In 1992, Brian Francis, a queer 21-year-old man living in southwestern Ontario, placed a personals ad in the newspaper. He received many responses, including thirteen to which he did not reply. Now, 28 years later, he responds to these letters with hilarity and poignancy in his play Box 4901, directed and co-created by Rob Kempson, playing at Buddies in Bad Times theatre. Continue reading Review: Box 4901 (timeshare performance)
Theatre Reviews
Reviews of theatre, dance, opera, comedy and festivals. Performances can be in-person or streamed remotely on the web for social-distancing.
Review: Motherhood: The Musical (Lower Ossington Theatre)
Musical about Motherhood Holds Nothing Back, Now on the Toronto Stage
Seven and a half years ago my life changed forever when we welcomed our son into the world and I entered the world of Motherhood. Many of those changes have been wonderful, others less so. Some of the changes have been stickier than I thought possible. Motherhood: The Musical, currently playing at Lower Ossington Theatre, takes the institution of motherhood to the stage with no holds barred: the good, the bad, and the messy. Continue reading Review: Motherhood: The Musical (Lower Ossington Theatre)
Review: Women at Play(s) (Red Sandcastle Theatre)
We laughed, we learned things, and we broke out into Bon Jovi for Women At Play(s) at the Red Sandcastle Theatre in Toronto’s east end.
You can see six brilliant short and sweet plays all in one evening, and hear diverse voices that don’t often surface in mainstream stories. But I can’t promise that you too will be singing “Livin’ on a Prayer” between plays since I don’t know if the audience’s energy and confidence were particular to last Friday night’s performance.
Continue reading Review: Women at Play(s) (Red Sandcastle Theatre)
Review: Brain Storm (Lucid Ludic/Why Not Theatre)
A cathartic and hopeful delving into the philosophical questions about who we are at our core
Lucid Ludic’s devised production of Brain Storm, a hit at the 2017 Toronto Fringe (winning that year’s Tosho Knife Cutting Edge Award) returns in a production at Dancemakers Studio in association with Why Not Theatre. The show shares vignettes from a young woman’s frustrating attempts at recovery from the literal cutting edge of brain surgery. Kate (Shayna Virginillo) was a playwright; now she can’t read, and the simplest tasks, like riding the subway, are fraught with discomfort and peril.
One phrase plays on repeat in Kate’s mind, linking her to her deceased spirit medium grandmother (Hayley Carr), who acted as a writing vessel for the words of spirits. One of these spirits, fittingly, is that of renowned Canadian neurosurgeon Wilder Penfield (Alexandra Montagnese and Maïza Dubhé) – yes, the Heritage Minute gets a reference – who proclaims his belief that death is not the end, but consciousness on a different frequency.
Continue reading Review: Brain Storm (Lucid Ludic/Why Not Theatre)
Review: Lady Sunrise (Factory Theatre)
Beautiful and tragic modern adaptation covers an abundance but stays focused and cohesive
Marjorie Chan’s Lady Sunrise, playing at Factory Theatre, is a phenomenal deep dive into the lives of six Asian women set in the early 2000s in Vancouver and Richmond, British Columbia. It follows their personal heartbreaks and professional pains and explores the struggles of trying to survive within the confines of a suffocating culture.