Les Belles-Soeurs At The Stratford Festival – A Review
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 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 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 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
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
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 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 […]
Frog Song At Here For Now Theatre – A Review
Frog Song At Here For Now Theatre In a delightful change of pace, Stratford’s Here For Now Theatre is presenting Frog Song, an opera – yes, an opera! – for children and never has its tent theatre and its bucolic setting seemed more magical. With a book by Taylor Marie Graham and music by William […]
The St. Nicholas Hotel At The Blyth Festival – A Review
The St. Nicholas Hotel At The Blyth Festival The saga of southwest Ontario’s ill-fated Donnelly clan continues in The St. Nicholas Hotel, the second installment of The Donnelly’s: A Trilogy at the Blyth Festival. The others in the series are Sticks and Stones and Handcuffs. After the broad overview of the legend of the Donnellys […]
Wedding Band At The Stratford Festival – A Review
Wedding Band At The Stratford Festival The Stratford Festival has another triumph on its hands in the form of Sam White’s searing production of the 1962 Alice Childress masterpiece, Wedding Band. Except for a mention in the author bio, the programme omits the play’s telling subtitle, A Love/Hate Story in Black and White, but it […]