What does a typical pre-theatre agenda look like? Perhaps a medium rare steak and a bottle of merlot at your favourite lighting challenged restaurant. This night was different – a grilled cheese sandwich, strawberry milkshake and a sundae! A perfect gastronomic pairing for Ross Petty’s The Wizard of Oz running through January 5 at Toronto’s Elgin Theatre. After all it’s a kid’s show and we know that going in.
Read MoreNeed to pay your rent? Try forming your own rock band. Just make sure the lyrics can be heard.
It has been years since I’ve seen the film version of ‘School of Rock’ with Jack Black. I will admit I was never a fan of his to begin and wasn’t certain if I was going to like this production.
Read MoreI have been sitting on this article for awhile because the impact of Duncan MacMillan’s ‘Every Brilliant Thing’ has finally hit me.
It’s a one-person story told in a theatre in the round bare stage setting at Toronto’s Berkeley Street house. The narrator breaks the fourth wall in speaking to the audience and tells her story how she has coped with her mother’s suicidal thoughts and tendencies. In between moments that are not so pleasant, the narrator has written items and points of interest on every brilliant thing that life has to offer people no matter the darkest hour or fear that we may confront.
Read MoreOver thirty years later, in an ironic turn of events, I had no idea an antagonistic rivalry of the scholarly minds existed between Marshall McLuhan and Northrop Frye until I had seen Jason Sherman’s ‘The Message’. These two iconic literary giants for me served as steadfast points of reference for many of my undergraduate papers in English Language and Literature. This new-found knowledge of academia head butting provided many amusing points of interest for me.
Read MoreIt is in those rare moments where one gets to see something uncommon in theatre that stirs the heart and makes one’s love of theatre grow. Case in point — Caryl Churchill’s “Escaped Alone”, being presented by Soulpepper in conjunction with Necessary Angel Theatre.
The play explores the relationship of three friends in their sixties or older, Vi (Brenda Robins), Lena (Kyra Harper), and Sally (Maria Vacratsis) — and a lesser-known neighbour they don’t know as well, Mrs. Jarrett (Clare Coulter), who arrives and joins them for tea in Sally’s backyard. Mrs. Jarrett listens intently as the three women chat about their lives and neighbourhood, finishing and cutting off each other’s sentences as only long-time friends can do. The action occasionally freezes, and Mrs. Jarrett delivers chilling and surreal accounts of apocalyptic visions, often with details that satirize our current social media climate (for example, people taking selfies amid a disaster event in case they get a chance to post them at some point).
Read MoreI tremendously respect and admire playwrights who bring an immediacy of personal reactions to their stories of racial conflict and tension within the theatre. The Stratford Festival’s recent production of “To Kill a Mockingbird” is only one example that comes to my mind. I had read in earlier press releases that Marco Ramirez’s “The Royale” deals with racial tensions in the Jim Crow era. As I sat quietly waiting for the play to begin, I wondered if audiences are becoming saturated to the point where we feel nothing about this theme?
Read MoreToronto premiere of Anosh Irani’s The Men in White disarmingly unravels the ties that bind the immigrant experience to Canada.
Read MoreJennifer Haley’s science fiction crime drama is set in the future where the Internet has become ‘The Nether’, a place where people can enter many virtual reality realms. Users may log in, choose an identity, and then indulge in any desire they wish.
Read MoreIt’s not too often that I find myself sitting in a theatre, moments before the curtain rises, and I am not really sure what it is I’m about to see, which is an exhilarating feeling. The parenthetical “A Theatrical Mixtape” gives a bit of a hint of what’s to come, but it still wasn’t enough to prepare me for the incredible sonic ride I was taken on moments later: Two young Black women — B-Girl and the DJ — growing up in Toronto struggle with their identity and heritage, navigating their way forward through an exploration of their social and cultural history, presented as a heady mixture of singing and spoken word poetry connected and surrounded by a soundscape of music, audio clips, and sound effects.
Read MoreMore details are available at https://capitoltheatre.com/.Although the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale was first published nearly 200 years ago, the version of the Little Mermaid that most people have ingrained in their minds is that of the hugely successful Disney animated film that started the Disney Renaissance of the late 80s and early 90s. The version of The Little Mermaid that is now being produced by the Port Hope Theatre Festival at the beautiful Cameco Capitol Arts Centre in Port Hope, Ontario, is the Disney telling, which was adapted for the stage and made its Broadway debut in 2008.
