Toronto is one of the greatest theatrical cities in the world and this winter I’ve seen a smattering of productions that prove that across style, medium, budget, and venue. Here’s a sampling of some of the standout eclectic work from recent weeks: The Student Show: A friend of mine invited me this past weekend to York […]
Before we announce the winners of the 2012 My Theatre Awards, we’re proud to present our annual Nominee Interview Series. The delightful star of The Stratford Festival’s two big musicals of 2012, Amy Wallis turned in memorable performances as both Sally Brown (Charlie’s precocious sister) and Mabel, the feisty soprano of Gilbert & Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance. One […]
The Canadian Opera Company had an interesting fall with two repertory productions that had little in common beyond being of about the same quality. Both Il Trovatore and Die Fledermaus had the stunning design work and professional overall calibre that is to be expected from the COC, but they were both about average when it […]
Two weeks after the PQ was elected as Quebec’s minority government- causing concern of renewed interest in nationalist policies- the time could not be more right for a project fusing our country’s strong English playwriting tradition with the electroacoustic music Quebec is renowned for. Montreal-based composer Louis Dufort and Toronto-based writer Tom Walmsley were both […]
I haven’t seen the full season of Stratford Festival fare yet but The Pirates of Penzance is one of very few things so far that’s thrilled me. I loved it. I went in fond of but aware of the flaws in Gilbert & Sullivan’s work, and specifically the technical insanity of trying to stage Pirates. […]
When Leonard Bernstein’s one-act opera about a crumbling marriage in the 1950s suburbs premiered in 1952, I imagine it was pretty subversive and revealing. The idea of something so flawed yet so seemingly perfect is a fascinating, dark and specifically suburban concept that would have played as insightful and daring back when the suburbs were […]
This has been a bit of a rough repertory period for the Canadian Opera Company- the full-length Offenbach they presented earlier this month was obnoxiously long and unforgivably dull and their double feature of Zemlinksy & Puccini one-acts contains one dreary dud and one brilliant success (the Puccini, predictably). With only 52 minutes of greatness […]
If you were to do a search of the most commonly used phrases on this website, one of the top hits would undoubtedly be “mixed bag”. I use the term constantly, mostly because I insist that a review include at least one criticism and one compliment for every production. But, really, most things lean to […]