From award-winning actor to writer-in-residence, Tracy Dawson finds next evolution at UCalgary

Tracy Dawson might just be proof that manifestation is real. 

“I learned about writer residencies around the time my first book came out,” she says. 

“I said out loud to every one of my friends, ‘I am going to get one’. The idea of working on your writing half of the time and then engaging with students and the community for the other half — it’s a dream.” 

Three years later, here she is. An award-winning actor, screenwriter and author, Dawson is UCalgary’s 2025-26 Canadian Writer-in-Residence based in the Faculty of Arts. 

Dawson started as a comedian on the Second City Mainstage before an acting career in Toronto, which garnered her both a Gemini Award and a Canadian Screen Award for her work on Call Me Fitz.

“I was doing comedy, so I was always writing and creating,” she says. 

"When you’re acting in Canada, you think you have to go to the States to make it, so I got my green card and moved to LA in 2006. 

“I slowly started to write more, first a play and then a TV show. It has been an evolution for me, from comedy to acting to writing.”

For Dawson, Calgary is an ideal location for her residency. 

“I love being in new places and writing. It’s perfect,” she says. 

In 2009, she won an award from the Banff World Television Festival that first brought her to the province, so it’s a bit full circle to be back again. 

The Calgary Distinguished Writers Program is one of Canada’s longest-running writers-in-residence initiatives. It connects students and the community with some of the country’s most engaging literary voices. 

“I love talking with students,” she says. 

“I am excited to visit classrooms coming up, especially across different departments.

"I was recently on a panel at Wordfest and met so many incredible people there — this city is so into books; I just love it.”

Dawson is also hosting a Literary Café on Nov. 4 at the Taylor Family Digital Library, where she will discuss the theme, Anonymous is a Woman, diving into the many women who wrote under a pseudonym or published anonymously. 

She will also talk about her book, Let Me Be Frank: A Book About Women Who Dressed Like Men to Do Shit They Weren’t Supposed to Do. 

“I’m very proud of this book — I had never thought about writing a book in my life," says Dawson.

"I pitched the idea for TV, but it didn’t sell, and I just couldn’t let it go.

“It’s deeply researched and told through a humorist, feminist voice.”

A second set of eyes, from a Writer-in-Residence

For a lot of writers, getting someone to read and provide constructive feedback on their work is a challenging task. The Canadian Writer-in-Residence offers manuscript consultations to writers across Canada, with priority given to those in the Calgary area. 

“It’s exciting because I get to read little excerpts, or scripts, or novels and give my thoughts,” says Dawson. 

“Anyone can submit their work and get my feedback through written notes, or a virtual call." 

For University of Calgary students, faculty or staff, they can also pop by Dawson’s office for a one-on-one discussion. 

While at UCalgary, Dawson is working on a feature film script and her second book. 

She toggles between the two projects, something she admits can be challenging, as it’s easy to get singularly focused. 

“The screenplay is in a good place — at this stage, it’s like a puzzle. I know I have to 'do this in act one' to pay it off in act three,” she explains. 

“It’s fun because coming up with the story is the hardest part," says Dawson, adding that, in contrast, during work in the initial stages, "sometimes you feel like, ‘why am I doing this?’”

Storytelling is integral to the human experience and it's something humans have been doing forever, adds Dawson. 

“We need empathy and connection and storytelling,” she says. 

“I am always mining connections of relationships, love, disconnect, grief. We are all broken and then someone says, you helped heal me. 

"That’s all I want to do as a writer.”