First-Person: Caleb McMullen Part III

FROM GOD-CHILD TO DRAG-QUEEN 

A Journey of Self Discovery and Creative Freedom: Part 3

by Caleb McMullen

For five months, whenever I was in The Tap, my new home, I was never without a martini glass. I was living the half-full life. I mean, quite literally, my glass was always at least half full, the owner made sure of it. It turns out, I was funnier and partied hardier when the booze was flowing freely, and it did. I know this to be true because I can barely remember it.

In fact, the time I worked at The Tap is a complete blur to me, filled to the gills with stories that ran right into the next of drunken debauchery amid the old men and strippers. It’s amazing to me how I went through my second semester of second year theatre school living this double life; because that is exactly what it was: my escape, my life of delusion every Saturday night. 

EVENT: Antigone (Fringe)

EVENT: The Loyalists (June 7-22)

CPT Picture of the Week, May 31, 2012

Tarragon's production of The Real World? by Michel Tremblay, closing this weekend - 

authentic down to the hideous wall paper.

Meg Tilly and Cliff Saunders in a Cylla von Tiedemann photo.

(Read our review)

NEWS: Toronto Theatre Critics Awards

Winner Nicole Underhay in Small Room (photo: Cylla von Tiedemann)

Press release:

(Links are to Charlebois-Post reviews of winning productions)

We are pleased to announce the winners of the second annual edition of the Toronto Theatre Critics' Awards.

The TTCAs were established in 2011 to honour the best in Toronto theatre. This year, the awards were decided by critics from The Globe and Mail (J. Kelly Nestruck), The Grid (Martin Morrow), National Post (Robert Cushman), NOW Magazine (Glenn Sumi) and Toronto Star (Richard Ouzounian). 

Productions that opened from May 2011 to May 2012 were eligible for consideration. In addition, the TTCA voters decided to give a special citation to actor Eric Peterson. See below for the full list of winners.

FULL LIST OF WINNERS

Interview: Sarah Illiatovich-Goldman on Pieces

It just came bursting forth like nothing I have ever written.

PIECES Interview with Playwright Sarah Illiatovich-Goldman 

by Jasmine Chen

CHARPO: When did you begin writing Pieces, and what was the initial impulse?

SARAH: I first started writing Pieces 3 years ago, except it wasn't a play. I had gone through a huge artistic dry spell, especially in writing; I thought I would never write again! I had this Summer of trying to figure my life out, and was depressed about everything until I was waiting at the airport to visit my childhood best friend when I struck by a short story I needed to write. I started writing it and it was called “The Old Man and the Young Girl”. I started thinking about moments I had in relationships and capturing those moments in short stories. I made these two characters and exaggerated them from real life and began writing these short stories. Over that Summer,  suddenly everyone in my life started having affairs. It was this bizarre thing, where adultery was the buzz word of the day! Everything was affairs, friends became mistresses; people's parents were breaking up; friends were telling me quite candidly about cheating on their partners. I realized, this is something that happens everywhere, apparently! So I took these characters I had been developing and all of these feelings that I had about affairs and wrote a draft of this play, in the time span of about a month. That was the departure point and it has changed in  every way possible since then. It just came bursting forth like nothing I have ever written.

After Dark, May 29, 2012

Fritzed!
Politics is exhausting
by Gaëtan L. Charlebois

In a discussion on politics and Queer culture, a woman once said to Larry Kramer, "I have been on the forefront of the civil rights movement. I was then an active feminist. Now I fight for Queers. When do get I to sit down?" Kramer said, "You don't." Kramer, who - in my humble opinion - is a Queer prophet, can also be incredibly tiresome.

I realized last Thursday (again!), that even when you agree with and even revere people, you wish they would just fucking sit down sometimes and realize, too, that they really should. If only for the good of the cause.

I am fritzed!

Theatre For Thought, May 26, 2012

SHAKESPEARE'S SEXUAL SUMMER

joel fishbane

Were one to judge novelist John Irving’s new book by its cover, it would seem to have little to do with theatre. Perhaps best known for The World According to Garp, Irving’s latest book, In One Person, concerns a bisexual whose coming of age begins in the repressed 1950s. Yet the novel begins with an epigraph from Richard II (“Thus play I in one person many people / and none contented”), moves on to a deft exploration of Ibsen’s women, pauses to poke fun at amateur theatre and then bases an entire plot thread around a production of The Tempest.  “What I really think,” the director tells the main character, “is that gender mattered a whole lot less to Shakespeare then it seems to matter to us.”

