Tag: community theatre

Brown gravy…This episodic structure and the posting of food titles (Fish and ships!!) might suggest a tweaking of brechtian critical realism however, this is mainly all about language.

Brown gravy…This episodic structure and the posting of food titles (Fish and ships!!) might suggest a tweaking of brechtian critical realism however, this is mainly all about language.

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The audience howled and squealed with delight as long strings of “ostie”, “crisse”, and “tabarnak”. “ciboire”, “sacrament”, “viarge”, and “câlisse”, just for starters, rolled off the tongue of four   women in Simon Boudreault’s   play Brown Gravy that opened Wednesday night at La Nouvelle Scène.

Given the extensive use of intense Quebecois swear words, as well as the extremely graphics images   referring to various lower body parts, the evening was expected to irritate a few people. Jean Stéphane Roy, artistic director of La Catapulte who programmed Brown Gravy, told the public they could leave quietly by the side door if they found the language too strong.  No one left.

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White Christmas – an Orpheus Musical Theatre production of an inferior musical of 1957. “Why do a new production?” asks Jamie Portman.

White Christmas – an Orpheus Musical Theatre production of an inferior musical of 1957. “Why do a new production?” asks Jamie Portman.

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Orpheus Musical Theatre’s decision to offer the stage version of the 1954 film, White Christmas, prompts one immediate question.

Why?

This was an inferior musical 57 years ago and it remains so today, whether you experience it on stage or the big screen. Yet, it inexplicably has assumed the status of a classic. It arrived in 1954, protected by built-in insurance — its title. Indeed, there’s a widespread misconception today that this was the movie which introduced Irving Berlin’s irresistible Yuletide ballad to the world. Not so: the song had been introduced 12 years earlier in a much better film, the 1942 Holiday Inn, starring Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire. Crosby was smart enough to make it one of his signature songs — a song which attained such potency that Paramount saw rich commercial potential in capitalizing on it with a new movie called White Christmas which would once again star Bing.

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White Christmas is less successful as a stage performance.

White Christmas is less successful as a stage performance.

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Crossing from one medium to another works best with first-class material. For example, the novella Gigi by Collette became a delightful movie at the hands of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe in 1958. Despite the high quality of the movie, the stage versions, musical or play, were less successful.

When the original is not top notch, the result is even less likely to be entirely successful. The 1954 Paramount movie, White Christmas, had very mixed reviews (to put it mildly). Therefore, when David Ives and Paul Blake delivered a stage version, they were faced with numerous problems.

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Maggie’s Getting Married at Kanata Theatre. Norm Foster has fun with the family!

Maggie’s Getting Married at Kanata Theatre. Norm Foster has fun with the family!

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Are the crashes of thunder in the Kanata Theatre production of Maggie’s Getting Married the director’s way of ensuring that the audience doesn’t miss any verbal bombshells in the dialogue? Maybe such a device could be justified in a drama with an obscure plot line and archaic language. But for a Norm Foster comedy?

Foster, often called Canada’s answer to Neil Simon, generally writes sit-coms, simple in language and often simplistic in plot. His plays offer the comfort of familiarity. Via light comedies, sometimes with serious undercurrents, audiences see themselves, their neighbours, aspects of their lives — exaggerated just a little.

Such is the tone of Maggie’s Getting Married, first performed in 2000. Set in the Duncan family’s kitchen on the night before the wedding, the focus is on sibling rivalry, pre-wedding jitters and family quirks.

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West Moon Street an early Oscar Wilde that already shows us his classic comedy of manners

West Moon Street an early Oscar Wilde that already shows us his classic comedy of manners

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Basing a play on a little known story by a famous writer sounds like a good idea. But when the story itself is not one of that author’s best (that may be the reason that it is so obscure) the adapter is likely to face credibility issues with the script.

The short story in question is Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime. In it, Oscar Wilde mocks frauds and confidence tricksters in the “fate” industry (palm readers, telepathists, spiritualists) and takes a tongue-in-cheek look at a gentleman’s approach to doing his duty. Wilde follows the pattern perfected in his classic comedy of manners, The Importance of Being Earnest, written four years later in 1895, making much of the insignificant and minimizing the value of important matters. The approach is just does not as effective in Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime.

