Photo Courtesy of the NAC. Jack Volpe and Andy Jones

A clump of sparkling white Christmas trees beckons to us at the entrance of the theatre telling us that the play has become part of the festive NAC landscape in a new way. Not just because A Christmas Carol has become a Christmas staple in Ottawa (gone are those British pantos which I loved so much) but also because this conception of Dicken’s work has a new existence, one that removes all that is dark, miserable, poor, disturbing and psychological. The event about the transformation of mean old Scrooge, the sad story of Tiny Tim and the poor Cratchit family and Scrooge’s frightening visits to his past his present and his future have been turned into a living Christmas decoration all fluffy, beautiful, seductive, dreamy, shiny, bursting with love, good feelings tinted with  the purity of pristine whiteness. Dickens meets Never Never Land!!! Visually, this production is unsurpassable. Glowing white clouds, given unlimited nuances of whiteness by Michal Walton’s magical lighting effects , reflect the tinges of blue, green and red transformed by  Bretta Gerecke’s set and costumes, as living creatures come to life in white wigs and flit around the audience just before the play begins.

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Photo: Courtesy Suburban Beast and NAC’ Ottawa.

Concord Floral was inspired by an existing greenhouse in Vaughan (in the Toronto area ) that was demolished in 2012 but the rotting space somewhere in a mysterious field that emerges from Tanahill’s imagination becomes the site of an encounter among ten young people and their deep-seated obsessions. The actors for this production were all chosen from the Ottawa area. …

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Production shot from the toronto production of Jordan Tannahill’s  “Concord Floral “

Those of us long past our teenage years can only breathe a sigh of gratitude to aging after seeing Jordan Tannahill’s disquieting Concord Floral.

Dislocation, loneliness, confusion: these we remember about our younger selves. And while Tannahill and this gripping production depict those horrors of growing up with precision and sensitivity, the show also layers in a creeping sense of dread about contemporary teen life, a feeling that “something in the air has shifted” as one character puts it, that may seem foreign to the adolescent experience of many older audience members. …

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The NAC English Theatre Company has teamed up with The Old Trout Puppet Workshop for a visually stunning production of William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. The Old Trout Puppet Workshop hits it out of the park with the sets and masks, which director Jillian Kieley elegantly brings to life. It’s not a flawless production, or a version that gives Shakespeare’s elegant balance of comedy and melancholy its due respect, but it is fun and visually appealing.

Twelfth Night hardly needs much explaining, so let me be brief. Viola is separated from her brother Sebastian in a ship wreck. She washes up on the shoes of Illyria, cross-dresses as a eunuch named Cesario, and serves in the court of count Orisno, who is in love with a disinterested Olivia. Viola-as-Cesario is sent to woo Olivia, who falls madly in with her/him. Did I forget to mention that Viola is in love with Orsino? Or that there is a sub-plot between Olivia’s perpetually drunk cousin, Sir Tobey Belch, his drinking buddy Sir Andrew Aguecheek, and the servants?

The production is light, colourful, and fun. It’s described as directed by Keiley and imagined by the Old Trout Puppet Workshop. This is very clear throughout the production, as the wonderful aesthetics overwhelm the story. Much of the depth of Shakespeare’s text is sacrificed for the visuals and an over-reliance on farcical, physical comedy. The joke Sir Toby Belch and his group play on Malvolio is treated as just a bit of fun, so the blighted man’s anger and despair seem out of place.

Likewise, the decision to set the play in the late 17th century would have been more believable had the costuming been more consistent. A sailor’s very modern raincoat and hat seem out of place in a sea of stockings, embellished jackets, and wigs. Likewise the jester Feste’s white costume looks out of place in the 17th century, and too simple and colourless for the 16th. …

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Photo. Andrée Lanthier

Shakespeare has become material for all forms of experiments in countries around the world. Nowhere more so than in Quebec where he is constantly transformed, mutilated, reorganized and reworked, in most cases with much success. It is sufficient to say that Shakespeare’s material lends itself to multiple readings because the plays consist of so much richly textured material that they allow one to go beyond the limits of any one style , thus opening the doors to infinite readings. Jillian Keiley’s version of Twelfth Night, a collaborative effort with the Old Trout Puppet Theatre from Calgary makes a similar attempt.

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Photo Andrée Lanthier

Static it’s not. Life-sized cut-outs of Illyrian townspeople drift across the scene. Paintings in Duke Orsino’s palace spring to life. A couple of castle-topped hills, craggy faces etched into their steep sides, slip across the stage for a brief encounter.

In fact, this immensely imaginative and hilarious production of William Shakespeare’s romantic comedy Twelfth Night doesn’t even have an intermission. Instead — rare treat in our attention-deficit era! – we get to relish the play in one two-hour swoop.

You know the story, right? Siblings Viola and Sebastian are shipwrecked on the shores of Illyria. Disguising herself as a man (Cesario), Viola lands a job with Duke Orsino who’s smitten with unrequited love for the Countess Olivia. Cesario pleads Orsino’s case to Olivia who in turn falls for Cesario just as Viola has fallen for Orsino. There’s a bunch of other characters including Olivia’s dipsomaniacal uncle Sir Toby Belch, his space cadet pal Sir Andrew Aguecheek, and Olivia’s stuffy steward Malvolio. Disguise, misdirected affections and a lack of self-knowledge are the order of the day, with all coming right in the end.

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