Secret Ingredients

Secret Ingredients is a theatre project created by Keely O’Brien that uses cake to explore the intricacies of human relationships. Leading up to the performance, the public is invited to consider messages that they find too difficult to express directly to someone in their life, and submit them via an online form. These messages are translated into beautiful, subversive, and delicious cakes, which are delivered to the intended recipients as an edible form of communication. The project culminates in a live performance and cake tasting, inspired by the cakes and the stories behind them.

Like overhearing tantalizing gossip at a neighbouring cafe table, Secret Ingredients satisfies a human itch to peek into intimate and relatable details of other people’s lives, while also inviting reflection on our own unspoken feelings. The project pairs sweet flavours with challenging messages: the dark chocolate of embarrassment, the citrus zest of annoyance, the tart cherry jam of grief. Secret Ingredients takes a playful and intentionally inefficient approach to the challenges of honest communication, and provides a window into the quirks, nuances, joy and heartache of real relationships.

About the Artist

Creator/Performer: Keely O’Brien Keely O'Brien is an interdisciplinary artist whose practice incorporates handmade objects with innovative theatre creation. Devoted to a thoroughly DIY process, Keely’s work includes experimental performance, imaginative ephemera, and interactive experiences. She often creates collaborative projects with community members who may not consider themselves artists, and invites the public to participate in unusual meaning-making experiences.

Keely is Co-Artistic Director of Popcorn Galaxies, a theatre company with a focus on unconventionally structured, site-specific, and audience-activated performance. She holds a BFA in Theatre Performance from Simon Fraser University, and is a self and family-taught visual artist.

Stage and Production Manager: Joël Azevedo Joël Azevedo is a dance artist and stage manager. As an independent artist their skill set includes production, stage, and tour management, with an emphasis on logistics coordinating for non-traditional shows and venues.

Access Consultant: V West V West is a non-binary artist, arts worker, and disability advocate. Their practice draws from their lived experience of neurodivergence, madness, and chronic illness. As an artist, their projects explore how disability can reshape understandings of self, kin, and community. As an advocate and educator, V contributes to disability-led consultation, education, community organizing, and peer support initiatives.

Access Consultant: Amy Amantea Amy Amantea is a legally blind artist, actor and advocate for persons with disabilities. Amy is Associate Director at VocalEye, and spends her time volunteering in the community, enhancing accessibility and creating awareness around sight loss.

Sound Designer: Alex Mah Alex Mah is an interdisciplinary artist, composer-musician, and performer. His electroacoustic music investigates time and timbre and his written music explores embodied concepts such as chance, choice, and relationality in performance. He has performed in Canada, the U.S., and Germany and holds a BFA from SFU (Canada) and an MRes from Bath Spa University (U.K.) under James Saunders.

Projection and Lighting Designer: Andie Lloyd Andie Lloyd is a queer interdisciplinary artist and community advocate who works primarily as a lighting and video designer for live performance. They studied Theatre Production at Studio 58 and have worked across Canada and internationally with numerous professional companies including Neworld Theatre, FakeKnot, rice & beans theatre and PuSh International Performing Arts Festival.

Mentor: Maiko Yamamoto Maiko is a Vancouver-based artist who creates new, experimental and intercultural performances rooted in long-term collaboration. She co-founded Theatre Replacement in 2003, where she has created over 25 new performances that have toured across Canada and internationally, and leads initiatives such as HOLD ON LET GO, COLLIDER residency program and the Accelerator Lab International Fellowship. Maiko directs, creates, teaches, mentors and curates for organizations in Canada and abroad. She holds a BFA from SFU School for the Contemporary Arts and an MAA from Emily Carr University, and recently premiered End of Greatness, a new multidisciplinary performance created with longtime collaborator and friend, Veda Hille.

Credits

Creator and Performer: Keely O’Brien

Sound Design: Alex Mah

Projection and Lighting Design: Andie Lloyd

Access Consultant: V West Additional

Access Consultation: Amy Amantea

Production and Stage Manager: Joël Azevedo

Props Builder/Buyer: Jesse Orr

Mentor: Maiko Yamamoto

Accessibility

Sensory Warnings: None

Content Warnings: mentions of parent’s life threatening illness, psychiatric hospitalization

Pay-What-You-Ten Tickets: 10% of tickets are available for $10, in an effort to make theatre more accessible to equity-seeking groups, newcomers, artists & arts workers, and anyone for whom cost is a barrier. We believe the arts have something to offer everyone and we want to reduce financial barriers to our programming. No registration, forms to fill out, or questions asked. Just select the PWY10 ticket when booking online.

Arrival at the venue: The doors will open  30 minutes ahead of showtime. Masks are welcomed inside the theatre and available at the box office. Refunds: If you are not feeling well or have any symptoms, please stay home to help keep everyone safe. We are able to discuss refunds on a case by case basis due to health reasons before the performance. Please contact tickets@intrepidtheatre.com. We are unable to arrange refunds after a performance has occurred.

• Event Types - Comedy
• $0.00 + $2.50 fee
• 18-November 20, 2026
• 70 minutes
• Intrepid Studio
• Intrepid Studio
• Ages 14+
• 
  Content Warning: Mentions of parent’s life threatening illness, psychiatric hospitalization