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Chronicling a Love Affair with Canadian Theatre

Love’s Labour’s Lost At The Stratford Festival – A Review

love's labour's lost

Love’s Labour’s Lost At The Stratford Festival The Stratford Festival’s production of William Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost is giving some younger and newer members of the company a chance to brush up their Shakespeare. The presence of a number of seasoned pros in the cast is no doubt beneficial for the development of their less […]

Queen Maeve At Here For Now Theatre – A Review

queen maeve

Queen Maeve At Here For Now Theatre Judith Thompson’s Queen Maeve, now receiving its world premiere at Stratford’s Here For Now Theatre, is a bleak but powerful portrait of a demented nursing home resident, one Mrs. Nurmi. The staff calls her “your Majesty” because she is convinced that in addition to being an 88-year-old “ordinary […]

Les Belles-Soeurs At The Stratford Festival – A Review

les belles-soeurs

Les Belles-Soeurs At The Stratford Festival Les Belles-Soeurs (the Sisters-in-Law) by the francophone Quebec playwright Michel Tremblay holds an iconic position in Canadian theatre history. It is receiving a thought provoking revival under the enthusiastic if occasionally over-emphatic direction of Esther Jun. The year is 1965 in the working class east end of Montreal and […]

The Real McCoy At The Blyth Festival – A Review

the real mccoy

The Real McCoy At The Blyth Festival The Blyth Festival is rounding out its 49th season with a smashing revival of Andrew Moodie’s 2006 play, The Real McCoy. A flawless cast and a sprightly script add up to an altogether marvelous show that is alternately hilariously funny and heartbreakingly sad. Elijah McCoy was the son […]

The Fox At Here For Now Theatre – A Review

the fox

The Fox At Here For Now Theatre Playwright Daniela Vlaskalic has adapted the D. H. Lawrence short story “The Fox” into an intriguing 90-minute play of the same name. It is receiving its world premier at Here For Now Theatre’s modest tent in the woods behind the Stratford-Perth Museum. The short story has never been […]

Frankenstein Revived At The Stratford Festival – A Review

frankenstein revived

Frankenstein Revived At The Stratford Festival Frankenstein Revived by Morris Panych at the Avon Theatre is a riveting piece of theatre and quite unlike anything I have ever seen at the Stratford Festival. Frankenstein Revived is an adaptation of the famous 1818 epistolary novel “Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus,” by teenaged Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. That […]

Life Without At Here For Now Theatre – A Review

here for now theatre

Life Without At Here For Now Theatre Here For Now Theatre’s Life Without by Steve Ross, the popular, indeed beloved Stratford Festival actor is the work of a promising and powerful playwright. (Closed borders during the pandemic prevented me from seeing his first outing with Here For Now, the well received goldfish.) Life Without unfolds […]

Handcuffs At The Blyth Festival – A Review

the donnelly trilogy

Handcuffs At The Blyth Festival The Blyth Festival’s epic presentation of James Reaney’s so-called Donnelly Trilogy, concludes with Part 3: Handcuffs. As abridged, adapted, and directed by Gil Garratt, it goes out in something of a blaze of glory. (To avoid needless repetition, I refer readers to my reviews of Part 1: Sticks and Stones […]

Chronicles Of Sarnia At The Blyth Festival – A Review

chronicles of sarnia

Chronicles Of Sarnia At The Blyth Festival The Blyth Festival has another comedy hit on its hands with the world premiere of Chronicles of Sarnia by Sarnia native Matt Murray. Murray also wrote Myth of the Ostrich, which Here For Now Theatre produced earlier this season. He clearly has a gift for intricately plotted, character […]

Is This The Stratford Festival’s Best Kept Secret?

tom patterson cafe

Is This The Stratford Festival’s Best Kept Secret? Looking for a nice quiet light lunch or dinner before the show? Or maybe you’d just like to have lunch in a quiet environment in which you can actually hear your companion. Let me introduce you to the Tom Pat cafe, located in the spectacular new Tom […]