The director is pretty wise about most things in the book, but I’d argue that on this particular point he generally misses the mark. Gender mattered a lot to Shakespeare – this, along with sexual politics, is one of his most pervasive themes. As we sit on the eve of another summer of Shakespeares on the stage, in the park and by the sea, we find that the vast majority of our summer fare will be the very plays where Shakespeare’s sexual politics take centre stage. 

Review: The Hunger

The Gingerbread Man

Not a pleasant night

by Dave Ross

A man dressed in black, wearing a mask, stepped into the lobby of the theatre this evening. He mingled with the crowd waiting to enter the theatre, and started silently directing the audience into the performance space. And then he walked into a few chairs and nearly fell over. This was clearly not part of the act, and was a bad omen at the opening night of Uncanny House’s The Hunger, running now at the Scotiabank Studio Theatre in Parkdale.

Before proceeding further in this review, I need to state that The Hunger is my first experience with an immersive performance installation. Until now, theatre for me has always been relatively traditional. It should also be noted that I’ve not included any names in this review—Uncanny House is a collective of artists, and the news release is unclear as to who was responsible for specific aspects of the production. No program is provided. This performance is billed as a “surreal, immersive experience” that explores the themes of escapism and consumption, while instilling a sense of child-like wonder. The news release states that this production “strives to distill the essence of… Hansel and Gretel.” These are lofty aims, aims that are not met even once during the production.

Review: The Turn of the Screw

(photo credit: Darryl Block)

Suffer the Children

Against the Grain scores again with Britten

by Axel Van Chee

Against the Grain Theatre has done it again. The company has set a very high bar for their future endeavors this time around with a stunning production of Benjamin Britten’s The Turn of the Screw, opening at the Helen Gardiner Phelan Playhouse. It is musically satisfying, theatrically absorbing, and they really should consider keeping this in their repertoire. It is perhaps the best production of the Screw that I have seen. 

CharPo's Real Theatre! May 25, 2012

Review: Home

Oliver Dennis and Michael Hanrahan (photo credit: Cylla von Tiedemann)

Storey's Story

Soulpepper goes Home

by Jessica Yen

Home, written by David Storey is a slow to unravel story about communication and trying to find familiarity in an unfamiliar place. The ensemble cast is what makes this tricky 80 minute plotless play a treat for audiences. 

The set, designed by Ken MacKenzie, is elegant and effective in that it is familiar and yet nondescript enough that the reveal of the play's true location is not given away. Jack and Harry are dressed impeccably as English gentlemen and for the first half of the play it is easy to believe that this may very well be a period play. Their exchanges are a wonderful display of nuance and wit. Oliver Dennis keeps conversation afloat and the physical details of his character are engaging to watch, from the way he holds his hat to the way he leans across the table. Michael Hanrahan as Harry is the yin to Dennis' yang. They navigate the non-sequiturs and silences with precision and sensitivity. 

CPT's Picture of the Week, May 24, 2012

Stockholm is, shall we say?, intense.

Karim Romero's splendid photo features Melissa-Jane Shaw and Jonathon Young.

Read Ms Shaw's first person piece.

Read our review.

After Dark, May 22, 2012

Dog's Life

Sometimes, when the dust has settled, it is nice to go back

by Gaëtan L. Charlebois

I was walking my dog a few days ago when off in the distance, coming toward me, was a man and his dog. In a few seconds a profound malaise came over me. A critic's nightmare: you are about to run into someone to whom you gave a negative review. The someone coming toward me was Andrew Shaver, director of Haunted Hillbilly now playing at Centaur. 

