The War of 1812: video cabaret that spares no one.
Photo. Michael Cooper.
Gasbags, drunks, popinjays and cowards: that pretty much describes the leaders, political and military, who cooked up and commanded — if you’ll excuse the term — The War of 1812 according to this deeply cynical, intensely theatrical and ultimately enervating show. Writer/director Michael Hollingsworth spares no one in his recounting of the war that’s commonly said to have defined Canada.
United States president James Madison is addle-brained, Isaac Brock, the hero of Queenston Heights, an elitist fop, the common foot soldier a blithering idiot.
Only Tecumseh, chief of the Shawnee and ally of the British, is worth his own salt, his quotations from Hamlet a signal that he understands war’s place in the continuum of human tragedy (or is that the continuum of stupidity?). In this instance, that tragedy included the ravaging of First Nations people that followed this war, one which left the borders between the United States and British Canada exactly where they were before the fighting began.
The War of 1812 is part of Hollingsworth’s larger cycle The History of the Village of the Small Huts, a satirical retelling of Canada’s history. In this play, the story is told in rapid-fire, pop-up vignettes sandwiched between short blackouts.
Eight actors – lit from the waist up in a portable black box theatre — appear in white face, brilliant costumes and big wigs as they play over 55 characters. The effect is at first startling, but you soon accept the outlandish physical exaggerations just as you accept the outlandish narrative……..
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