The Team on the Hill at The Blyth Festival

The Blyth Festival scores another hit with their production of The Team On The Hill by Canada’s beloved Dan Needles.

When it comes to life on the farm, Needles knows whereof he speaks. Needles, the scion of Canadian theatre royalty and something of a national treasure, is best known as the creator of Wingfield Farm, a series of wryly humorous tales of rural life in Ontario. They started as newspaper pieces and evolved into seven one-man shows that have become something of a sinecure for Stratford Festival veteran Rod Beattie. They are all on DVD and well worth seeking out.

Needles has also written a number of actual plays and the Blyth Festival is reviving his 2013 The Team on the Hill in a spirited production under the steady direction of Severn Thompson, Blyth’s Associate Artistic Director. If the audience reaction at the last preview, which I saw, is any indication it will be a major hit — and deservedly so.

The Ransier family is at a crossroads. The farm, which has a magnificent view of Lake Huron, has come through a bruising period of debt and near disaster thanks to some poor decisions by grandpa Austin, whose love of farming often outstripped his business sense. His son Ray had fled the farm to work on the ships plying the Great Lakes, but he came home to rescue his father from ruin. His many years of hard work have paid off — barely — but the strain has taken its toll. He is angry and bitter and sorely tempted to sell the place to a developer who wants to turn it into a golf course.

As The Team On The Hill begins, son Larry, fresh out of Ag school, returns with his girlfriend Leanne. He loves farming as much as his grandfather and wants to come back and set the farm to rights with his newfound knowledge of the benefits of soy bean cultivation (the play is set in 1970). Grandpa, meanwhile, has started down the slippery slope of dementia and spends his time on the porch seeing things that aren’t there.

This might sound like the kind of scenario that John Steinbeck would turn into an operatic spectacle of despair. Needles doesn’t turn away from the very real pressures his characters face, but he unfailingly finds humour in their travails and reveals the deep and abiding love that ties the family together even when they are having screaming fights and breaking things in their fury. The result is a heartfelt and heartwarming comedy that provides plenty of laughs and, yes, a tear or two.

In Austin, the family patriarch, Needles has created the kind of rich comic character who, like Falstaff in the Elizabethan era, leaves audiences wanting more of his company. He is the heart and soul of the play and Layne Coleman gives him the kind of bravura performance that for once makes the standing ovation at the curtain call perfectly appropriate.

Coleman’s performance alone would warrant a trip to Blyth, but Thompson has surrounded him with lovely performances by Julie Tamiko Manning as Marion, Ray’s loving, long-suffering wife, Tony Munch as Ray, and Kurtis Leon Baker as Larry. Lucy Meanwell, as the girlfriend, has little to do but look adorable and she pulls that off nicely.

Kelly Wolf has provided a clever set with a revolving farmhouse, Noah Feaver has lit it sensitively, and sound designer Heidi Chan has provided unobtrusive music to fit the period.

Then again, as someone once said, the play’s the thing, and Needles has created a loving portrait of the world of Ontario farming and the special breed of people who inhabit it. It was clear to me, who wouldn’t know a soy bean if I fell over it, that the audience had a deep connection with the world on stage. Indeed, The Team on the Hill represents the epitome of Blyth’s mandate, to produce new Canadian work on rural themes and in a rural setting. Once again I find myself urging my fellow Americans to come north to enjoy the kind of terrific theatre that will probably never be seen south of the Poutine Curtain.

The Team on the Hill plays through September 5, 2019 in repertory with other productions.

Blyth Festival
423 Queen Street
Blyth, ON N0M 1H0
(877) 862-5984
blyth festival.com

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