Review: Jekyll and Hyde

Constantine Marouli, Deborah Cox (PHOTO CREDIT: CHRIS BENNION PHOTO)

This is the Moment . . . When Things Start to go Wrong
Like its namesake, this Jekyll & Hyde has a bit of split personality

by Stuart Munro

Jekyll & Hyde is one of those shows I’ve never been sure what to do with. The score is peppered with some of the most memorable songs that the 1990s added to the musical theatre canon, but Leslie Bricusse’s book and lyrics are so overwrought and Frank Wildhorn’s pop score is so repetitive that I’ve always found the material impossible to sift through and find something coherent enough to build a show out of. So imagine my surprise last night when the curtain came up on a somewhat subdued and restrained treatment of this famously over-the-top show. The opening mob-like scene has been replaced with an upstairs/downstairs look at London society and, along with what I’m sure are some new orchestrations, there is an almost restrained and chamber quality to the first two-thirds of Act I. Sure, some of the 90s pop-ishness still comes out in the score, but it’s not nearly as brash as previous incarnations of this piece have been.

Sadly, all that hard-earned subtlety comes to a crashing halt as soon as Mr. Hyde appears, and the show quickly descends into the over-the-top ridiculousness I tend to associate with it. The climactic confrontation between our two titular characters has been reduced from an intense battle of the wills to a 1980s Def Leppard music video, and the show’s finale is laden with enough heavy-handed Christian imagery sure to leave even the most pious among us confused.

Review: The Little Years

Bethany Jillard and Chick Reid (photo credit: Cylla von Tiedemann)

The Curse of Passing Time
by Beat Rice

The current version of The Little Years was commissioned by the Stratford Shakespeare Festival last year where it was part of their season in the studio theatre. The production now has a new life at the Tarragon with recreated designs and some different casting. It shows us the beautiful and malicious ways people can affect others unintentionally. 

We are introduced to young Kate, played by Bethany Jilliard, at the beginning of the play. We meet a bright, curious pre-teen with questions and ideas about time, space, and physics, as big as the universe.  We instantly have high hopes for her, but unfortunately her ideas are deemed unacceptable and foolish for a young girl in the 50’s. Her mother, played by Chick Reid, discourages her from even talking of such subjects, and instead encourages her to go out, be social, and meet boys. She decides to place her daughter out of regular school and place her in vocational school, a move that alters the fate of Kate drastically. Irene Poole plays adult Kate, who grows up to be a bitter young adult who constantly has to hear about how well her brother William is doing in life. William is an invisible but ever-present character in the play. His wife Grace, played by Pamela Sinha, gives Kate love and support to try to pull her out of her negativity. She never gives up, even as Kate descends into a darker place as she approaches mature adulthood. 

The Still, November 15, 2012

Sometimes you just have to let the image do the talking, which is the case in this deceptively simple portrait by Cylla von Tiedemann of Chick Reid for The Little Years. Everything - from pose, to dress, to makeup, to ring and pearls - tells us part of the story of this woman.

In A Word...Playwright Brad Fraser

(photo credit: G. Elliot Simpson)

The Voice...and when to use it

Brad Fraser is an internationally produced and mutli-award winning playwright, pundit, director and screenwriter, residing in Toronto.

CHARPO: You've been fairly vocal about situations both political (Harper, Ford) and theatrical/political (Healey, Gass), and now you have a column in Xtra - is this a playwright's prerogative (as opposed to other celebs we wish would just shut up)?

FRASER: I think it’s is the obligation of any person in society to speak out when they see something wrong being done. The only celebs people want to shut up are usually the stupid ones so I don't think it's just a celebrity thing. Also when the majority of people are towing an obvious immoral party line it's up to those with the strength to say so to do so regardless of their profession. A playwright is just one of the many things I am.

The Vid, November 14, 2012

Behind the scenes of Soulpepper's Endgame.

(Read our review)

After Dark, November 13, 2012

My First Time
The importance being exposed
by Gaëtan L. Charlebois

My mother died when I was 13. You need to know that because it is important to the story of my first time.