Now Andrew probably does not remember this but before I started the whole CharPo business I had run into him at a depanneur - I was recovering from a very long illness - and he said, "When are you coming back." So he is, to some extent, responsible for the existence of The Charlebois Post. Since then our meetings on the street have had more to do with our two crazy dogs. His is big, mine is small and they both have a chip on their shoulder. It culminated with my dog attacking his and me getting so pissed at my idiot animal that I did a César Milan trick: I lifted my Jack Russell up by the scruff of the neck and presented his gonads to Andrew's dog. When I put my dog down, he got on his hind legs, put his front paws on the shoulders of Andrew's dog and they kissed. Good times.

First-Person: Joel Ivany on Turn of the Screw

Killing Curiosity

Staging Britten's brilliantly dark piece

by Joel Ivany

It is a curious story.

Benjamin Britten’s chamber opera, The Turn of the Screw, opened in 1954 at Teatro La Fenice in Venice.

Against the Grain Theatre will be producing the eerie tale from May 24-27 at the Helen Gardiner Phelan Playhouse, on U of T campus.

It’s quite an exciting theatrical piece to be preparing.  Described primarily as a ghost story, it can also be interpreted, though rarely is, as a love story.

Review: Rent

(photo credit: John Jones)

Remember the Love

While dated, RENT proves it has staying power

by Stuart Munro

You know you’re getting old when that hot new show you were obsessed with as a teenager is now being presented as a period piece, but that’s what Sheridan College has chosen to do with their production of RENT, now on stage at The Panasonic Theatre. The opening monologue gives us a year (1989) where there never was one before. This is not really a bad thing. After all, New York’s East Village is no longer the shady, dangerous neighbourhood it once was, and AIDS, while still horrifying, is no longer an epidemic or death sentence in North America. Yet both these realities are central to the late Jonathan Larson’s Tony and Pulitzer Prize winning musical. So if raising a glass to “people living with . . . not dying from disease” is no longer the revolutionary comment it was back in the early 1990s, does RENT still have a message to get across and a place on today’s stage?

Theatre For Thought, May 19, 2012

THEATRE SHOULD BE SEEN, NOT READ

joel fishbane

I don’t usually take issue with comments waged by Gaëtan Charlebois, our eponymous editor, but this week I couldn’t resist. Last week, in his own weekly editorial, Gaëtan did not lament the lack of production of “the classics” and remarked that he’s satisfied with the idea that these plays can still be read. “Because theatre is also literature,” he wrote. Sorry, Gaëtan, but here I have to object. Theatre is not literature: the mark of a truly great play is that it cannot be read.

As someone who dabbles in both plays and fiction, I’m deeply aware of the great divide between the two genres. With literature – which here I’ll define as any written prose, fiction or non - nothing separates author and audience. The enjoyment of the text is dependent on nothing but availability of the material and one’s ability to read. Further, the author knows this and tailors the writing accordingly. Hemingway, for instance, often structured his dialogue to ensure the audience knew what the characters were doing without the narrative voice having to explain. Other writers rely on descriptive prose, heightened language and other rhetorical styles. But the point is that in the end there is only one voice - the author’s – and one listener – the reader. 

CharPo's Real Theatre! May 18, 2012

First-Person: Caleb McMullen Part 2

FROM GOD-CHILD TO DRAG QUEEN: A Journey of Self-Discovery and Creative Freedom | PART 2

by Caleb McMullen

To this day, I don’t know how or why my parents didn’t kick me out of the house. 

I remember one heated moment in my relationship with my father where I thought the dam would break. I had just come home from my first Pride Parade. I was seventeen, in a ‘relationship’ that consisted of fooling around behind the LCBO in Markham, for lack of a better place. Carmelo. I had met him at The Homo Hop. He was too shy to say hello himself. He sent over his friend. I thought that was endearing at the time. I had put up a photo of Carmelo and I kissing as my desktop screen on the family computer; out and proud for the world to see.

I was making tacos at the time, having just come home from the parade; like a young gay debutant who had just been introduced to the world. My father enters the kitchen and demands that the ‘obscene’ photo of Carmelo and I be removed from the family computer. I was given an ultimatum: I remove the photo or I leave. I just so happened to be dicing tomatoes at the time and I just so happened to throw them at my father, point blank. The tomato guts were still dripping down his glasses when I dashed out of the house. Apparently, at seventeen I already knew how to make an exit.

