Jake’s Gift is a memory play. And it’s a meditation on the tragedy and triumph of war — the grief, the loss, the anger and ultimately the healing that in itself constitutes a sort of victory. So it can also have the texture of a mood piece.

But ultimately this lovely, 65-minute one-hander is about the kindness of strangers. The stranger in this instance is Isabelle, a 10-year-old French girl who lives in a village near the Normandy beaches and who, through sheer goodness of heart, changes the life of an elderly Canadian named Jake.

This crotchety old veteran has made a reluctant return to France for the 60th anniversary of the D-Day invasion. And he seems the quintessential sour-puss — profane and resentful over even being there, yet also consumed with guilt over his failure to have come back sooner.

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There’s the potential for an absorbing theatre piece in the story that Radium Girls has to tell. But that potential is squandered, first by deficiencies in D.W. Gregory’s script, and secondly by Kanata Theatre’s failure to surmount the challenges it poses.

The play deals with the real-life tragedy of the young women who had the misfortune of working for the U.S. Radium Corporation a century ago. They contracted radiation poisoning as a result of a job that involved applying self-luminous paint to watch dials.

And when five of them challenged their their former employers in court, the prolonged litigation led to landmark changes legitimizing the right of employees to sue on the grounds that they have contracted an occupational disease.

The play, frequently awkward in exposition and shallow in its character-drawing, also has structural problems. Gregory offers a series of episodes that don’t always unfold naturally and instead follow jerkily one after the other and lack even the basic requisites for some kind of cinematic flow. Director Tom Kobolak engages in a failing struggle to deal with this material’s deficiencies and bridge the gaps. Karl Wagner’s set and lighting offer some support — there are, for example some evocative back projections courtesy of Justin Ladelpha— and Brooke Keneford’s soundscape contributes some atmosphere. But one is too conscious of the yawning silences between scenes, of the static moments when characters walk on stage to take up positions before a scene starts, of a sense of a production that is lumbering along in fits and starts.

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Photo: Black Theatre Workshop

A chorus of ancestors pour down the aisles from the back of the orchestra and converge on stage, all the while their wordless song grows in intensity. From within that rising chorus of ancestors, Rainey Johnson (Lucinda Davis) mimes holding her infant daughter in her arms—a bundle of cloth that is pulled away from her. Rainey loses her young daughter, and the chorus of ancestors encircles her, their a cappella melody meet Rainey’s pain with a mournful song. Even the very first scene of the play will send shivers down your spine with its ability to be so deeply emotive, and yet so beautifully constructed.

The new season at the NAC has opened with Adventures of a Black Girl in Search of God, and it sets a high standard for all that is to come. It is an immersive theatrical experience that blends theatre, dance, and song. The result is a seamless performance that is haunting in its depth of portrayal of the human experience of grief. What’s more, the play is equally lighthearted, finding humour and joy even in face of terrible pain. This is the power of Governor General Literary Award winner Djanet Sears’ impeccably crafted production.

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“Jake’s Gift,” a one-woman show written and performed by Julia Mackey, is a powerful tribute to Canadian veterans, especially those who participated in the World War II D-Day landing on Juno Beach. Inspired by her trip to Normandy in 2004 for the 60^th anniversary of D-Day, Miss Mackey and Director Dirk Van Stralen created Juno Productions to present and tour this piece across Canada. As Americans we hear mostly about Omaha Beach. It’s good to be reminded that our neighbors to the North also had a major part in the landings.

The two main characters are Jake, a veteran in his 70s who has returned for his first visit to Juno Beach since the war and Isabelle, a lively and inquisitive 10 year-old French girl. She has, as she says, “. . .the most important job in the world.”As they gradually become friends, Isabelle helps Jake in finally being able to come to terms with his past.

Julia Mackey relies mostly on body language and her voice to delineate the believable character changes between the irrepressible Isabelle and the initially grumpy Jake. We also meet Isabelle’s Grandmama and a Canadian teacher. Using only a bench, a small table and a suitcase Miss Mackey makes both the story and relationship easy to follow. She’s ably assisted by Gerald King’s sensitive lighting, especially in the scene where Jake puts on his uniform jacket. When he snaps a salute, we catch a glimpse of the young soldier who enlisted so many years ago. …

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  Photo: Tim Matheson

A thoughtful and sensitive colllaboration between lone  performer, Julia Mackey and director Dirk Van Stralen has produced a more than memorable performance  dealing with the 60th anniversary of the  bloody events of  the  D-Day landings on the shores of Juno Beach in Normandy, France. While revisiting the precise spot where it all took place, Jake a crusty old veteran , incarnated by the actor,  limps onto the stage and begins this luminous encounter.  Playing both the old fellow who feels guilty for not returning to see the remains of his brother   since he was killed  during the invasion,  and 10 year old Isabelle, a strongwilled imaginary young French girl,  Julia Mackey   opens an incredible healing process for those who are suffering as both  characters  meet on the beach where a touching friendship developes. .   

Director Dirk Van Stralen has put the actor in the foreground,  refusing to distract us with news reels, or images from the period, or  journalistic sound effects or  violent   lighting.  Julia Mackey stands alone at the centre, looking straight into our eyes,  facing us like a proudly defiant young woman and a talented  actress. Dressed in a gender ambiguous cap and pants, she easily and smoothly transforms herself from the

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