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The Party Faces Are Off at NextStage in Jules Lewis’s First Theatrical Production
Reviewed in this essay: Tomasso’s Party, from Rooftop Creations. Written by Jules Lewis. Directed by Nigel Shawn Williams, and produced by André du Toit. Until January 15th at Factory Theatre, 125 Bathurst Street, Toronto. Part of The Toronto Fringe’s NextStage Festival. 416-966-1062 or www.fringetix.ca. It’s a performance that gives “pillow talk” an electrifying new meaning.…
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Donna-Michelle St. Bernard’s Gas Girls
For this piece, Will Goldbloom, a theatre historian, and Zack Russell, a theatre artist, read Donna-Michelle St. Bernard’s Gas Girls, published in 2011 by Playwrights Canada Press. They wrote up their thoughts separately, then the TRB recorded their first conversation about the play. Listen to their discussion: [audio: issuetwo/willzack.mp3] WILL: “Love for gas, gas for…
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“Sally Forth, Comrades!”: Jesus Chrysler Drives Full Force into Toronto’s Progressive Theatre Scene
Reviewed in this essay: Jesus Chrysler, at Theatre Pass Muraille, 16 Ryerson Ave., Toronto. Runs until Dec. 11th, 2011. “Sally forth, comrades!” – with these three words you are likely to be ushered into Theatre Pass Muraille’s intimate backspace by a friendly-faced, trouser-clad woman named Jim. You’ll shuffle to your seat while she bickers with…
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Rothko on a Canadian Stage: a Review of Red
Reviewed in this essay: Red, at the Bluma Appel Theatre at the St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts, 27 Front Street East, Toronto. Runs until Dec. 17. Canadian Stage’s audience has been the topic of many news stories since Matthew Joceyln took over as Artistic Director two years ago. Jocelyn, a Canadian director who has…
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Reviewing the Critic: The Ever-increasing Canon of Kamal Al-Solaylee’s Theatre Criticism
Discussed in this essay: Tonight at the Tarragon: A Critic’s Anthology, edited by Kamal Al-Solaylee. Playwrights Canada Press, 2011. The book features work by prominent Canadian playwrights such as Michael Healey, Kristen Thomson and Jason Sherman, and launches, in fact, tonight at the Tarragon Theatre rehearsal hall, 30 Bridgman Avenue at 5:30 p.m. A funny…
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Ride the Cyclone at Theatre Passe Muraille: Saskatchewan Ghost Cabaret a Rollercoaster Hit
Ride the Cyclone, from Atomic Vaudeville. Written by Jacob Richmond & Brooke Maxwell. Directed by Richmond & Britt Small. Until December 3 at Theatre Passe Muraille, 16 Ryerson Ave. 416-504-7529 or artsboxoffice.ca The final recital of a newly dead troupe of teenage choristers is a rollercoaster of a ghost cabaret in Ride the Cyclone, which…
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“The Normal Heart” At Buddies in Bad Times Theatre
For a brief period of time, Larry Kramer was known as the angriest gay man on the planet. The Normal Heart, his molotov cocktail of a play about AIDS in New York in the early 1980s, was angrily hurled in the face of theatregoers in Manhattan as the disease was silently ravaging thousands of people…
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Tapestry at Theatre Passe Muraille: Mangoes, cows, and other operatic arias fresh from the factory-floor
The brown-brick Theatre Passe Muraille is a far cry from the polished maple and clean-glass lines of the Four Seasons Performing Arts Centre. A historic brass plaque at the door informs you as you come in that the theatre just east of Queen and Bathurst streets was once a stable and bakery, and something of…