The Shaw Festival Is Canada’s Great Theatre Bargain
The Shaw Festival Is Canada’s Great Theatre Bargain After sharpening my pencil and doing some calculations, I have decided that the Shaw Festival, in drop-dead-gorgeous Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, is the greatest theatre bargain in Canada. I have booked tickets for the missus and myself for the entire 2023 season at the Shaw Festival – a mere […]
Aaargh!
(Image: New YorkTimes) Gimme A Break! This review in the New York Times made me want to open a vein and slide into a warm tub. Why on earth do people like director Thomas Ostermeier insist on grafting their gawdawful “visions” onto Shakespeare, instead of creating their own works that would illuminate their brilliant insights […]
The Season I Missed (4) – Serving Elizabeth
Serving Elizabeth Streaming on Stratfest@Home Serving Elizabeth, a wonderful new play by Marcia Johnson, travels in time from Kenya in 1972 to London in 2015 with five terrific actors playing all the roles. The conceit of Serving Elizabeth – and this is all entirely fictional – is that Mercy, an outspokenly anti-British Kenyan cook and […]
The Season I Missed (3) – Midsummer Night’s Dream
Midsummer Night’s Dream Streaming on Stratfest@Home Before he tackled the job of desecrating Shakespeare’s Hamlet in 2022, director Peter Pasyk warmed up with the Bard’s Midsummer Night’s Dream in 2021. The script has been ruthlessly cut to accommodate a cast of just eight and an intermission-less running time of about 90 minutes. Fair enough. Stranger […]
Billy Bishop On Demand
Billy Bishop On Demand If you missed Drayton Entertainment’s excellent production of Billy Bishop Goes to War earlier this year, you’ve been granted a second chance. In honour of Remembrance Day, November 11th, Drayton is presenting “Billy Bishop On Demand” for a limited time, from November 7 to 11. And at a bargain price, too, […]
The Season I Missed (2) – Three Tall Women
Three Tall Women Streaming on Stratford@Home Edward Albee has legions of devoted fans. I am not among them. But I soldiered through the Stratford Festival’s nicely observed production of Three Tall Women, now streaming on its Stratford@Home platform, to savour Martha Henry’s final performance. What a performance it was! Henry was dying of cancer when […]
Toward Beauty – A Book Review
Toward Beauty Book Review I’ve been a fan of Dennis Garnhum ever since I saw his masterful take on A Christmas Carol at the Grand Theatre in 2017. I even had a chance to chat with him briefly when he was workshopping Grow at Goodspeed in Connecticut. So when I saw that he had a […]
Want To Become A Canadian Citizen?
Want To Become A Canadian Citizen? Well join the club. I know a lot of Americans who would love to become a Canadian citizen. The same holds true for folks from a lot of other countries. But if you’ve given any thought to what it takes to move to Canada you probably know that it’s […]
The Season I Missed (1) – I Am William
I Am William At The Stratford Festival [I was unable to attend the Stratford Festival’s truncated 2021 season because the border was closed to “non-essential travel” during the pandemic. However, the plays presented that season were filmed and are currently available on Stratfest@Home, the Festival’s very own streaming service. This is one of a series […]
Rain Vs. Shark
I recently took in two British imports at Mirvish theatres, Singin’ In The Rain and The Shark Is Broken. I was intrigued to note that my reactions to both shows were somewhat at odds with those of the reviewers for the major papers. Singin’ In The Rain received generally positive reviews whereas my reactions were […]