When genderqueer multi-disciplinary artist Kate Story looked back on their 2025 performance about navigating their cancer diagnosis at the Small Dance for a Small Space Festival at The Theatre on King, they realized they hadn’t been entirely truthful with the audience.
“What really struck me about the first round of the piece is that it was obvious to me that I was just so worried about people worrying about me,” Story recalls. “On some level, I wasn’t even trying to reassure other people — I was probably trying to reassure myself.”
Story will perform a more honest and complete version of “Hysterical” at the Market Hall in downtown Peterborough on Thursday, November 19, as part of a double bill of theatre and dance performance exploring the impact of cancer diagnoses presented by Public Energy Performing Arts.
Beginning at 7:30 p.m., “Bodies Under Siege” also features the world premiere of Toronto choreographer Allison Cummings’ “Opponent,” which will be performed by Peterborough-born dance artist and educator Christy Stoeten.
A Newfoundland-born writer and theatre artist in Peterborough-Nogojiwanong who works across a range of genres, Story is a recipient of an Ontario Arts Foundation award for theatre and a past finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award and CBC Literary Award for her writing.
She is also a cancer survivor, having been diagnosed in 2024 with endometrial cancer — a common type of cancer that begins in the cells of the inner lining of the uterus and most frequently occurs after menopause.
“We’ve probably all gone through the feeling in the medical system where it’s a bit of a struggle sometimes to get seen,” Story says, explaining they previously had very little success getting medical attention despite having menstrual problems from a young age.
“Once I got diagnosed with cancer, the contrast is huge, because, in Canada anyway, it’s well-funded. Immediately I had a team, I had a doctor, I had an oncologist, I had a surgeon, I had a plan. That was both reassuring and really alarming.”
The name of Storey’s work both reflects the root of “hysterical” being the Greek word for “uterus” and its common use to mean uncontrolled emotion, which stems from the ancient Greek and Egyptian belief that emotional or physical distress in women was caused by a “wandering womb” moving around the body.
A version of that belief continued well into the 19th and 20th centuries, when “hysteria” was first considered a diagnosable physical illness in women and later a mental illness by male physicians like Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis. The mental illness diagnosis was only removed from the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders in 1980.
“There’s just a lot that we don’t know about women’s bodies and we know this — it’s not like I’ve discovered that — but it’s weird,” Story says. “I think it’s strange because we’re half the population.”
As the primary treatment for endometrial cancer is to have the uterus removed, Story had a hysterectomy in September 2024, followed by a second major abdominal surgery just two months later. Meanwhile, they had to grapple with what it meant to have a uterine cancer as a non-binary person.
“There’s this weird thing that happens when you’ve got a female-presenting body and you’ve got cancer,” Story says.
“People were assuming that my problem was going to be that my identity as a woman was going to be compromised. People mean well, and it wasn’t the worst part of the experience for me, but I definitely wish people wouldn’t make assumptions about how we (non-binary people) feel about our bodies.”
When programming director Kate Alton approached Story with the idea of expanding “Hysterical” for Public Energy’s 2026-27 season, Story says it was a “great honour.”
“The piece still, for me, is about my own experience and, at the same time, it’s also me exploring this idea of the uterus — and my own uterus — and my absolutely always fraught relationship with it.”
“It’s not just me trying to reassure the audience that I’m okay,” Story adds. “I think it’s also this reality that so many of us have had cancer, or have had loved ones who’ve had cancer.”
Despite the heavy subject matter, Story promises humour throughout their performance — as you’d expect when they bring a symbolic replica of their uterus on stage.
Using a lecture/demonstration style, Story details the thoughts they were having while recovering from surgery, including inquiries about how other animals experience menstruation and menopause. Altogether, the show promises Story’s signature blend of theatre, dance, and storytelling.
Story developed “Hysterical” with dramaturges Marie-Josée Chartier and Story’s own creative and life partner Ryan Kerr, with support from mentors Kerry Beebe and William Kingfisher and composer Karol Orzechowcki aka Garbageface.
Along with “Hysterical,” Bodies Under Siege will feature the world premiere of “Opponent” by Toronto-based choreographer Allison Cummings, who has partnered with Peterborough-born performer Christy Stoeten to explore the experiences of both artists with breast cancer through their common medium of dance.
Cummings is the artistic director of Moonhorse Dance Theatre, which focuses on providing opportunities for established dance artists over the age of 45. Her artistic work, produced work under the umbrella name Sore for Punching You, has been presented at venues and festivals across Canada and internationally, and she is the recipient of multiple awards.
With sound design by Lyon Smith, “Opponent” is a meditative and focused performance that illustrates the balancing act of navigating life and the medical system after a cancer diagnosis.
“It’s a visceral piece and it’s smart and, in places, funny,” Story observes. “It evokes something so powerful about the experience, as they both are breast cancer survivors. It’s just that feeling of estrangement from your reality and from time and place — that’s what it did for me watching it. I’m really honoured to be on a double bill with them.”
Following Bodies Under Siege, Cummings and Stoeten will return to Market Hall on Saturday, November 21 to lead a performance creation workshop from 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Suitable for all disciplines and experience levels, the workshop will begin with movement warm-ups and improvisational exercises before participants explore creative process tools through response and collaboration.
Promising a “catharsis” for those navigating a cancer diagnosis, Story hopes audiences walk away from Bodies Under Siege being “held by the experience.”
“Both pieces contain a range of feelings, but in a safe way,” Story says. “I hope people feel held by that and also seen in a way. Whether you’ve had cancer or not, whether you were assigned female at birth or not, we all have these bodies and things can go wrong, and the medical system can be a very frightening place.”
Tickets to Bodies Under Siege are priced on a sliding scale from $20 to $50 and can be purchased at publicenergy.ca/performance/bodies-under-siege-new-works-by-allison-cummings-kate-story/.
kawarthaNOW is proud to be a longtime media sponsor of Public Energy Performing Arts.
