Review: (Toronto) Cabaret

(photo: Seanna Kennedy)

Kander and Ebb classic is a wilkommen addition to the LOT’s repertoire.
Occasionally misplaced excess won’t spoil your evening at this Cabaret.
by Christian Baines

Full disclosure before we begin. I really can’t overstate my personal affection for Cabaret, which has been my favourite musical for almost as long as I’ve loved the form. Kander and Ebb’s songs are timeless, Christopher Isherwood’s unforgettable characters engage us immediately, and the plot’s modular structure (based as it is on a collection of short stories) allows plenty of room for a unique take on it every time. 

Those qualities have secured Cabaret an enduring popularity with young audiences fascinated by Isherwood’s Berlin. If the energy of this production at Lower Ossington Theatre (LOT) is any indication, Cabaret has many more long and happy years ahead of it.

Review: (Toronto) Cabaret

Michael-David Blostein (Photo credit: Daniel DiMarco)

The Storm is Now

Cabaret proves it is current

by Stuart Munro

Show girls. Authors. Gender bending. Nazis. All part of the territory in Kander and Ebb’s classic piece, Cabaret, which opened Friday night at the University of Toronto’s Hart House Theatre.

Set in the golden days of the Weimar Republic right before the Nazi’s rise to power, Cabaret tells the story of Clifford Bradshaw (played by Keenan Viau), an American author come to Berlin to find inspiration for his novel; and Sally Bowles (played by Courtney Lamanna), the star of Berlin’s infamous Kit Kat Klub.