What’s in the (in)box??

You’re reading the November 21, 2025 edition of the Peterborough Currents email newsletter. To receive our email newsletters straight to your inbox, sign up here.

---

Hi, it’s Currents co-editor Gabe Pollock here with your weekly Peterborough Currents email newsletter!

This week I visited Peterborough’s little black box theatre that could, the Theatre on King. They have a particularly silly fundraising show coming up this weekend and I was eager to hear all about it. It’s also been a few months since the theatre’s co-founders left and a new artistic director came on, so I wanted to check in on how the theatre is doing.

Plus, it’s (still) municipal budget season in Peterborough, and we have a handy summary of the week in budget negotiations. 

On the topic of the budget: in case you missed it, last week Currents published an in-depth exploration of the Peterborough Police budget. Why does the police budget keep going up? What are the police spending it on? And is it making our community safer?

Fundraiser for black box theatre asks, “What’s in the box?”

by Gabe Pollock

Visitors to the Theatre on King, Peterborough’s small black box theatre, may have noticed a mysterious package in the space for the last couple years: a nondescript cardboard box, sealed with packing tape from a Chinese shipping company and with marker scrawled, “DO NOT OPEN.”

Finally, this Saturday at a fundraising show for the theatre, the question will be answered: What’s in the Box?

The event is the brainchild of Shannon McKenzie LeBlanc, the Theatre on King’s new artistic director. Peterborough Currents broke the story in April that co-founders Ryan Kerr and Kate Story would be leaving the theatre, citing burnout. This week, Currents spoke with LeBlanc to discuss the event and catch up on how it’s going, a few months into her term as director.

“I had the idea like two years ago,” she says, “just watching a stupid TikTok video of people doing a live unboxing of mystery boxes. Like, oh that would be a really stupid idea for a show!” She found a mystery box on an online auction site and the event was born.

During the show, host Kevin MacNeil (Rapids End Improv) and a lineup of local actors and improvisers will take items out of the box and use them as suggestions for improvised scenes… whatever they are. Pirate treasure? Amazon return knockoff iPads? Who knows? There’s also a backup plan, “in case the items are horrible,” LeBlanc says with a laugh.

At the end of the night, items from the box will be raffled off, as well as a number of donations from local businesses and artisans, including Bluestreak Records, Hi Ho Silver, Gather Studio, Jackson Creek Press, and more.

The event is set up as a fundraiser for the Theatre on King, with ticket sales and raffle proceeds going back into the theatre. It’s part of the theatre’s fall fundraising campaign, which hopes to raise $15,000. “It’s not a crisis,” says LeBlanc, but she emphasizes the need for ongoing funding. 

Like so many local organizations, the Theatre on King relies on funding through the city’s Community Grants program, for which they reapply every year. Two years ago, the theatre faced an existential threat when the city suddenly denied their funding request, and last year, a proposed 25% overall cut to the grant program was only reversed after the community rallied in support.

While Community Grants funding is stable in this year’s city budget, times are ever uncertain for a little theatre. “Financially it’s tough,” says LeBlanc. “The first few months were super scary, figuring out how everything was going to get covered. So it’s nice to have that little buffer.”

But in general, LeBlanc seems cautiously optimistic. “I had concerns when I took over: are people still going to use the space? What’s going to happen?” In fact, it’s become a busy autumn, with a wide variety of shows taking place at the theatre, including concerts, plays, workshops, and dance events, plus a steady stream of rentals.

“Generally, it’s really busy,” says LeBlanc, “which is really great.”

---

Recap: the week in budget talks

by Gabe Pollcok

Earlier this week, city councillors and staff met for two days of marathon budget discussions, going through the municipal budget line by line and looking for efficiencies, before the budget is finalized and approved on December 8. Here are some of the highlights, as reported by our partners in local media:

• Peterborough’s all-inclusive municipal tax rate for 2026 will be increasing by 6.56 per cent. This is somewhat lower than the 7.87 per cent originally proposed. 
  
• In order to cover this difference, the city will be tapping into its Legacy Reserve fund, which was originally set up to save money for local construction projects. They will also be deferring some spending projects, including renovations of a cottage at Jackson Park, a development study of the Coldsprings area, and renovation work at City Hall.
  
• Coun. Alex Bierk proposed a motion requesting the costs to renovate and expand the Peterborough Police station be capped at $75 million, after the project expanded from $66.5 million to $91.9 million earlier this year. Following vigorous debate, the motion failed 4 to 7 votes.
  
• Council did vote to send the police budget back to the police board, requesting that they reduce their operating budget increase from 9.22 to 7 per cent. The next day, following a 20-minute private meeting, the police board responded that they will not be reducing their budget ask.
  
• As budget discussions were in progress, Coun. Keith Riel announced he will be running for mayor in the next municipal election, which will be taking place October 26, 2026.

---

---

Thanks for reading the Peterborough Currents email newsletter! Here’s where you can sign up to have these sent straight to your inbox.