Read MoreSoulpepper is adding a splash of fun to the dog days of summer, with Bed and Breakfast, a comedy by Canadian playwright, Mark Crawford. Bed and Breakfast is a delightful romp about a young gay couple, Brett (Gregory Prest) and Drew (Paolo Santalucia), who are growing ever tired of Toronto’s urban rat race and frustratingly competitive real estate market. An opportunity drives them to move to small-town Ontario and turn a beloved deceased aunt’s house into a bed and breakfast.
Read MoreThrough all their faults, mistakes and errors, Eduardo De Filippo has written a story of human individuals who have learned to embrace their foibles and weaknesses no matter how awful and terrible in whatever time and place these people find themselves. This production of Napoli Milionaria does appeal to our humanity and, in doing so, this appeal has enabled the playwright “to find an eager audience among all social classes’ as Cimolino writes in his Director’s Notes.
Read MorePurported to be the last play the Bard had written alone, Stratford’s version of The Tempest captures a sweeping tale of revenge, compassion, empathy and forgiveness now on stage at the Festival Theatre. I can recall reading the rather challenging text during my undergraduate years and remembering there was so much going on at so many levels. It would take a discerning vision somehow to connect all that is going on to a diverse twenty first century audience taste.
Read MoreInitially I wasn’t too sure if I really wanted to see Rocky Horror again as I felt I had seen it enough already. Director Donna Feore certainly made me feel welcome, when I changed my mind, with the warm invitation in her Director and Choreographer Notes: “It doesn’t matter who you are or where you’re from; right here, right now, you’re family. So come as you are, in whatever you like, and take your rightful place.”
Read MoreI’ve read several recent online articles about the value of the spontaneous standing ovation, and if it is now somewhat expected at the end of each play rather than earned by hard-working actors. Has the standing ‘O’ lost its’ impact because audience members simply jump to their feet since they either are friends of the cast or director and do not want to disappoint or offend anyone? I’ve noticed recently in some of the larger professional/semi/non-professional Toronto/GTA houses that, while I may have enjoyed a performance but felt it did not merit me standing, I’ve had to do it begrudgingly, so I can watch the actors take their earned bows.
Read MoreTheatre on the Ridge’s production surface dives initially and then spirals downward deeply into the very being of a disintegrating family.
Read MoreBreathing fresh, modern relevance into a play written some 420 years ago is challenging to say the least. Sure, there are themes and archetypes that transcend time, but when the play is old enough to be seemingly written in a different language, the challenge certainly remains for any theatre company tackling the works of William Shakespeare. The Driftwood Theatre Group takes on this challenge so effortlessly with their production of Rosalynde (or, As You Like It) that you find yourself wondering why Shakespeare is so notorious for being difficult to understand in the first place.
Read MoreIt was more than 100 years ago that playwright and novelist J.M. Barrie created his most iconic character, Peter Pan. Since that time, the boy who wouldn’t grow up has been well-represented in everything from plays and books to movies and TV shows.
At its heart, the play is about the discord between the fun and innocent nature of being a child and the seriousness and responsibility of being an adult. While Barrie explores the darker side of this conflict in his original play and in his subsequent novelization, Theatre on the Ridge’s production focuses on the more lighthearted and magical aspects of the story, making the show much more accessible for children. And that is a very good thing because, let’s face it, there is not enough theatre available for kids to enjoy.
Read MoreDashing Canadian hero, Richard Hannay, whisks us on an epic journey through an adventure-filled myriad of iconic film noir characters, accents, and scenes in hopes of revealing the meaning behind ‘The 39 Steps’. Take a 1935 Alfred Hitchcock film thriller and adapt it for the stage. Add some slapstick comedy, mix in four brilliant actors who play an array of iconic spy genre characters plus a dash of some quirky stage directions, and you’ve got Capitol Theatre’s latest, boisterous and bona fide hit, The 39 Steps!
Read More‘Tis a puzzlement, these plays of Oscar Wilde. They require audiences to pay careful attention as it is easy to get lost in the intricate and, sometimes, silly plots. Considering the advent of #metoo, I’m also wondering if Wilde’s plays of characters who withhold secrets and indiscretions still hold relevance for a twenty first century audience. I sat on the incompletion of this opening night review for a few days to ponder whether Stratford’s ‘comedy of manners’ production of An Ideal Husband was a wise choice for the 2018 slate.
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