Instead of our typical five-show recommendation, this week’s Cheap Theatre listing is a suggestion to check out the Global Cabaret Festival, which is being put on by Soulpepper. To quote the event site, “the Global Cabaret Festival lineup is composed of Songbooks, Feature Performances, and Cabarets, encompassing a wide range of theatrical themes and forms including jazz, pop, opera, musical theatre and the best of classic cabaret standards”. With such a wide variety of styles and performances, there’s bound to be cabarets that appeal to any theatregoer. Check out the performance schedule here. Tickets can be bought online, starting at $23 ($20 for students), with discounts if you buy packages of 3 or 6! Definitely sounds like some good, Cheap Theatre to me!
Play Listings for the Week of October 20th, 2014
October’s just flying by, isn’t it? Probably because it’s such a busy month for everyone. The theatres of Toronto are no exception – we have an extraordinarily high number of shows in this week’s listings, and are happy to share them with you below. Our Editor, Mike, had a few hard decisions to make – but anything highlighted in red, with two asterisks before it, comes highly recommended by him.
Continue reading Play Listings for the Week of October 20th, 2014
Review: Evita (Lower Ossington Theatre)
Toronto’s Lower Ossington Theatre brings Andrew Lloyd Webber’s classic Evita to the stage
Evita (playing the Lower Ossington Theatre) has always wobbled slightly. From the very beginning, opponents have criticized it for misrepresenting the life of its subject, presenting her as an aggressive — and heavily corrupt — political operator: an opportunist, an embezzler, an apologist for fascism, and a woman who relied upon “the parts in between her thighs” to make her way in life, all of which have been brought into question by subsequent research. After she’d left the show, having scored her first Tony award, Patti LuPone dished that playing Evita was “the worst experience of my life […] a part that could only have been written by a man who hates women”.
The LOT does not embrace these criticisms: their production is straight and faithful, with very few moments of ambiguity or self-reflection. And while the show’s fun to watch — the songs include some of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s best — the way that director Heather Braaten approached the story reminded me of a student reading a book report of a novel he didn’t particularly enjoy. The plot points are mentioned; the songs are in the right places; but this felt like a recitation, rather than a retelling from someone who’d actually engaged with the material.
Review: Concord Floral (The Theatre Centre)
Concord Floral, playing at The Theatre Centre, is engaging theatre that captures life and spark from a young cast
Jordan Tannahill is no stranger to subversion. The award-winning playwright and queer activist creates and hosts all kinds of challenging experimental performances in his small storefront venue Videofag in Kensington Market. But of all the risks he’s taken, Tannahill’s latest play Concord Floral, playing at The Theatre Centre, does something that should really make people nervous: It stars teenagers. Continue reading Review: Concord Floral (The Theatre Centre)
Review: Waving is Funny
Waving is Funny, a dance piece on stage at Toronto’s Ralph Thornton Centre, is unfortunately anything but
Tina Fushell’s Waving is Funny, a collaborative movement piece that “began as a joke” before becoming “a very real performance idea” sounds pleasantly kooky. There is something about examining the act of waving that appeals to me, a comedy goldmine just waiting to be explored.
I was curious about the subject matter. How do people wave? What do we look like when we do? How does our environment impact this greeting? And how does this small act relate to other types of waves? The title suggests a wealth of material that could go just about anywhere.