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Chronicling a Love Affair with Canadian Theatre

The Diviners At The Stratford Festival – A Review

the diviners

The Diviners At The Stratford Festival The Diviners, a classic of Canadian literature by Margaret Laurence, is being brought to grand and glorious life in a sinuous adaptation by Vern Thiessen and Yvette Nolan on the stage of the Stratford Festival’s Tom Patterson Theatre. The Diviners is a sprawling work that tells the story of […]

Salesman In China At The Stratford Festival – A Review

salesman in china

Salesman In China At The Stratford Festival The Stratford Festival has a major hit on its hands with the transcendent, Broadway-worthy world premiere of Salesman in China, by Leanna Brodie and Jovanni Sy, directed by Sy. Now playing to full houses at the Avon Theatre, it is an imagined recreation of the events surrounding the […]

London Assurance At The Stratford Festival – A Review

london assurance

London Assurance At The Stratford Festival Antoni Cimolino is perhaps the most gifted interpreter of William Shakespeare in North America. So when I saw that he was directing none of the Bard’s works this season at the Stratford Festival, I consoled myself with the knowledge that at least he would be directing London Assurance, the […]

Lakefront At Lighthouse Festival Theatre – A Review

lakefront

Lakefront At The Lighthouse Theatre With Lakefront, now enjoying it’s world premiere at Port Dover’s Lighthouse Festival Theatre, the prolific Norm Foster is proving that oldsters can be just as romantic – and funny – as the younger couples he has been writing about for decades. “Write what you know” is timeless advice for writers, […]

With Love And A Major Organ At Here For Now Theatre – A Review

with love and a major organ

With Love And A Major Organ At Here For Now Theatre Have you ever given your heart to someone? Most of us have been in love at least once in our lives, but no one gives their heart quite like the heroine of With Love and a Major Organ by Julia Lederer, the surreal, witty, […]

Snow In Midsummer At The Shaw Festival – A Review

snow in midsummer

Snow In Midsummer At The Shaw Festival The programme for Snow In Midsummer by Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig, now showing at the Shaw Festival’s Studio Theatre, tells me that the play is “based on the classical Chinese drama The Injustice to Dou E that Moved Heaven and Earth by Guan Hanqing.” The distinguished scholar and critic […]

Candida At The Shaw Festival – A Review

candida

Candida At The Shaw Festival The works of George Bernard Shaw seem to be almost an afterthought these days at the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, which was founded precisely to honor his considerable output. Severn Thompson’s smashing production of Candida is a bracing reminder that the Festival ignores the master at its peril. The Candida […]

The Melville Boys At The Foster Festival – A Review

melville boys

The Melville Boys At The Foster Festival The Melville Boys, an early play by Norm Foster, is marking its 40th anniversary with a sterling revival at The Foster Festival in St. Catherines, Ontario. The Melville Boys was Foster’s second published play and according to the Canadian Theatre Encyclopedia the one that put him on the […]

Onion Skins and Peach Fuzz: The Farmerettes At The Blyth Festival – A Review

farmerettes

Onion Skins And Peach Fuzz: The Farmerettes At The Blyth Festival The Blyth Festival is capping its 50th anniversary season with Onion Skins And Peach Fuzz: The Farmerettes, a vibrant and moving story of the thousands of young women who volunteered to work the fields of Ontario during the Second World War, while the farm […]