Theatre in Ottawa and the region Archives - Page 50 of 92 - Capital Critics' Circle / Le cercle des critiques de la capitale

Equivocation: Solid production of a problematic play

By Jamie Portman | November 13, 2016

Equivocation by Bill Cain
Kanata Theatre
Directed by Alain Chamsi

Kanata Theatre’s production of Equivocation contains so many fine moments that you’re left saddened by the fact that it ultimately doesn’t work.

Director Alain Chamsi and his colleagues have worked with diligence and discernment to bring shape and substance to a play that uses an imagined crisis in Shakespeare’s life as a platform for an examination of the fragility of truth in a hothouse political climate.

But ultimately the centre does not hold. Playwright Bill Cain, a Jesuit priest whose moonlighting activities including scripting an episode of House of Cards, has solid credentials, and this 2009 play has been acclaimed in many quarters. But it’s overly ambitious in scope, thematically cluttered, structurally uncertain and at times painfully glib and facile.

Furthermore, when it comes to tone, it attempts to have it both ways — expecting the audience to go along with moments of serious drama, which include a pair of gruesome public hangings, while also expecting them to revel in episodes of comic buffoonery as well as bits of more subtle satire. It’s an uneasy fusion. …

Read More Read More

Imaginary Lines isn’t as clever as it thinks

By Jamie Portman | November 9, 2016

Photo courtesy of Linden House Theatre Company

Imaginary Lines by Reggie Oliver

A Linden House Theatre production

Directed by Robin Bowditch

The premise of Reggie Oliver’s comedy, Imaginary Lines sounds promising. It proposes to explore the often turbulent waters of personal relationships by examining two layers of communication. The first exposes us to what people are saying out loud to each other. The second lets us in on what they’re actually thinking — or, more specifically what they wish they had said in attempting to find empathy with a member of the opposite sex.

Unfortunately, the Linden House Theatre Company’s production fails to find justification for the play’s surprising popularity among community theatre groups. Despite a strong cast and an excellent set design from Rachel Hauraney, Imaginary Lines seems no more than a feeble attempt on this playwright’s part to emulate the audacious structural mind games for which his mentor, Alan Ayckbourn, is renowned.

Indeed, the script is not even consistent in allowing us into the repressed thoughts of every character. This may partially explain why director Robin Bowditch has difficulty in establishing a sustained comic rhythm for this play. It keeps disconnecting. …

Read More Read More

Burn: Muggleton and cast put on suspenseful, fun play

By Maja Stefanovska | November 6, 2016

Burn
Written and directed by John Muggleton
Avalon Studio

Longtime friends Robert, Samira, and David meet after some time apart at the request of the daughter of their recently deceased friend, successful horror writer, Paul. None of the three friends know precisely why Eve, the daughter, wants to meet them, except to deliver something – whether it’s news, a portion of their friend’s will, or a package isn’t clear. When she arrives, she easily and somewhat aggressively inserts herself into the conversation. Thing start quickly falling off the rails when she insists on telling her own horror (or is it ghost?) story, peppering it with unsettling secrets from Robert’s and Paul’s past. It’s at this point that Robert, Samira, and David realize that there is something undeniably eerie about Eve. Although the script and directing needs some very minor fine-tuning, writer and director John Muggleton ultimately takes the audience from comfort and intimacy to the edge of their seats in suspense in, Burn.

It’s obvious that Muggleton knows a thing or two about people – how they love, how they doubt, and what and how they fear. The play opens with a rather lengthy exchange between Robert (Chris Torti), Samira (Tahera Mufti), and David (Michael Thompson) as they wait for Eve’s arrival. Although this section could be shortened a bit, there is a method to the seemingly slow pace. Muggleton, Torti, Mufti, and Thompson take the time to establish characters and invite the audience into their private world. Empathy is a powerful drug and it’s this intimacy makes the suspense and horror, when it does come, that much more powerful. Having said that, the same effect could have been achieved in less time. …