My mother was the kind of Catholic who, if Christmas fell on a Sunday, would bring us all to church twice - once for Christmas, once for the Sunday. When my mother died my father - profoundly in love with his wife of 25 years and the mother of his six children - went mad with grief and got through it two ways: by falling in love with another magnificent woman and by blaming the Catholic Church for my mother's death. My mother had not been a well woman since being hit with rheumatic fever as a child and so her seven pregnancies (she lost one) had been hellish. My father thought she had died so young because they had never used birth control because of my mother's Catholicism. (Stay with me...there is a point to this.)

My father, relieved, I believe, of my Mother's staunch Catholicism, became a lot more liberal. When I was 15 he allowed me to start drinking...in the house...with him. (His own father was an alcoholic and he preferred I do my drinking at home so he could see how I handled it.) He brought me to my first x-rated film at about the same time. (I have always looked like I was 30 so he suspected I was already buying nudie magazines. He was right.)

Opinion: Stuart Munro on Reality TV Casting

Andrew Lloyd Webber and Over the Rainbow winner, Danielle Wade

The pros and cons of reality TV casting
The Case of Over the Rainbow

Stuart Munro

After eight weeks of highly entertaining television, Canada has finally picked its Dorothy for the upcoming production of The Wizard of OZ – 20 year-old Danielle Wade. This young woman will be carrying no small burden on her shoulders, as nearly everyone in the audience on opening night will have watched her progress through the competition, not to mention the millions of dollars invested in this mega production by Andrew Lloyd Webber and David Mirvish. These two men are no doubt nervous; their headliner has been picked, not through the regular casting process, but through a Canadian Idol-style competition. And while I think the viewers at home have picked a great Dorothy, the fact remains that we’re not casting directors. Which begs the question: Can this casting process be considered ‘legitimate?’ What are the pros and cons of choosing a leading lady in this fashion?

The Show, November 12, 2012

(from Tarragon website)

On reading a play by John Mighton you might not be wrong if you said he was an acquired taste. But on stage something happens to his words - alchemy, if you like (though Mighton, a mathematician, would bridle at the term). His play, The Little Years, fits well into the heads of directors and especially well into the mouths of actors. The work has been road-tested at Stratford with the same director who is bringing the piece to Tarragon, Chris Abraham.

Kate, in the 1950s, is told to give up her math and science dreams and to be a good girl. Simply, a person is formed by dreams - both granted and unfulfilled. Kate, as we see over decades, is no exception. Mighton once again proves why he delights. It is germane, here, to site what the jury for his Siminovitch Prize said of him: "His voice has grace, delicacy and a gentle humanity."

The Story: First-Person - Matty Burns on Tagged and It's Complicated

From Napkins to Opening
The jagged journey of Tagged and It's Complicated 
by Matty Burns

Only a few years ago, I thought I had it all. I was living the dream, enjoying my final year at Queen’s University and had everything I could possibly want. I had spent four years not letting school get in the way of my education! I learned a lot about myself, made the best friends I could ask for and secured a spot in the the theatre and campus community that fit me just fine. I was home. Everything was looking up Milhouse! Then over night the curtain opened and reality sunk in. It was time for the bubble to burst. I knew it was coming. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how I could possibly hold onto this dream life for a little longer. But I wasn’t the only one leaving. Things were about to change and fast. I didn’t even go to my graduation ceremony because I was so upset about having to move on. But I had to grow up... again....this was the next step. 

Opinion: Holger Syme on the new Soulpepper season

Albert Schultz (photo credit: Sandy Nicholson)

Soulpepper: Requiem for a Dream

This is an obituary.

by Holger Syme (reprinted, with permission, from dispositio)

Let me quote Soulpepper’s own company history, a history that traces the progress from a “dream” to “making the dream a reality” to the birth of “a new company”:

Soulpepper Theatre Company began with twelve actors who wanted to explore the great stories of classical theatre and inspire the next generation of artists and audiences. … A few years out of the Stratford Young Company, these actors were craving a return to the classics and saw that there was a void in the Toronto theatre scene. Why in one of the theatre capitals of the world was there not a world class classical theatre company? At a series of boisterous and passionate dinner parties over many months, the foundations were laid to form a theatre company which met that very need.