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Into The Woods: A Stellar Production By The Orpheus Musical Theatre Society

Into The Woods: A Stellar Production By The Orpheus Musical Theatre Society

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“Living happily ever after” was never Stephen Sondheim’s favoured style. So when he latched onto some of the fairy tales of the brothers Grimm and he and book writer James Lapine headed into the woods in 1986, it was almost certain that the resulting musical would be closer to the W.W. Jacobs story of The Monkey’s Paw (a classic illustration that we should be careful what we wish for) than to riding off into a sunset filled with joy.

It is also worth remembering the theory that fairy tales are frequently seen as a projection of children’s fears and that many of the Grimm classics are horror stories filled with violence and evil. (The early editions of the 19th-century stories were criticized as being unsuitable for children.)

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dirty rotten Scoundrels laughs mostly at itself.

dirty rotten Scoundrels laughs mostly at itself.

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Relying heavily on equal parts of chutzpah and polish, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels is funny, irreverent, ironic, occasionally coarse and frequently politically incorrect. It mocks stereotypes, borrows style and content from other musicals as required, periodically breaks through the fourth wall and, most of all, laughs at itself.

In other words, this cheeky, lighthearted entertainment — adapted from the 1988 movie starring Michael Caine and Steve Martin — is a great deal of fun. …

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Fringe 2011: The Interview

Fringe 2011: The Interview

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Is old Mr. Anderson senile? Clever? Does one negate the other? Are the two cops good, bad, just doing their jobs? And what will it be like when you and I and those two police officers are old? Will we feel powerless or will we – and does Mr. Anderson – still find ways to bend the world to our desires?

The Interview, a multi-award winner at the 2010 Eastern Ontario Drama League One-Act Play Festival, prompts questions. It’s also a highlight of this year’s Ottawa Fringe Festival.

Written by Ken Wilson, the one-act drama balances suspense, comedy and humanity in its story about Mr. Anderson (the outstanding Dan Baran) who lives in a nursing home where a murder has occured. Ken Godmere and Michael Kennedy play the two cops investigating the killing. Klaas van Weringh directs. And the audience, which never quite figures out the truth of what happened, leaves the show asking each other a lot of questions about what might have happened.

The Janigan Studio has poor sight lines, so choose your seat carefully.

The Interview

by Ken Wilson

Directed by Klaas Van Weringh

Featuring: Dan Baran as Mr Anderson, Ken Godmere as Detective Smith,

and Michael Kennedy as Detective Thorpe

* * * * * * * * * *

The Story of Two Con Men(The Dirty Rotten Scoundrals) Milking Rich Divorcees on The French Riviera Crackles….

The Story of Two Con Men(The Dirty Rotten Scoundrals) Milking Rich Divorcees on The French Riviera Crackles….

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Relying heavily on equal parts of chutzpah and polish, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels is funny, irreverent, ironic, occasionally coarse and frequently politically incorrect. It mocks stereotypes, borrows style and content from other musicals as required, periodically breaks through the fourth wall and, most of all, laughs at itself.

In other words, this cheeky, lighthearted entertainment — adapted from the 1988 movie starring Michael Caine and Steve Martin — is a great deal of fun.

…

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Melodramatic nonsense rather than stylish comedy says Iris Boston of this piece at Kanata Theatre.

Melodramatic nonsense rather than stylish comedy says Iris Boston of this piece at Kanata Theatre.

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story by a famous writer sounds like a good idea. But when the story itself is not one of that author’s best (that may be the reason that it is so obscure) the adapter is likely to face credibility issues with the script.

The short story in question is Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime. In it, Oscar Wilde mocks frauds and confidence tricksters in the “fate” industry (palm readers, telepathists, spiritualists) and takes a tongue-in-cheek look at a gentleman’s approach to doing his duty. Wilde follows the pattern perfected in his classic comedy of manners, The Importance of Being Earnest, written four years later in 1895, making much of the insignificant and minimizing the value of important matters. The approach is just does not as effective in Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime.

…

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