1 actor plays 2 roles to tell WWII story Half the Battle

A new play tells the story of two Canadian pilots in the Second World War who don't just battle the enemy they also battle each other.

Alberta playwright Owen Bishop wrote and also performs in Half the Battle after being inspired during a 2009 high school trip to Europe, which included a Canadian battlefield tour.

"We toured many, many Canadian cemeteries and what I noticed there is when a pilot and co-pilot were shot down in battle, the tombstones were attached to symbolize their partnership lasting into the afterlife, and that image stuck with me for a long time," he told The Homestretch on Monday.

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"When I was tasked with creating a one-man show as a graduation piece, I wrote a story of a pilot and a co-pilot stuck together in the afterlife and they do not like each other very much. It is their adventure and discovery of how they get out of there, do they go on from there? Do they go back to the world they came from?"

This is the third iteration of Bishop's one-man show.

"It began as a 20-minute performance, then it was 35 [minutes] and now it's about an hour long," he said.

"It's something I keep coming back to and it's a story I keep researching and keep re-telling and it's something that's important to me."

One reason for the importance, he said, is to remind current generations about the sacrifices Canadians made.

"For my generation it's easy for me to distance myself from the Second World War because it is so far removed from what I know and the world I live in," he said.

"And when I was diving into this piece and doing the research, I came across these stories, these horrific tales that were both in the European theatre and back home, and affected everybody in the country, and this is my way to reconnect my generation and the people who are as disconnected from the war, back to that history."

The showis on nightly at 7:30 p.m. until Nov. 10 at the Motel Theatre in Arts Commons.

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With files from The Homestretch