Reviews of theatre, dance, opera, comedy and festivals. Performances can be in-person or streamed remotely on the web for social-distancing.
I braved the wild rain on Friday evening to see Stopheart at Factory Theatre. It looked as if a lot of other people weren’t as brave, it was a small audience.
The play is about growing up different in South Porcupine which is pretty much the same as growing up different anywhere. Continue reading Review: Stopheart (Factory Theatre)
In the second act of The Biographer, playing at Videofag, the titular character welcomes a stranger into his home, offers him a cup of tea, and invites him to spew his guts. Tell me everything. Tell me anything. The stories of strangers are a biographer’s lifeblood; the fact that this particular stranger is brandishing a knife is just an added bit of flavour.
And in that moment, Daniel Karasik’s play is laser-sharp. There is insight and perspective to be gained from these scenes.
But scenes always end. And when it happens, these moments of clarity disappear completely.
It has been on my bucket list for years to get to see a Compagnie Marie Chouinard production, but every time I have had the opportunity, something has stopped me from being able to go. So when I was given the chance to see The Golden Mean (Live) on Wednesday night at the Bluma Appel Theatre I was overjoyed.
Continue reading Review: The Golden Mean (Live) (Compagnie Marie Chouinard/Canadian Stage)
The Canadian Opera Company is closing its 2012-13 season with French composer Francis Poulenc’s 1956 opera Dialogues des Carmélites. The opera tells the story of an order of Carmelite nuns who were guillotined during the French Revolution for refusing to renounce their faith and hence became religious martyrs.
Continue reading Review: Dialogues des Carmélites (Canadian Opera Company)
Last night was the Toronto premier of Bea by UK playwright Mick Gordon at Factory Theatre Studio. Given that I knew that it’s a play about a young woman with a debilitating illness who has spent eight years in bed, I took tissues. For quite a while I thought that I wasn’t going to need them.
The stage was in the middle of the theatre with the seats on two sides. The set was a large bed with a metal canopy, a ladder, and a chair. As we took our seats Bea, played by Baherah Yaraghi, was lying in bed not moving. She must have stayed like that for at least 20 minutes.
At the heart of the play is Bea’s desire to die and her physical inability to kill herself. Continue reading Review: Bea (Actors Repertory Company)