Read More Read More

The Last Wife is an exciting and purposed reimagination of Katherine Parr’s history

By Kat Fournier | November 6, 2016

There’s a bravery that sits at the heart of The Last Wife that caught me off-guard. Playwright Kate Hennig imagines the intimate conversations that may have occurred in the most private moments between Katherine Parr and her husband, King Henry VIII, and even conjures up an unexpected romance. A historical play, one might expect a dusty piece brimming with period costumes and old-school notions; to say that this production is anything but dusty is an understatement. This artistic team, with director Esther Jun at the helm, is exhilarating from start to finish. Yet, The Last Wife is also much more than a romantic yarn between an odd-couple—it’s a story that reimagines Katherine Parr as a woman who challenges the status quo of her role as a woman and as the king’s closemouthed wife. …

Read More Read More

Burn: Promising situation but problems in making it work

By Jamie Portman | November 6, 2016

Burn

Written and directed by John Muggleton

Avalon Studio to Nov. 13

There’s a certain type of thriller that makes its impact by bringing in a character whose very presence generates apprehension and unease both on and off stage.

That’s the task of actress Megan Carty who is very good at cranking up the tension in John Muggleton’s new play, Burn, at the Avalon Studio.

She plays a young woman named Eve whose initial flakiness slides into something more tenacious and sinister once she starts playing mind games with a trio of literary types named Robert, Samira and David. …

Read More Read More

The Last Wife: One for the memory book

By Jamie Portman | November 5, 2016

The Last Wife

By Kate Hennig

A CGCT/Victoria Belfry co-production

Directed by Esther Jun

GCTC to Nov. 20

It’s rare to encounter as outstanding a fusion of creativity and on-stage talent as that now on display at GCTC. But this production of Kate Hennig’s mesmerizing play, The Last Wife, is definitely one for the memory books.

We’re in the turbulent world of Tudor England here — but again we’re not. This examination of the dying days of King Henry Vlll’s reign — and in particular the last of his marriages to the remarkable Catherine Parr — is set in modern dress. It’s an audacious move, but it brings into bolder relief issues that never really go away — issues having to do with the elusive dynamics of personal relationships as well the ravaged reality of power politics, both global and domestic …

Read More Read More

Attempts on Her Life: Brave, bold, modern, challenging, creative

By Rajka Stefanovska | November 2, 2016

“Attempts on Her Life” is written by postmodern British playwright Martin Crimp, but has been entirely interpreted by Peter James Haworth, which is probably the only regularity in a highly irregular play. I say ‘regularity’ only because that is exactly the way Crimp works. Narrative is not his focus, therefore his dialogues are meaningless. The stage resembles madhouse whose residents are lost in nothingness. Reality disappears, lucid identity is non-existent, and lives are lived in a virtual world shaped by media.

The story – if one can talk about a story at all – revolves around Anne, the only character in the play. That is, if we can talk about character at all. Anne is not on the stage. She might be already dead, still alive, in the neighbourhood, or somewhere very far. Everybody talks about her, trying to shape her, disagrees about who she is, but in spite of all of that, here she is. She occupies our minds, our thoughts and becoming more real than we are. Welcome to the modern world of advanced technology and consumerism wrapped up into a global capitalism. In seventeen apparently disconnected scenes, groups of people talk about her as a terrorist, a porno star, a tourist hostess, a daughter of grieving parents, a suicide artist and even as a car. Crimp does not express his opinion; he does not create atmosphere or protagonist and anti-protagonists. In his emotionally detached work, he leaves every possible interpretation to the director.

There is no point in trying to understand a deeper meaning of the story (because there is none). …

Read More Read More

Southern Dis-Comfort: An evening of fun

By Iris Winston | October 31, 2016

Southern Dis-Comfort

By Dan Lalande and Noel Counsil

Eddie May Murder Mysteries

Directed by Thea Nikolic

Murder mystery dinner theatre is not intended to be taken seriously. Neither should it be viewed in the same light as regular theatre.

