A tricky farce falls flat in Stratford's production
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:00PMIt’s no great surprise that Soulpepper’s production of Twelve Angry Men should turn out to be a spellbinder, not to say a humdinger
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMThe actual Dora nominations seem remarkably classy this year, which I suppose is a critic’s way of saying that nestled among the possible winners are most of those who were actual winners …
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMThe Shaw Festival’s second round of openings pairs two classic comedies from the very late 1930s: one British, one American
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 03:14PMA program note suggests that the musical (vintage 1966) is a throwback to the idealistic Rodgers and Hammerstein shows of the 1950s. Not really, unless you’re thinking of R&H at their …
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:30PMBertolt Brecht famously believed theatre audiences should never be allowed to forget they are in the theatre
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:00PMChris Abraham’s Stratford production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream is an extraordinary mixture of magic and mishap
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMThere was a beautiful musical on Broadway this season: a show gorgeously scored, cleverly staged, profoundly well acted, and honestly moving
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 10:54AMColm Feore’s King Lear is a fine portrait of a father, a less powerful one of a king
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:21PMThe Stratford Festival’s King John is a very good production of a play about a very bad king
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMOnce thought too painful to perform, Shakespeare’s merciless & kingly tale calls out the best in those who present it, which this year seems to be everyone
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 03:40PMThe fancy name Watching Glory Die has been affixed to a decidedly plain play
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMThe Shaw Festival’s Cabaret proves, again, that there will never be a production of this musical as good as the first one. History — including theatrical history — is against it
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMFiona Reid can divide a comic line into three parts, get a laugh on each without crowding the others, and still keep the sense and the rhythm unbroken
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 03:04PMOf Human Bondage is adapted by Vern Thiessen from the 1915 novel by Somerset Maugham, a book generally accepted as being partly autobiographical
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:00PMPlays about God move in mysterious, not to say frustrating, ways. Two of them are currently playing in Toronto
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 01:00PMYann Martel’s Beatrice and Virgil is a novel with, effectively, two characters
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMTwo plays have now opened in Toronto in rapid succession in which a character’s stubbing a toe turns out to be a defining moment
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:00PMErin Shields’ Soliciting Temptation is full of surprises. It unfolds in a series of narrative and character reversals. That makes it compelling. It doesn’t make it believable
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 08:00AMIf you suspect the title Cock of having anatomical significance, your suspicions are justified. It also has metaphorical significance
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 04:33PMIrishmen are possessed by an overwhelming passion to sing like their idols. So, at least, Irish drama would have us believe
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMChekhov’s The Seagull famously flopped at its first production, and though there seem to have been purely local and technical reasons for this, the fundamental cause was that neither actor…
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 11:13AMMusically, this is the strongest Second City show I remember, running to a duet for a hit-man (the straight-arrow Thompson) and his neglected wife, sung through Andrew Lloyd Webber style, lu…
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AMLungs, a 2012 British play by Duncan Macmillan, is a terrific evening
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 04:13PMIt’s all duologues at the Tarragon. In the Extra Space, there’s the all-talking Lungs; on the main stage the all-singing, and sometimes-dancing, Marry Me a Little, which is a sort of Ste…
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 10:00AMThe grandiose title The Two Worlds of Charlie F. conceals a fairly simple production. It’s a drama-documentary that grew from a rehab-come-therapy project in the U.K. for veteran soldiers
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:00PMAnita Majumdar’s new piece Same Same But Different consists of two thematically linked one-act plays, which may be a sly reason for that perplexing title. It also makes for a long evening
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 08:00AMThe plays are Twelfth Night and Richard III, and the productions have been imported from Shakespeare’s Globe in London.
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 06:23PMAlbert Schultz, director of Idiot’s Delight, has described this 1936 American play as The Time of Your Life meets You Can’t Take It with You. To me it feels more like the meeting of The …
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:00PMInherently and inescapably, theatre is artificial, and never more so than when it tries its hardest to be real. These paradoxes are exhibited, explored and exalted in London Road, a fascinat…
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 02:00PMRobert Cushman: There is a particular kind of acting that I constantly find myself railing against but for which I have yet to find a satisfactory name. Maybe I should call it explanatory ac…
SOURCE: National Post (Canada) at 09:00AM
