by Ryan Oakley

When people who hate theatre imagine a modern play, they imagine something like Theatre Smith Gilmour’s GRIMMtoo at Factory Studio. It seems more like drama students practising their craft than a finished piece, more like a television comedy mocking theatre than an actual play.

It’s a collection of incomprehensible short pieces, and it starts very badly. A man sits on the edge of the stage and tells us about all the strange things he’s seen. This would be fine but, like most of the play, it’s interminable. He goes on and on and on, giving us a list instead of a story until he bludgeons any magic out of these strange things. And finally, the lights are turned off and the play begins.

Continue reading GRIMMtoo – Theatre Smith Gilmour →

By Darryl D’Souza

I have conflicting feelings about Daniel MacIvor’s latest play, Communion, playing at Tarragon Theatre (where, incidentally, MacIvor is the new playwright-in-residence). To be fair, I am a huge fan of MacIvor, so my expectations for this play were very high.  I’ve actually been waiting to see Communion ever since I first heard about it last September. 

However, experience has taught me that high expectations – whether they’re for a play, novel or film – are often a sure-fire recipe for disappointment.  I was disappointed to a certain extent, but also enthralled with the intriguing characters, their complex relationships with each other and the fact that it was far more political than MacIvor’s last Tarragon play, A Beautiful View. Continue reading Communion – Tarragon Theatre →

by Sam Mooney

This is the 22nd New Ideas Festival hosted by Alumnae Theatre Company, so you know that they’re doing something right.  The Alumnae website describes it better than I can: “The New Ideas Festival is a juried, three-week annual festival of new writing, works-in-progress and experimental theatre, with a different program of plays each week, and a staged reading on Saturdays at noon. It runs from March 10 – 27, 2010. There are 18 scripts in the Festival this year – something for everybody: long ones, short ones, funny, sad, tension-filled, silly, and some surprises that we won’t give away.”

It’s a juried festival so you know that it isn’t going to be a crapshoot – every show will have some merit.  Of course, they may not all be to your taste.

This week, there are 4 plays, listed below in order of presentation:

• JOIN THE CLUB by Suzanne Courtney & Leora Courtney-Wolfman • Directed by Stacy Halloran
• AN INKED HEART by D.J. Sylvis • Directed by Heather Keith
• A VERY DIFFERENT PLACE by Carol Libman • Directed by lindi g. papoff
• ASHES TO ASHES by M.P. Fedunkiw • Directed by Maureen Callaghan

Continue reading The New Ideas Festival 2010 – Week One – Alumnae Theatre →