The Top 10 Toronto theatre artists of 2025 — plus the year’s breakthrough talents

I always look forward to compiling this annual list of the year’s stand-out Toronto theatre artists. These choices are personal and highly subjective. However, continuing the tradition begun by my late NOW Magazine colleague Jon Kaplan, artists must have been involved in at least two productions that played Toronto in the past calendar year.

Because there’s so much talent in this city, I’ve included another 10 artists after the first list. And I’ve also singled out some people who broke through to a new level of recognition or artistry this year. Note: I didn’t see everything at the Shaw and Stratford Festivals, so of course there are big omissions.

Here, in alphabetical order, are the people who made going to the theatre a pleasure in 2025.

Nick Blais

Designer

When I recall certain productions, it’s often the stage pictures — the set design and lighting — that come to mind. And many of the most memorable stage pictures this year were crafted by Blais. The way he configured the therapist’s office in Job, for instance, with its oval shape and two rows of illuminated raised bookshelves (lighting by Wes Babcock), gave the play a real enclosed feeling, as if we were trapped in the tense standoff between two characters, while his lighting for Table for Two was essential in facilitating the storytelling. His use of suspended strands of yarn and pulleys could have made Spycraft a mess, but instead it emphasized the dangerous web of intrigue the characters were caught in, while his set for Rainbow on Mars evoked an otherworldly liminal space. Best of all were his lights and set for Fulfillment Centre, in which a series of cardboard boxes captured everything from a shipping facility to an apartment and car — all temporary places the characters found themselves in as they searched for connection in a dehumanizing world.

Ted Dykstra

Actor/director

Dykstra, now the sole “chief engineer” at Coal Mine Theatre — whose entire 2024-25 season playbill was recognized with Dora nominations — has been on this list before. But this year it was once again hard to ignore his excellent, multi-faceted work. In his production of Abe Koogler’s Fulfillment Centre — a brutal, searching look at lives upended by late-stage capitalism — he found the perfect cast, design team and rhythms to make it sing. He also performed in Waiting for Godot, bringing a clown-like, boyish charm to Estragon and making each exchange with Alexander Thomas’ Vladimir spontaneous and full of tragicomic weariness.