This was the first episode of The Handmaid’s Tale that throughout felt like… a TV show. A really good TV show, mind, but a show that relies on the normal mechanisms of plot and awe to carry viewers from one week to the next. Which isn’t all bad. If every week was like “Late,” I’m […]
I’m gaslighting myself in going to the big shows. Shows that scream, shows that flash, shows that flail their banality around like spaghetti and people clap. They clap! They clap. Why review? It’s hard to be in a room with 890 people who probably disagree with you. I wasn’t in love with Angels; I don’t […]
The lights go down, the famous crashing motif begins and the curtain immediately flies up to reveal the chapel of a massive Roman church, into which an escaped prisoner appears, searching for refuge. Giacomo Puccini’s famously sensational work cuts through all the introductory formality (no overture!) and instead plunges us straight into the drama, sparing […]
The final offering of the Canadian Stage Spotlight Festival: Australia was The Return by Circa, a genre-defying combination of cirque and opera. The stage is shared equally between the circus artists and the live chamber ensemble, with the former occupying stage right, and the latter stage left. An imposing black wall spans the width of […]
Two Birds One Stone “Some of this is true and some of it is not” Natasha Greenblatt says to openTwo Birds One Stone, which premiered as part of the Why Not Theatre’s Riser Project, Thursday night. But co-star and creator Rimah Jabr, disagrees. It’s all true, she tells us. What unfolds is an aptly named […]
My second viewing party of The Handmaid’s Tale was, if anything, more horrifying than the first. It was also, inexplicably, more hopeful. This week, we’ll take ourselves episode by episode, so I can focus more on the individual episode’s brilliance and plot development than on the (still terrifying, still awful) political resonance. But fine one […]
Developed and collectively dramaturged by Public Recordings- a theatrical dance company with a distinctively eclectic aesthetic- Evan Webber’s alternative gospel narrative is a little bit biblical adaptation, a little bit dystopian allegory, and a little bit sacrilegious fan fiction. Long-haired and tunic-clad, Ishan Davé repeatedly declares “I am Jesus” and we combine the evidence before […]
It was an Event. Jez Butterworth is The Playwright. An Architect. Racy and gnomic. Not a priori great—David Hare was The Playwright and he’s made no great work since Skylight. But look at any recommendations of the century’s best plays: Jerusalem ranks one. Since 2009 Butterworth’s done minor work, like The River, and disconcertingly/reassuringly added […]