By opening the season with [Schiller's Don Carlos], the Soulpepper founders wanted to make clear that they were up for the challenge, ready to tackle even the toughest of texts and make them exciting and engaging for Toronto audiences.

The first season at Harbourfront was a huge success. The critics and audiences raved. Soulpepper had delivered what Toronto audiences were craving.

Fifteen years later, the company enjoys great success in its beautiful venue in the Distillery District. But the dream its website describes in such evocative terms? That dream is over.

The new season, just announced yesterday [ed: Tuesday], may be logistically ambitious. It may be unusual among Toronto companies in not being exclusively driven by brand new work, preferably written by Canadian authors. But what it isn’t is the kind of season “a world class classical theatre company” might put together.

Theatre For Thought, November 10, 2012

HATCHED FROM A THEATRICAL EGG
joel fishbane

“I didn’t want it to be an issue play,” said Claire Burns. “Just a play that deals with certain issues.” She’s referring to Hatched, her new play that was inspired from her own experience as an egg donor back in 2004. Produced by Toronto’s Triangle Co-Op Productions, the show aims to be less about the moral / legal issues surrounding in vitro fertilization and more about the ripple effect our choices have on generations to come.

It’s hard to discuss Hatched without resorting to puns, so I’ll get them out of the way now. The show was “conceived” after Burns donated her eggs, it “gestated” while Burns conducted research, interviewing egg donors, recipients and donor children. After its initial “birth”, it was “nurtured” by Burns with some dramaturgical help from the people at Triangle Co-Op. And last week, the show finally arrived, aged and mature, at the Toronto Free Gallery.

Review: The Anger in Ernest and Ernestine

(photo credit: Deanna L. Palazzo)

Ernest's Hammer

by Christian Baines

@XtianBaines

If you’re going to follow the well-worn theatre trope of a disintegrating – though possibly inescapable – relationship, told through an intimate two hander, you’d better find a fairly unique way to flesh it out. The Anger In Ernest & Ernestine rises to the task fairly well, setting its terminally flawed bliss within a self-aware ‘theatre home’ and using banal familiarity to create a sense of whimsy that instantly attracts us to the rather odd central couple.

Ernest is a sweet, well-organized and slightly uptight nebbish. Ernestine is more of a free spirit, for whom a messy life is one well-lived. Writer/director, Robert Morgan (co-writing with Martha Ross and Leah Cherniak) never pretends the course of this marriage will run smooth, illustrating petty annoyances between the pair from the get go. Where, for instance, is the ideal place in the room for a tissue box? And whatever did happen to Ernest’s hammer? 

CharPo's Real Theatre! November 9, 2012

Review: Romeo and Juliet

Paolo Santalucia (photo credit: Daniel DiMarco)

Where we set our scene...

...and a Romeo to dream about

by Cassie Muise

Everyone knows the story of star-crossed lovers, Romeo & Juliet. Whether you’ve seen it with Leo DiCaprio and Clare Danes, or The Lion King 2, the story of star-crossed lovers kept apart by a family feud is still as accessible as it is relevant today. There are many things to enjoy about this slick, well-polished production of what is arguably Shakespeare’s best-known play. 

As always, I am impressed with Hart House’s sophisticated, seamless execution. The lighting, set, and music are well used without being distracting. What is distracting, however, is the fact that it is set in modern day, hip-hop, gangster-overrun Verona. Although there were some gimmicks I appreciated about this – the boys using sunglasses instead of masks for the party, and the party itself a club with pulsing beats and crazy lights – I usually find modernized versions of R&J unnecessary, and this was no exception. In fact, by the second act almost all of the modernized elements had vanished, except the clothing. I wonder if this was an attempt to engage younger audiences. Although the cast brought this world to life with vim and vigour, I think that the approach they went for here is best left to West Side Story. They did it better. 

The Still, November 8, 2012

There is so much happening in Shaun Benson's terrific photo of Richard Clarkin and Yanna McIntosh in Speaking in Tongues, that we don't know where to start. McIntosh's closed eyes suggest passion, but the place itself is motel-sleazy. The way the light falls on the wall and bed-spread frames but also reveals. (You wouldn't want to do the luminol-thing on that bed...)

(Read our review of the production)