Belarus Free Theatre can claim that not only is it underground in form but also in substance. What it discusses in its plays is subversive: it challenges basic principles that constitute modern society. Of course, the substance of the underground exists on a spectrum, all the way from Dostoevsky to VICE magazine. After seeing four […]
Banana Boys (Factory Theatre) I’m loving the Naked season at Factory. The text-centric, stripped down approach the company is taking to all the pieces in their so-far-so-good fall seasonette is spotlighting great performances, inspiring directorial creativity and refusing to let great texts get overshadowed by trappings. Banana Boys is the perfect example of what’s so […]
Not since 1605 has Guy Fawkes night brought the British government so close to destruction than on this past November 5.* Parliament was dissolved. The monarchy was threatened. The United Kingdom lay on the verge of total collapse. At least, that is the reality that played out on the Music Box Theatre stage in Mike […]
Written and performed by Sarah Thorpe, Heretic is a modern retelling of the story of Joan of Arc. Currently at the Theatre Passe-Muraille Backspace, this Soup Can Theatre production is a remount of an earlier version that Thorpe helped to produce last spring. In the programme, Thorpe tells us that the show was inspired […]
There’s something really special happening at the Theatre Centre right now. Actually, there are two (soon to be three) special things happening at the Theatre Centre right now. They are the productions that make up Why Not Theatre’s latest theatrical experiment and I can’t say enough about them, or it. The November Ticket is […]
Edmond (The Storefront Arts Initiative) In David Mamet’s bleak one-act Edmond, nearly every actor plays multiple roles. Director Benjamin Blais has his large, diverse cast nearly omnipresent and in perpetual motion, creating a swirling, oppressive crowd through which Tim Walker’s frantic Edmond has to constantly fight to make his way to each of the 23 […]
The Immigrant (Harold Green Jewish Theatre Company) You know Mark Harelik, or at least you know his face. He has a recurring role on The Big Bang Theory; he was Topanga’s dad on Boy Meets World; he’s in an episode of Breaking Bad! The reason Mark Harelik is here to be a familiar face in […]
The Screenwriter’s Daughter is a compelling piece of theatre: a humorous, entertaining and historically enlightening new play currently showing at the Leicester Square Theatre. It revolves around the later life of Ben Hecht, a relatively unknown yet prolific and successful screenwriter during Hollywood’s Golden Age, and his increasingly tearaway daughter, Jenny, a counter-cultural revolutionary and […]