Margaret Reid At Here For Now Theatre – A Review
Margaret Reid At Here For Now Theatre What’s real? Who can you trust? Do we create our own truth or are we at the mercy of the truth of others? Margaret Reid, Madeleine Brown’s anarchic, surrealistic, and meta-theatrical examination of these existential questions may not answer them, but she sure gives us a lot to […]
The Apple Cart At The Shaw Festival – A Review
The Apple Cart At The Shaw Festival I can only assume that the reason that George Bernard Shaw’s The Apple Cart is not as well known and as frequently revived as some of his other works is because it deals with politics with a capital P. I dare say that, being one of those dreaded […]
Blithe Spirit At The Shaw Festival – A Review
Blithe Spirit At The Shaw Festival Noël Coward occupies a small but beloved niche in twentieth century theatre and his Blithe Spirit from 1941 is perhaps the most popular of his comedies. Director Mike Payette is giving it an enjoyable, if occasionally puzzling, revival at the Shaw Festival’s Festival Theatre. The plot is no doubt […]
Playboy Of The Western World At The Shaw Festival – A Review
Playboy Of The Western World At The Shaw Festival Tá bearna mhór idir scéal gallda agus gníomhas salach. J. M. Synge The Shaw Festival is giving J. M. Synge’s groundbreaking 1907 play, Playboy of the Western World, a sturdy production under the direction of Jackie Maxwell in the Studio Theatre that bears her name. Maxwell […]
Village Wooing At The Shaw Festival – A Review
Village Wooing At The Shaw Festival Each season, at the Royal George Theatre, the Shaw Festival presents a short one-act play at lunchtime. This year it’s George Bernard Shaw’s rather slight two-hander, Village Wooing. Village Wooing is a trifling piece – Shaw called it a “comedietta.” It is receiving a puzzling and egregiously over-produced rendition […]
Myth Of The Ostrich At Here For Now Theatre – A Review
Myth Of The Ostrich at Here For Now Theatre When I saw Liars at a Funeral at the Blyth Festival, I thought I had seen the funniest show of the 2023 season. Matt Murray’s 2014 comedy Myth of the Ostrich, in a dream of a production at Stratford’s Here For Now Theatre, is giving it […]
Outlaw At The Foster Festival – A Review
Outlaw at the Foster Festival Norm Foster’s Outlaw, is not a new play, but its setting and subject matter were new to me, quite unlike any Foster play I have previously seen. Instead of contemporary middle-class suburban Canadians, Outlaw gives us three pistol-packing Americans in Kansas in the years after the Civil War and one […]
Sticks And Stones At The Blyth Festival – A Review
Sticks and Stones at the Blyth Festival The Blyth Festival’s ambitious plan to stage all three installments of James Reaney’s so-called Donnelly Trilogy is off to an impressive start with Sticks and Stones. It is artfully abridged, adapted, and directed by artistic director Gil Garratt, and presented at the magical outdoor Harvest Stage. James Reaney […]
Richard II At The Stratford Festival – A Review
Richard II At The Stratford Festival For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground And tell sad stories of the death of kings. Before I get to Jillian Keiley’s and Brad Fraser’s Frankenstein monster of an adaptation – a “revolutionary” adaptation no less – of William Shakespeare’s Richard II, let me get something off […]
Wizard of Oz: The Panto At Drayton – A Review
Wizard of Oz: The Panto at Drayton Wizard of Oz: The Panto at Drayton Entertainment’s Huron Country Playhouse in Grand Bend, Ontario, is keeping a beloved tradition alive. When impresario Ross Petty announced his retirement in 2019 after Peter’s Final Flight, there was a danger that pantomime might fade from the Canadian consciousness. That would […]