Tom and Erica It all starts in the darkness, a tiny stage in front of you and the shuffling of a restless audience waiting for the comedian to come on stage. The Toronto Sketch Festival was created 10 years ago with a clear mission: to make Toronto a funnier place to be. As part of […]
When the curtain rises, the stage is a blur of muted greys, of bland beiges. Bodies trundle to and fro with shuffling urgency to a discordant jumble of notes – the soundtrack as dissonant and buzzing as the crowd itself. The monotony of city life and the stark existence of the working class person’s crushing […]
The third story in A Series of Unfortunate Events is “The Wide Window” and it’s…fine. It is good at points, but never achieves any greatness. The pacing problems from “The Reptile Room” continued, and got worse. *Spoilers ahead* Overall, I liked “The Wide Window”, but I liked it less than “The Reptile Room”, which I […]
Anton Piatigorsky’s Breath in Between is playing in Crow’s Theatre’s brand new studio space until the end of the week but I’m still trying to figure out how it got there in the first place. Crow’s Artistic Director Chris Abraham is someone I associate, above all, with good taste. His own productions are always impeccably […]
For the past four years, I’ve been ranking every film I see- just the new releases, from January 1st to December 31st. The rankings are subjective, based entirely on how much I enjoyed and/or connected with or appreciated the film rather than on some sort of objective artistic criteria. Basically, this is a list of […]
I got far too hyped discussing the last big Hamlet and, worst of all, it ended up not being that big—Cumberbatch was competent, but the production didn’t generate discussion beyond theatre demography and the post-show ‘fuck the politicians’ appeal. This one, in the Almeida’s tight proscenium, is far larger, in thought rather than aspect, and […]
Virtual reality is one of those things that most of us are aware of, but for many (me included), its uses don’t appear to extend much beyond teenage boys wearing a headset and playing the latest video game. In Lindsey Ferrentino’s new play, the technology is presented as an antidote to physical pain, specifically the […]
With a rock opera-esque musical, you usually know the kind of thing you’re going to get: a focus on song over story, a tendency for melodrama over subtlety and a production design which more resembles a rock concert than a traditional stage; these quirks can succeed if the songs and performances are strong. Lizzie adheres […]