Talking about an exercise in identity management!

Kristen Thomson had paid her dues in full as an actress when she opted to step up to the plate in 2002 and introduce herself as a playwright with I, Claudia which went on to become such a monster hit that it migrated to both television and DVD release.

While playgoers unjustly concluded that she must be spitefully punishing audiences by not following up sooner with a sophomore project, the pixie-esque Thomson insists this was nothing more than a gross misconception. And with one crack of a smile that takes shape on her exceptionally youthful face, it’s easy to concede that entertainment enthusiasts were blatantly lacking compassion for an artist who wanted to shift her attention to other aspects of life regardless of their appetite for poignant dramas splashed with undertones of highly imaginative jollity.

But let it be said that she’s every bit a playwright as she is an actress having returned to the stage recently in several Soulpepper Theatre Company productions. Sometimes it simply takes the right life event to trigger a narrative exploration guaranteed to equally intrigue and excite as much as a debut creation.

The waiting game is over as Tarragon Theatre gets ready to unveil The Patient Hour.

The story, featuring two children visiting an ailing mother in the hospital with a nurse taking a curious interest in the son and a down-the-hall patient dropping by to take refuge, is inspired by the passing of Kristen Thomson’s real life grandmother suffering from Alzheimers.

It wasn’t a collage of vibrant personages that generated the story but rather the tears that ran down the seemingly unresponsive grandmother’s cheek when Thomson comforted the senior for the love that was shown to her throughout the years. It was this phenomenon that alerted the actress/writer that a separate consciousness exists than the one we take for granted.

She’s a slave to the works of Jane Austin and disciple of the literary legacy of Anton Chekov. If one thing is for certain, Kristen Thomson’s deep interest in the interior worlds of actors allows her to mine for storylines that alter perspective towards the word in which we live.