CPT'S Picture of the Week, May 17, 2012

Are there any pictures more beautiful than those of dance sequences from musicals - especially West Side Story. Carol Rosegg captures the dynamism of the the Dancap production. 

Review: Stockholm

Melissa-Jane Shaw, Jonathon Young (Photo credit: Karim Romero)

Deception

Nightwood goes into the dark corners of couplehood

By Gregory W. Bunker

Stockholm is a psychological snapshot of the life of a young couple caught in an interpretation of Stockholm Syndrome: when a hostage empathizes with his captor. It isn’t immediately clear that this is the case—outward appearances being what they are: appearances—and while it will have you happily entertained with gentle poking fun in the beginning, the façade of blissful coupledom quickly becomes disturbing. This dark transition is brilliantly accomplished through a third-person narrative that privies the audience a glimpse of the thoughts behind the dialogue of Kali and Todd, the play’s only on-stage characters. This narrative is especially effective, and frightening, when it illustrates that each of them makes a continuous, conscious effort to deceive the other. This drama plays out under the direction of Kelly Straughan, who has put the many theatrical pieces of this non-stop, off-the-rails rollercoaster together for an extremely realistic, passionate production. That the play has its North American debut at the intimate Tarragon Theatre makes it even more visceral.

First-Person: Melissa-Jane Shaw on Stockholm

Melissa-Jane Shaw, Jonathon Young (Photo credit: Karim Romero)

Double-Duty

The weight of two roles in presenting Stockholm

by Melissa-Jane Shaw (notes compiled by Jasmine Chen)

Seventh Stage Productions, which is now heading into  its 7th year is dedicated to telling stories by women, about women and for everyone; as well as generating opportunities for emerging and established female artists both on and off stage. Stockholm by Bryony Lavery is about to have its North American Premiere at the Tarragon Extra Space. As Artistic Producer of Seventh Stage Productions and the actor playing Kali, I invite you to see this startling piece of theatre that we have all worked so hard on. 

Stockholm has a cast of two, which is myself and the wonderful Jonathon Young. People often ask me how I manage to perform in the show while acting as producer at the same time. Our company is very small so the roles are essentially defined by Kelly and I, based on our strengths. Initially most of the business side of the company fell on my shoulders, which I found got to be too much. This past year, we sat down and figured out what we could divide. It has been easier this season for me with the division of duties; I don't think I could have done this show without Kelly's help. 

After Dark, May 15, 2012

Questions. Answers?
Discuss
by Gaëtan L. Charlebois

- Louis CK does a bit on the words "nigger", "faggot" and "cunt"
- Bill Burr does one in which he wonders about sports commentators' careers which have gone up in flames because the commentators have mentioned race as a reason for sports talent
- David Cross suggests God is a pedophile in one piece and that Jesus is a faggot in another
- David Sedaris reads from a story in which he visits the Anne Frank hideaway in Amsterdam and admires its real estate potential
- Dieudonné denies the Holocaust, praises Hitler and is relentlessly anti-semitic in his comedy

This week, the Corona Theatre in Montreal cancelled a Dieudonné gig citing contractual difficulties. The French comic is picketed at nearly every venue in which he appears. So what is the difference between them and Dieudonné?

Discuss.

First-Person: Caleb McMullen (Part 1)

FROM GOD-CHILD TO DRAG QUEEN Part 1 

A Journey of Self-Discovery and Creative Freedom

by Caleb McMullen

It was New Year’s Day 2009. Of course, I had been partying the night before and for whatever reason I was possessed with the need to continue the partying the following day. Windsor, Ontario had two gay destinations: a sad little club whose name changes with every new takeover of management and an equally sad strip club on the other side of town; the wrong side of town. And that’s where I felt so inclined to approach the owner of this fine establishment to set up a very unique opportunity.

For all the nudity that could be found, there was not a drag queen in sight. I am from Toronto and this lacking of stiletto sporting men seemed curious to me, even though I was in a temple dedicated to the beauty of masculinity. However, in my drunken euphoria, I managed to get permission to perform as a drag queen on the stage the following night.

