Ontario

The Master Plan At Crow’s Theatre I was familiar with the work of director Chris Abraham mostly through classics like Much Ado About Nothing and Uncle Vanya, so I was eager to see what he would do with The Master Plan, Michael Healey’s new “ripped-from-the-headlines” play at Crow’s Theatre. I wasn’t disappointed. It’s terrific. The…

The Amen Corner At The Shaw Festival The Shaw Festival’s production of The Amen Corner, James Baldwin’s searing tragedy set in a Pentecostal church in 1950s Harlem, marks the first time a play by a Black author has graced the mainstage of the Festival Theatre. Having seen Kimberley Rampersad’s blockbuster production, it’s hard to image…

The Shadow Of A Doubt At The Shaw Festival The Shaw Festival has a history of rediscovering long-forgotten plays. With The Shadow Of A Doubt they’ve done themselves one better by producing the world premiere of a 1901 play by none other than Edith Wharton, the first woman to receive a Pulitzer, not in drama…

The Clearing At The Shaw Festival Shaw Festival artistic director Tim Carroll has a soft spot in his heart for the English Interregnum (1649-1660) and its aftermath. In 2019, he presented (and directed) Victory, a scabrous little play by Howard Barker. This season it’s the far superior The Clearing from 1993 by English playwright Helen…

Love’s Labour’s Lost At The Stratford Festival The Stratford Festival’s production of William Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost is giving some younger and newer members of the company a chance to brush up their Shakespeare. The presence of a number of seasoned pros in the cast is no doubt beneficial for the development of their less…

Queen Maeve At Here For Now Theatre Judith Thompson’s Queen Maeve, now receiving its world premiere at Stratford’s Here For Now Theatre, is a bleak but powerful portrait of a demented nursing home resident, one Mrs. Nurmi. The staff calls her “your Majesty” because she is convinced that in addition to being an 88-year-old “ordinary…

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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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…

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 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 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 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…