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 Ryan Oakley

Guantanamo Hotels & Resorts playing at Bread and Circus Theatre attempts to make a comedy out of a concentration camp.  It’s a difficult task.   Some are likely to shout: “Too Soon!”

In 1990, when Air America, a comedy about CIA drug smuggling in Laos, was released, people wondered if America was ready to laugh at Vietnam; a war that had ended fifteen years before.   Is anyone ready for a comedy about September 11?  And is anyone ready to laugh at Guantanamo Bay?  After all, the camp is still open.  It’s not just soon, it’s now.

If you might be offended by the subject matter, you will be.  Don’t attend the play.  This review is for those people who, like me, have a dark sense of humour.  I’m ready to laugh at Guantanamo Bay and at September 11, I love nothing better than a good Hitler joke and I think that cancer can be funny.

I live in “too soon” with weekend trips to “too much.”

Having said all that, this play just isn’t that funny.

Continue reading Guantanamo Hotels & Resorts: Pandemic Theatre →

by Ryan Oakley

The Belle of Winnipeg, playing at the Winchester Street Theatre, fulfilled a long-time wish of mine: Actors were silent. Throughout the entire play, not a single actor said a single word.

This wasn’t done in the spirit of some German art-house, where they moped about the stage, sadly reflecting on the meaninglessness of life, but in the style of a silent movie. Set to live piano music and using film projection, the play tells the story of a bride in 1882 who, without prospects, runs away to Winnipeg and finds herself in a bordello. Those who have read enough history to know the likely fate of such a woman will be surprised to learn that hilarity, rather than horror, ensues.

Or is supposed to.

Continue reading The Belle of Winnipeg: The Keystone Ensemble →

by Ryan Oakley

A strange tale told in an old house during the Halloween season should be sufficiently gruesome.  It should tingle the skin and infuse even the most banal aspects of your surroundings, the creaking step and flickering light, with menace.  At this, DVxT’s adaptation of Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, playing at The Campbell House Museum, is particularly effective.

Continue reading The Turn of the Screw: DVxT at The Campbell House Museum →

By Ryan Oakley

(ed. note:  This is a repost of the original article because WordPress apparently ate the original.)

Before I attended the East Side Players’ adaptation of Waiting in the Wings my editor told me that community theatre doesn’t get enough reviews.  After ten minutes of watching the play, I could understood why:  It’s very hard.

The cast, who were mainly older ladies, looked like they were having fun.  There was no pretention, no high-flown stupidity disguised as vile philosophy and no monologues from some rich beatnik in a turtleneck.  It just seemed like decent people having a genuinely good time.

This completely dulled my spite.  And I need my spite.  Without it, I’m simply one of you.

Continue reading Waiting in the Wings – East Side Players →