Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (The Musical)
Book by Stephan Elliott and Allan Scott
Musical arrangements and orchestrations by Stephen ‘Spud’ Murphy
Developed for the stage by Simon Phillips
Based on the movie The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
TotoToo Theatre
Directed by Michael Gareau

In a way, Priscilla: Queen Of The Desert revels in its own ramshackle, cheeky improbability. That’s what made it so endearing back in 1994 when it lumbered onto cinema screens as a delightful road movie. …

Read More Read More

Toto Too never  stops outdoing itself  and this ultra-energized performance under the direction of Michael Gareau proves it once again. It all  glows and glitters with the marvelous costumes of the  drag Queen world,  (created by designer Lu-Anne Connell ), the stunning  singing voices , the  excellent acting  and Paddy Allen McCarthy’s all-encompassing choreography,  take over  the original  music and lyrics that transgress  the established codes of  the musical world.  Priscilla, Queen of the Desert is a brilliant monument to a shifting world where every human individual is given a space of one’s own.   …

Read More Read More

Photo: Courtesy of Allan Mackey.

The cheerful, uninhibited ribaldry of Avenue Q may well jolt some theatregoers. But they’re more likely to be disarmed by this essentially sweet-natured musical satire about life in a run-down apartment building on the wrong side of the tracks.

Ottawa’s Toto Too Theatre’s new production is a triumph — and a notable one. After all, this enterprising local company could have stumbled badly when it decided to tackle this long-running but challenging Broadway hit.

The show’s creators — Robert Lopez, Jeff Marx and Jeff Whitty — have created an infectious combination of witty word-play and toe-tapping music. They have stocked their comic playground with a collection of engaging and generally endearing neighbourhood types. But we’re also getting a mischievous, albeit affectionate, send-up of Sesame Street here, along with some R-rated moments that are clearly not intended for the moppet brigade. That means that puppets — and, more specifically their effective use on stage — are integral to the success of any production of Avenue Q. Without effective puppetry, the material falls flat.

…

Read More Read More

Photo: Courtesy of Allan Mackey.

Inspired by the TV show Sesame street, the award winning team of Robert Lopez, Jeff Marx and Jeff Whitty has created a witty, satirical and joyous celebration of difference, with music, puppets, singing and dancing, that all fit together under the extremely skilful direction of Michael Gareau. Toto Too’s first rate production of Avenue Q created a wave of excitement and laughter in the theatre that I have not seen in years.

The set by Sally McIntyre, was a closed New York neighbourhood, Avenue Q, made up of individuals who are black and white, yellow and blue, Japanese and Jewish, recent immigrants and less recent immigrants, puppets and humans, young and old, poor and less poor, gay and straight, monsters and non-monsters, the scale of diversity is non ending but the parody lay in the authors’ attempts to unite this community of differences in a great bond of human sympathy by subverting all the stereotypes, ridiculing taboos, saying what people think but don’t dare say, and creating a human landscape of total liberation that is absolutely wondrous. After the show you feel you have just experienced a breakthrough session of collective psychotherapy that has actually worked.

Of course it’s an adult show and in this context it transgresses the biggest taboo of adult life: sex, turning the subject into great explosions of fun, gales of laughter and by dealing with such things in such an open and unembarrassed way. Everything becomes “normalized”.  How exotic! 

…

Read More Read More

Raunchy, subversive, funny as all get-out, Avenue Q by Robert Lopez, Jeff Marx and Jeff Whitty is a gem of contemporary musical theatre, one that takes the iconic children’s television show Sesame Street and turns it on its head with sex, obscenities and the very realistic notions that life frequently sucks, that none of us is really all that special, and that while the dispossessed might band together they will, for the most part, remain dispossessed.

TotoToo takes all this and wraps it into one excellent production. An ensemble piece, the show nails pretty much everything from voices and puppetry to Aileen Szkwarek’s well-oiled choreography and the live musical accompaniment directed by John McGovern . Artistic director Michael Gareau keeps the show moving at the requisite smartly staged clip while inspiring all the performers to have so much fun that the audience is swept along by the same joyous spirit.

Of particular note among performers: the wonderfully expressive Pascal Viens (Rod) who is making his debut in musical theatre, Alianne Rozon whose Kate Monster is a lonely lady to whom we can all relate, and Andrew Galligan as Princeton, a character in search of self-authorship. 

The Kailish Mital Theatre’s sound system is lacking, and distortion at the show we attended occasionally made lyrics impossible to understand. It was a small price to pay for a crackerjack show.