“You have a brave heart and a beautiful soul and it can be clearly seen by anyone who bothers to look closely” is (loosely paraphrased) one of the last things Rebecca Northan said to her co-star at Tuesday’s performance of Blind Date at Tarragon Theatre. I don’t know if she says that every time- the […]
The Unit 102 Theatre at Queen and Dufferin is an interesting space. It is a black box theatre, with the audience on two sides meeting at the downstage right corner, which also functions as an entrance and exit for the actors. It’s small so it can make for a very intimate theatre experience. The main […]
It is best to see Lela & Co without knowledge of it beforehand—if you want to see worthwhile theatre then stop reading this and go see it, essentially. The reason you want to know less about it is that Cordelia Lynn’s script creates expectations from the outset and relentlessly reshapes them. Lela is a pitiful […]
It’s done- Bryan Fuller’s beautiful and haunting Hannibal. There’s been time to watch, rewatch, and rewatch again. There’s been time to reflect – to digest, if you will. (I’m not even going to pretend to be sorry about that. As far as I know, this is my last Hannibal review, and when will I next […]
Oh, Peter Hinton, where would the Shaw Festival be without you? Pygmalion is exactly the sort of “ugh, this again?” play that the festival has no realistic way of avoiding, but that’s why they need Peter Hinton. A rare director of grand ambition, a Peter Hinton production is never boring, never simple, never lazy. Even […]
This is literally the only badly executed play at the entire Shaw Festival this year. Do you know how impressive that is? Most ten-play seasons have a hit or two and maybe a handful more that are merely pleasant, then at least a few duds. But Light Up the Sky, that’s it this year for […]
There are two issues to address here. 1) The Shaw Festival’s production of Sweet Charity is pretty good. 2) Sweet Charity is a piece of illogical, misogynistic nonsense and, though it has a fun song or two, no smart and interesting company should be programming it over the hundreds of wonderful (both lesser-known and far-more-popular) […]
I understand the complaint; the formula is exhausting. A rag tag team- each with a complementary special ability- forms a makeshift family as they solve a new crime and/or crisis every week. At this point, said formula fills up the vast majority of network primetime programming. I usually ignore the entire slate of these shows, […]