I suppose this story deserves a bit of context. I came out in a flood of colour and lights when I was sixteen. My outing was, of course, disastrous to my born-again Christian parents whose dream of having a youth pastor for a son was dashed to pieces. We were at odds. They believed that my “choice” was of the devil's influence. They believed that I had been confused by the evils of the world, a world that quite frankly worships sex as god supreme. And I, in my rebellion, embraced all extreme forms of my recently claimed homosexual identity. I had to. I was in a transformative time in my life.

Theatre For Thought, May 12, 2012

STRUCTURE VS. THE MODERN PLAYWRIGHT

joel fishbane

Playwright Theresa Rebeck showed up on my radar again. Long time devotees to my ramblings will recall that last year I discussed Rebeck’s comments on sexism in theatre. Rebeck - whose diverse body of work includes a play that was a finalist for the Pulitzer and the current TV hit Smash - recently wrote a piece for the LA Times about a recent discovery: writing well-structured plays is a good way not to get produced. 

In the article, she tells the story of an unnamed artistic director who remarked to her that his literary department considered it “uncool to structure a play these days” and how, at a development workshop, a young playwright proudly announced that she was purposely avoiding “anything that resembled a plot.” You can read the rest of Rebeck’s comments here, but the gist is this: she has noticed a trend that new theatre, while beautifully written, lacks in structure and cohesion. “Structure is not our enemy,” she protests. “It is the form that makes content possible.” 

CharPo's Real Theatre! May 11, 2012

Review: High

Kathleen Turner (photo credit: Lanny Nagler)

A solo which is not

Kathleen Turner fills her vehicle

by Jasmine Chen

High, which opened at the Royal Alexandra Theatre last night, is the story of a tough talking recovering alcoholic nun, Sister Jamison Connelly who attempts to rehabilitate a 19 year old drug addict, Cody Randall. Oscar and Tony nominee Kathleen Turner is the headliner in this coming clean tale of redemption and faith. Turner, who battled against alcohol addiction herself, brings her own experience to the playing of Sister Connelly. She anchors an otherwise ungrounded play. Turner, with her unmistakable voice, commands the stage and brilliantly delivers the dry sarcasm Sister Connelly uses to get through to Cody. She is not your typical nun. She curses, plays tough love, and continually struggles with her own demons.

Review: Semele

Jane Archibald (photo credit: Michael Cooper)

A Jolly Good Time...

...and utterly ridiculous and bombastic

by Axel Van Chee

“No, no I’ll take no less” sings Semele to Jove with grim determination in Act 3 of Handel’s oratorio/opera Semele, and the director Zhang Huan takes her complaint seriously, answering her pleas with a more-is-more, part documentary, part HBO, part National Geographic production. Playing at the Four Seasons Performing Arts Centre, the Canadian Opera Company rolls out - hands down - its most spectacular creation of the 2011-2012 season, ending it with a bang. In fact, I have not heard this much discussion in the foyer post show in a very long time. This Semele is at once gorgeous, perplexing, humourous, and at times angst inducing, and whether one agrees with the Director or not, it is certainly entertaining with a capital E. You should check it out and judge it for yourself, I mean, seriously.

Review: West Side Story

(photo credit: Carol Rosegg)

West Side Story Soars

Fifty-five years later and still a masterpiece

by Stuart Munro

There are certain shows that make me wish I could go back in time and experience them, for the first time, with everybody else in the room. West Side Story is one of those shows. Around the time I was learning how to pirouette, I was also learning how West Side Story had revolutionized theatre and changed the musical forever. I, of course, had grown up surrounded by the effects of those changes (the closest my generation ever got to something groundbreaking was the rock opera, but Jesus Christ Superstar was already ten years old by the time I showed up) and we all now take for granted the fact that musical performers must be actors, singers and dancers. But I’ve always imagined sitting in New York’s Winter Garden Theatre fifty-five years ago, and seeing what must have been something truly exciting and electrifying, and wondering what it felt like.

Last night, I got my wish.

CPT's Picture of the Week, May 10, 2012

Opera is pretty photogenic most of the time, but there are very few pictures that are as striking as this gem from Chris Hutcheson. The drama is there but so too is composition - a magnificent series of coiled verticals thrumming through the chiaroscuro with the characters providing an organic focal point.

It is of the COC's Florentine Tragedy, and features Alan Held and Gun-Brit Barkmin.