Rather, the mystery is the frame for a variety of clichés about characters and plot, bookended by a meal and a miniscule amount of suspense as the audience solves whodunit. Audience members must also be prepared to interact with cast members in character while they are eating. In addition, they should be ready to laugh a lot between mouthfuls.

For two decades or more, Eddie May Mysteries have proved conclusively that the formula works. Now, the company has expanded to a second venue — the Velvet Room attached to Fat Tuesdays restaurant in Kanata Centrum.

Southern Dis-Comfort by Dan Lalande and Eddie May founder Noel Counsil is the first show to play at both the downtown and the west end location. The storyline not only speaks of murder and mayhem at the Caj-Inn hunting lodge in Louisiana, but also provides a vehicle for banter about Canada versus the U.S. and even a few moments of song. There are also some slow-down film-like segments that work very well. …

Read More Read More

‘da Kink is powerful as ever, but keeps the present at arms length

By Kat Fournier | October 26, 2016

Trey Anthony’s influence in Canadian theatre is remarkable, and ‘da Kink in My Hair sits at the very heart of her contributions to Canadian culture. Originally a box-office-breaking Toronto Fringe offering in 2001, the play has taken on a life of its own and evolved into a modern classic. It has been adapted for television and re-worked as a musical. As part of a partnership between the National Arts Centre in Ottawa and Theatre Calgary, the musical has just finished its run in Calgary and now Ottawa audiences are fortunate to see Trey Anthony reprising her role as Novelette at the National Arts Centre until November 5.

Anthony as Novelette is irreverent, saucy, and no-nonsense. The character brings humour and healing to the other women that come through her salon. More importantly, Novelette is also a key literary device that underpins the whole production. Her name may be your first clue that she is the “man behind the curtain” so to speak, and the all-knowing curator of the stories that we hear in this transcendental space. The setting, Letty’s Salon, is a shifting type of reality that allows these women’s stories to be woven together. It’s a space that incorporates a touch of magical realism and, paired with the musical elements of the production, emphasize the indeterminate nature of the stage. The set design by Cory Sincennes blends modern and retro elements. Red-framed mirrors adorn the walls, while dryer chairs and hair cutting stations flank stage right and left, respectively. The most important details of the stage are two elements that are rigged on a pulley system: The larger-than-life Letty’s Salon sign that hangs over the playing arena, and the backdrop that features dozens of black women’s hairstyles. When they are pulled up, we know we’re not at Letty’s anymore…. …

Read More Read More

The Novel House: Misguided production of predictable play

By Patrick Langston | October 22, 2016

The Novel House

By Jayson McDonald

Black Sheep Theatre at The Gladstone

Why bother?

That’s the question about Black Sheep Theatre’s misguided production of Ontario playwright Jayson McDonald’s tiresome family drama Novel House.

The plot – contrived and coy when it’s not simply inert – finds the jaunty writer James Novel (William Beddoe) working on – wait for it – the great Canadian novel in his rambling, leaky and apparently ghost-riddled home called Novel House. For reason that eluded at least me, Novel is writing his masterwork with a quill pen even though the setting is present-day.

We the audience are apparently reading the novel as he writes it. This allows him to address us directly from time to time before stepping back into the action of his novel which, if it tells the story of his and his family’s collective life, may not be a novel at all. Assuming you care to plumb things to that depth.

James’s wife Mary (Alexis Scott) is an annoyingly fidgety scatterbrain, but one who loves her husband and adult daughter Rebecca (Whitney Richards, who brings a welcome freshness to this dank show). There’s a cutely weird grandfather (James’ father Geoffrey, played by Jeffrey Lefebvre) who talks to a lamp and hangs out in a wardrobe (one keeps hoping he’ll be whisked away permanently to Narnia). Also on the scene: Thomas Winding, an earnest, whiny kind of guy played by the able Tony Adams, who marries Rebecca, almost fathers a child and does other stuff. …

Read More Read More