Hamlet-911 At The Stratford Festival – A Review
Hamlet-911 at The Stratford Festival If you’re not feeling sufficiently woke, hie thee to Hamlet-911, Ann-Marie MacDonald’s cheerfully anarchic mishmash of a play now receiving it’s much-delayed world premiere at the Stratford Festival’s Studio Theatre. Hamlet-911 is a satiric comedy about white male privilege in the theatre, specifically the Stratford Festival, and the exclusion of […]
Uncle Vanya At Crow’s Theatre – A Review
Uncle Vanya At Crow’s Theatre The astonishment of Artistic Director Chris Abraham’s electrifying production of Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya at Toronto’s Crow’s Theatre begins with the set and lighting. Co-designers of set and props Julie Fox and Josh Quinlan have transformed the Crow’s capacious Guloien Theatre into one of the most impressive sets I’ve seen […]
1939 At The Stratford Festival – A Review
1939 at The Stratford Festival In a canny bit of programming at the Studio Theatre, the Stratford Festival has paired its production of Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well with 1939, a masterful and moving play about Canada’s residential schools, by Jani Lauzon and Kaitlyn Riordan. The residential school system was created to turn the […]
Shaw Announces 2023 Season
Shaw Announces 2023 Season The Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, has announced an ambitious 17-play 2023 season and it looks promising. The Shaw’s 2023 season will kick off with a two-part, six-hour updating of the Sanskrit epic The Mahabarata, featuring an all South Asian cast. It will run for just four weeks, from late February […]
Long Wharf Theatre, Meet The Blyth Festival
(Image: Monica Silvestre) Long Wharf Theatre, Meet The Blyth Festival Jesse Green’s recent article in the New York Times about ending racism in theatre kicks off with a discussion of changes at New Haven’s Long Wharf Theatre If you are not up to speed on Long Wharf’s current situation, Green’s article will fill you in. […]
John Ware Reimagined At The Blyth Festival – A Review
(Image: Blyth Festival) John Ware Reimagined at the Blyth Festival Something remarkable is happening on the bucolic, outdoor Harvest Stage at The Blyth Festival. What could have been a disaster — the last-minute illness of a lead performer — has become the occasion for a remarkable tour de force for Janelle Cooper, director, music director, […]
The Real Poems at Here For Now Theatre – A Review
(Image: Here For Now Theatre) The Real Poems at Here For Now With its closing production of Robert McQueen’s beautifully written, magnificently performed, and quietly devastating The Real Poems, Here For Now Theatre once again establishes itself as a theatrical company that, despite vast differences in scale and resources, is every bit the equal of […]
Death and the King’s Horseman at the Stratford Festival A Review
Death and the King’s Horseman at Stratford Wole Soyinka’s poetic and elegiac play, Death and the King’s Horseman, widely considered the masterpiece of this Nigerian Nobel Laureate in Literature, packs quite an emotional wallop. Director Tawiah M’Carthy mounted this play just two years ago at Soulpepper in Toronto with a much smaller cast. Thanks to […]
The Miser At The Stratford Festival – A Review
The Miser at the Stratford Festival Intermittent hilarity and a bravura central performance manage to salvage the Stratford Festival’s uneven production of Moliere’s The Miser, one in which high comedy style at times verges on desperation. In Ranjit Bolt’s new version of the 1668 comedy, the miser Harpagon becomes despicable Canadian skinflint and usurer Harper […]
Spit At Here For Now Theatre – A Review
(Image: Here For Now Theatre) Spit at Here For Now Theatre Here For Now Theatre continues its admirable run of plays by and about women with Irish playwright Noelle Brown’s brief (just an hour) but powerful Spit, which with admirable economy lays bare the shame of Ireland’s infamous Mother and Baby Homes. Sisters Jessica (Siobhan […]