Category: Theatre in Ottawa and the region

The NAC comes up trumps with carried away

The NAC comes up trumps with carried away

By |
Photo: David Hou

 

carried away on the crest of a wave By David Yee, Directed by Kim Collier. An NAC English Theatre Production to April 1

Again and again, the stage of the NAC Theatre takes on an eerie beauty — one that is often not quite of this world yet stays anchored to a heartbreaking reality.

That reality is the 2004 earthquake and tsunami that killed a quarter of a million people in the area of the Indian ocean. A key thread running through David Yee’s compelling play — “carried away on the crest of a wave” —  suggests not just aftershocks around the world but an existential crisis that occurred in the lives of those left behind to mourn the loss of those they cared about. It’s also about a loss of faith — in one key episode , a matter-of-fact Muslim engineer demolishes a Roman Catholic priest’s fervent belief that it was an act of God that saved his basilica and congregation from destruction. Mythology also surfaces:  is it really pure fantasy to suggest, as one character does, that Planet Earth sits on the back of a turtle? …

Read More Read More

Phoenix drops the ball with Stage Kiss

Phoenix drops the ball with Stage Kiss

By |
Stage Kiss, poster from Phoenix Players

Stage Kiss by Sarah Ruhl, Phoenix Players, Directed by André Dimitrijevic and Rachel Worton, Gladstone Theatre

If Sarah Ruhl’s occasionally funny comedy, Stage Kiss, is to work in performance, it needs more than the decidedly inexpert treatment meted out to it by Ottawa’s Phoenix Players.

To be sure, there’s at least potential in Ruhl’s quirky reworking of the play-with-a-play convention. A new stage piece is in rehearsal and two former lovers who haven’t seen each other for 20 years have been cast in the lead roles. Kissing on stage reignites their passion — or does it, really? Perhaps it’s mere illusion, like the play and production that have triggered it. Who knows? …

Read More Read More

Streetcar Named Desire, a highly creditable production of a difficult drama.

Streetcar Named Desire, a highly creditable production of a difficult drama.

By |
Streetcar Poster OLT

A Streetcar Named Desiare by Tennessee Williams. Ottawa Little Theatre. Directed by Sarah Hearn

A Streetcar Named Desire, generally regarded as one of the major plays of the 20th century, is also one of the most disturbing. Playwright Tennessee Williams’ portrait of aging southern belle Blanche Dubois, surrounded by self-delusion and fantasy as she crumbles into mental collapse was the primary focus of the drama when it premiered in 1947.

When Marlon Brando recreated his stage performance in the 1951 movie version as her brother-in-law Stanley Kowalski, the balance of the drama seemed to shift to make Streetcar his story, highlighting the explosive relationship with his wife, Stella — Blanche’s younger sister — and the constant tension with Blanche. …

Read More Read More

Stage Kiss lands up giving stage kisses a bad name.

Stage Kiss lands up giving stage kisses a bad name.

By |

Stage Kiss by Sarah Ruhl

Phoenix Players

Directed by André Dimitrijevic and Rachel Worton

How much of a risk for actors is kissing on stage? Does the challenge of making a kiss appear full of emotion sometimes/occasionally/often morph into the real thing? And what happens when a pair of ex-lovers is cast in a romantic comedy about, what else, a pair of ex-lovers rekindling former romance? …

Read More Read More

carried away on the crest of a wave:stylistically simple and attractive throughout

carried away on the crest of a wave:stylistically simple and attractive throughout

By |
John Ng, Clarissa Lauzon;   Photo: David Hou

carried away on the crest of a wave  by David Yee, directed by Kim Collier. An NAC English Theatre Production

Throw a pebble into a pool of water and the circles of ripples spread far beyond the point of entry. Magnified a thousand times, the aftermath of a massive natural disaster such as the December 2004 tsunami that claimed more than 250,000 lives spread around the world.

In carried away on the crest of a wave, playwright David Yee demonstrates the aftershocks in lives changed forever in many parts of the world far removed from the tsunami in Asia. …

Read More Read More

A Streetcar Named Desire: Challenging subject matter tackled adeptly

A Streetcar Named Desire: Challenging subject matter tackled adeptly

By |
A Streetcar Named Desire  Photo Maria Vartanaova: Stanley and Blanche

Reviewed by Natasha Lomonossoff on March 22, 2018

As a theatre usually known for staging pleasant comedies and murder mysteries, the Ottawa Little Theatre’s current production of the classic American drama by Tennessee Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire, marks a promising new direction for it. Directed by Sarah Hearn, this production captures much of the essence of Williams’ script without whitewashing the difficult subject matter and periodic violence that is seen onstage. Strong performances by the cast and skillful scenic techniques (especially the projected backdrop and unique use of light) further augment the theatrical experience of the play. …

Read More Read More

Ottawa Little Theatre’s Streetcar yields some outstanding moments

Ottawa Little Theatre’s Streetcar yields some outstanding moments

By |
Streetcar Named Desire Photo, Maria Vartanova
Stanley (Dan DeMarbre)  and Blanche (Laura Hall)

 

 

A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams, Directed by Sarah Hearn. OLTplays to April 7

In some ways, A Streetcar Named Desire is more of a minefield than it was when playwright Tennessee Williams unveiled it to the world 71 years ago.

Back then it jolted audiences wth its sexual candour and revelation of unsettling undercurrents in the way human beings treat each other. But today, we may be uncomfortably conscious that the play also seems to be telling us to be more accepting of the relationship between Stanley Kowalski and pregnant wife Stella — a relationship prone to outbursts of domestic violence. …

Read More Read More

A Night in November: a riveting piece of theatre and a legendary performance!!!

A Night in November: a riveting piece of theatre and a legendary performance!!!

By |

A Night in November by Marie Jones. Performed and directed by Pierre Brault

The Irish Troubles were raging in1994. Therefore, it is not surprising that the World Cup series qualifying football match in Belfast between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland — won by the Republic (later that year to win the World Cup) turned into a battlefield.

Prejudice and violence coated in national loyalty were laid bare at the game. In A Night in November, this is the glass through which Kenneth McCallister, a Protestant dole clerk in Belfast, views his life. …

Read More Read More

A Night in November: Pierre Brault’s current Gladstone show is not to be missed!

A Night in November: Pierre Brault’s current Gladstone show is not to be missed!

By |
A Night in November
Photo: from the Ottawa Citizen

We’re drawn into a culture in which a Protestant welfare clerk named Kenneth Norman McCallister chortles with glee when he secures a coveted membership in a Belfast golf club ahead of his boss — a Roman Catholic named Jerry who probably would never be allowed to join anyway.

It’s a culture in which Kenneth takes pleasure in humiliating those claimants who come to his counter and prove to be of the wrong religion. And even though he’s bored and resentful of a stifling home life, he shares the religious bigotry of his house-proud wife and their friends …

Read More Read More

Declaration by the Capital Critics Circle

Declaration by the Capital Critics Circle

By |

———

Iris Winston, a member of Capital Critics Circle, recently published an opinion piece in the Ottawa Citizen titled Why #MeToo is not for me. Ms. Winston wrote the piece as an expression of her own beliefs and not as a representative of Capital Critics Circle. Capital Critics Circle believes that censorship is the antithesis of all art and we support the free expression of opinion.