All posts by Mike Anderson

Mike was that kid who walked into the high school stage crew booth, saw the lighting board, and went ooooooooooooh. Now that he’s (mostly) all grown up, Mike keeps his foot in the door as a community-theatre producer, stage manager and administrator. In the audience, he’s a tremendous sucker for satire and parody, for improvisational and sketch-driven comedy, for farce and pantomime, and for cabaret of all types. His happiest Toronto theatrical memory is (re) Birth: E. E. Cummings in Song.

Review: Commencement (Convection Productions)

Commencement

Commencement, a solo play about a school shooting takes the stage at Toronto’s Hub 14

Commencement is built of three monologues: one from mother of a school shooter; one from a classmate; and one from a victim’s mother. From the very beginning we know exactly what has happened, and playwright Clay McLeod Chapman pushes us to imagine why.

As we explore the ways in which these three women — all played by Janelle Hanna — grapple with that moment of public violence, the stories begin to blend and intertwine. And under the guise of talking about one awful day in an American high school, Chapman gets his audience thinking about bullying, parenthood, crushes, adolescence, and how “the best years of our lives” can go so horribly, horribly wrong.

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Review: Hatched (Mamela Nyamza/CanStage)

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Hatched

Provocative dance piece has “audience members twisting in their seats” at the Berkeley in Toronto

In Hatched (playing as part of Spotlight South Africa), creator Mamela Nyamza confronts the audience. She hungers; she accuses; she explains; she spites; she learns; she rejects; she implores. Through dance, movement and brief moments of interaction, she explores her own story as a dancer, a mother and an African. She invites us to peer into her soul, just a little bit.

Now, fair warning: this is an uppercase-D Dance show. At one point, a dancer crosses the stage topless, en pointe, balancing a bucket on her head and strewing clothespins everywhere. If that description is making you queasy, you may want to avoid this one. But as someone who normally has trouble plugging into dance, I found I really warmed to Nyamza’s frank, honest, thoughtful and—occasionally—brutal performance. If you can get past the Dance label and connect with the performer, Hatched is a profoundly interesting and rewarding experience.

And if you’re already predisposed to enjoy dance and movement, well, you lucky duck: get yourself to the Berkeley, pronto.

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Cheap Theatre in Toronto for the Week of March 31st, 2015

Live shows for $20 or Less

You don’t see enough comedy. I mean, I get it: maybe stand-up’s not your thing (“Am I right, ladies?”), and maybe the earnestness of improv puts you off — but if you can stomach a scripted proscenium show, you can handle a evening of sketches. So let’s send you to some! This week’s Cheap Theatre isn’t all comedy, but there’s a lot of it going, and a lot of it’s damned cheap.

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Buzz: ShakesBeer (Classical Theatre Project)

At Mooney on Theatre, we love the Classical Theatre Project. Whenever we see them, we have a marvelous time, and we especially dig their mandate of making classics relevant to new audiences and in new ways — particularly in schools.

So when we heard about their revival of ShakesBeer, we were excited. ShakesBeer combines a production of a CTP favourite — the highly irreverent Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged) — with three other Mooney favourites: beer, pies, and the Artscape Wychwood Barns. It’s a noisy, boisterous and hilarious evening under the stars with plenty to please devoted fans and newcomers alike.

Best of all, CPT is offering a $10 discount for readers of Mooney on Theatre: just use code brew39 at checkout.

Tickets start at $49 ($39 with the promo code) and normally sell quickly, so if this sounds up your alley, snatch one up while you’ve got the chance!

(Full press release follows under the jump.)

Details

  • ShakesBeer plays the Artscape Wychwood Barns on April 18th, 2015. Two performances, one at 6:30 and one at 9:00.
  • Tickets are $49 for general admission, $79 for premium seating.
  • Tickets can be purchased online or by telephone at 416-915-6750.
  • All tickets include three complimentary beer tastings. Additional beverages and meat pies will be available for sale.
  • If you’re bringing kids, we recommend the early performance; the cast is normally a little looser by the 9:00 show. (Of course, that means it’s more fun for the grown-up!)

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Review: Nature of the Beast (Lone Wolf Collective)

nature of the beast

Nature of the Beast, at the Storefront Theatre in Toronto, leaves audiences “unsettled and unsatisfied”

Nature of the Beast turns upon Francis (Nicholas Rice), a genial old stoner — think Bob Ross and his happy little trees — who lives in a tiny cottage up the ass-end of nowhere. He earns a little money selling wood carvings, and a lot of money as an unlikely dom, entertaining a parade of privileged city slickers who’d like to be whipped into shape in his basement.

All’s well until Francis’ teenaged nephew (Jakob Ehman) drops in suddenly and expects to stay: big argument at home, things that can’t be unsaid, and the kid’s got nowhere else to go.

But as Francis tries to balance these two worlds which can’t collide — the fragile high school student in the guestroom, the client (Clint Butler) chained to the wall in the basement — his life slowly begins to unravel, until playwright Brandon Crone finally reveals (here it comes, folks, I hope you’re ready) the Nature of the Beast.

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