoff Chapman, "The Doras gild Lilies as top drama/comedy". Toronto Star, June 18, 1991.
^Vit Wagner, "Dora Awards crazy for Crazy For You". Toronto Star, June 21, 1994.