In a Word...Erin Brandenberg on BOBLO

Audiences seem to respond to our work, but it seems to be more of a personal connection.

by Christopher Douglas

Erin Brandenburg, creator of festival hits like Reesor, Pelee and Petrichor, ventures into a new direction with her latest piece, BOBLO. Co-created with her partner, Andrew Penner of The Sunparlor Players, BOBLO plays for the next two weeks at The Great Hall Black Box Theatre. Inspired by personal memories and collected stories about the Bob-Lo Island Amusement Park, their collective, Kitchenband, has created a unique way to take an audience back in time while staying in the present, to pay tribute to a place that is gone but not forgotten through songs and remembrances, photos and field recordings. When asked about how this ghost story came to life, Erin had a few things to say.

CHARPO: Shows seem to require an awfully long workshop period these days. How do you feel about the years it can sometimes take to have a fully realized performance before a paying audience?

BRANDENBURG: This is the first show we've developed in this way – with a two year period dedicated to development before presenting it as a co-production with The Theatre Centre. Having the time to experiment and try out ideas, or even having the time to really delve into an idea and throw it out if it doesn't work, has been really important for this project. But it’s also a challenge to sustain the creative drive over such a long time period. With this show, I don't think we could have done it in a shorter time period - we were really fortunate to have a residency at The Theatre Centre to allow for that time.

Review: Tales Of...

The Story Hour
Tales Of: Firsts
by Christopher Douglas

Dry and warm from the cold rains of Monday night, the charming Rustic Owl hosted the first of a new monthly storytelling series. The evening's theme was Tales of: Firsts - a witty way to launch.  

The quaint environs welcomed a small but friendly crowd to hear six storytellers share their experiences. 

Starting the evening was comedian Marco Bernardi regaling the audience with his tale of growing up and coming out in a small city, and writer/comic Paul Bellini's first funeral. Not Paul's funeral but the first he would attend... for his Italian grandfather... on Paul's 14th birthday... as Paul stared at the shirtless summer-student gravediggers.

The Story: Interview - Jacqui Burke of Jaybird Productions on Oleanna

Mamet's Politics Squared

by Christopher Douglas

(Photography by burdettphotography.com. All photos feature Jacqui Skeete as Carol and James R. Woods as John.)

David Mamet's Oleanna is a bold choice for a first production by a new venture. However that's exactly the script that Jaybird Productions decided to tackle. Experienced Producer and Director, Jacqui Burke, explains why she is forging such a brave path for her company.

CHARPO: Why Oleanna for this venture into producing?  

BURKE: Well, I love this show. Oleanna is a riveting piece of work that I've been wanting to direct for some time. But also Jaybird Productions was starting to produce shows that were rarely, if ever, done at the Community Theatre level. Happily, Oleanna falls into this category. Finally, it’s a small show (which means it's inexpensive to produce) – a two-hander that blossoms with minimum production values and is best experienced by an audience, in my opinion, in a tiny house. It’s a natural inaugural production for a fledgling theatre company.

CHARPO: Do you think audiences will be challenged by the political nature of the script? And do you have any plans to mitigate that?
BURKE: It's interesting that you might think I would want to mitigate the power of any script. I think my job as a Director is to help the company tell the story as honestly as we possibly can. Actively buffering the impact of a play or reducing its power to ensure that it’s more palatable to an audience is censorship. That’s not my job.  Yes, this show is challenging and, no, I will not do anything to mitigate its impact. If folks want easy, there’s lots of that kind of stuff on TV.  

Interview: Pooria Fard of Horses at the Window

Mother Son Daughter Father Wife Husband

by Christopher Douglas

A recent graduate of Humber College’s Theatre Performance class, Pooria Fard stars in Horses at the Window by Matei Viniec in a translation by Alison Sinclair. In addition to playing the role of the Messenger, he is also a member of Go Team Producing, serving as assistant producers on the show. Having participated in the SummerWorks Leadership Intensive Program with him this summer, I sat down with Pooria and caught up about the upcoming show.

CHARPO: What is the show about?

FARD: The play centres on three relationships: Mother and Son, Daughter and Father and Wife and Husband. In each of these, the amazing Oyin Oladejo plays the woman. And, in each scene, after the men leave for battle, a Messenger arrives with news. 

There is no specific timeline to the play; it’s not about one war or another, though it mentions battles by name but they span history and geography. The play emphasizes the universality of war and the consequences for those left behind but it isn’t about war so much as being about what it is to be left behind when people go to war. It’s about how survivors react to the news that something terrible has happened to someone they care about. For me, playing the Messenger, it’s about the challenge of having to tell each woman in a new way, to let them know without sounding automated or scripted, finding the compassion in a moment that asks for impersonal action and demands strength.

In a Word... Arlene Duncan, Dora-winning actor

(photo credit: Pierre Gautreau)

Be careful what you wish for though, because sometimes your dreams can be larger than you imagined.  

by Christopher Douglas

Winner of the 2012 Dora Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female in a musical, Arlene Duncan is a woman of many talents.  Ranging from her stage roles where she sings and dances, Ms Duncan also has numerous film and television credits including the recently-wrapped sixth season of Little Mosque on the Prairie.  As if that’s not enough, she also taught herself Wordpress to redesign her website.

Sitting down with the talented Ms Duncan over an iced tea, I wasn’t sure if I’d get somber Fatima or sullen Caroline.  Since Arlene flashed that first smile, our interview flew past as we laughed and chatted.

CHARPO:  After your successes on film and television, what made you return to theatre and – more specifically – to Caroline, or Change?

DUNCAN:  I wanted to come back to the theatre.  I mean, I missed the music and everything.  I love to sing and dance and this show would be a chance to work that muscle again.  But theatre is disciplined in a way that film and television isn’t.  Theatre has an immediacy to it, the thrill and the energy and the reactions of the audience, that allows you to have control of the character in a different way; from night to night, you have to roll with how the character might subtly shift.

Be careful what you wish for though, because sometimes your dreams can be larger than you imagined.  I put it into the wind that I would love to do theatre again and that I hoped an amazing part would come along.  Then Caroline appeared and she was one of those roles.

Interview: Wesley J. Colford (Mature Young Adults)

characters riffing on the chasm

by Christopher Douglas

Wesley J. Colford may be young but he certainly has sunk his teeth into the Toronto theatre scene this summer. As an actor in the Toronto Fringe play, Tam Lin, and writer and producer of the Best of the Fringe selection, The Wakowski Brothers, Colford did not rest on those laurels. After completing the SummerWorks Leadership Intensive Program (S.L.I.P.) last week, he stars in a fully-staged performance of his latest play, Mature Young Adults, which opens August 23 at the Tarragon Far Studio.

CHARPO: Tell us about your latest production Mature Young Adults: what brought it to Toronto now and what is it about?

COLFORD:  I originally wrote the show about two years ago as a short play that was about 20 minutes long. Workshopped by Theatre New Brunswick, that version was then published in the new play anthology Out on a Limb: Short Plays by New Playwrights last year. In preparing it for publication, I began rewriting and with it in mind, I kept working on the script as a writer-in-residence with the Paprika Festival where as a full-length script, Mature Young Adults had a successful reading back in March. I see this presentation as a next step in the development process, the first time with actors on their feet, and we’ll see how what we do in the rehearsal room meets with the audience.

As for the story, it’s set in Nova Scotia and explores innocence and discovery as two ex-lovers are reunited in the park where their relationship began. Told in reverse, the audience watches these teenaged lovers struggle with societal and parental pressures, distances, repressed sexuality, misogyny and the unknown emotions of first love.