David Jansen

David Jansen is an award-winning actor and director. Born in the States, he was raised in Connecticut, southern Ontario and Newfoundland, Canada. He received his Masters in Directing at the University of London in England where he lived on and off for several years. Mr. Jansen most recently directed the premiere of Nick Carpenter’s The Return of Corporal Mazenet at the 2010 Summerworks Festival in Toronto and a reading of Tom Murphy’s The Gigli Concert at the Shaw Festival, one of North America’s largest repertory theatre companies. As an actor, he recently played Clive and Cathy in the Mirvish production of Cloud Nine at the Panasonic Theatre, Toronto. The four years prior were spent acting with the Shaw Festival, playing lead roles in A Moon for the Misbegotten, Ways of the Heart, Little Foxes, A Month in the Country, The Circle and Design for Living, among others. Recently in Toronto, he co-wrote and performed in the Tarragon theatre production Ubuntu. Other work includes: Three Squares A Day (Theatre Passe Muraille); the Scottish/Canadian tour of Necessary Angel’s Half Life; Soulpepper Theatre’s The Long Valley for which he was nominated for a Dora (Toronto Theatre Award); A Whistle in the Dark (Company Theatre); and . He performed in the UK premiere of Risk Everything and The Peter Hall Company's production of Design for Living. He was also involved in Peter Hall’s production of Betrayal which was the second time Sir Peter Hall had staged the production, the first being the world premiere in 1978. David Jansen worked for five seasons at the Stratford Festival, the largest classical repertory theatre in North America, performing lead roles in The Cherry Orchard, The Two Gentlemen of Verona and As You Like It among others. Mr. Jansen co-founded the theatre company Wild Pig in the 1990s, for which he gave his award-winning performance in The Conquest of the South Pole and his critically acclaimed performance in Greek. David Jansen will next be appearing in The Cosmonaut’s Last Message To The Woman He Once Loved In The Former Soviet Union at Canadian Stage and co-directing Martin Crimp’s Attempts on her Life at Ryerson Theatre School, both in Toronto, Canada.