Review: (Ottawa) Morro and Jasp do Puberty (Undercurrents)

(photo by Jim Moore)

Awkward as An Art Form
by Jim Murchison 

The best clowns take a recognizable weakness in the human condition and expose it in a way that makes us laugh and illuminates something of the common human spirit.  What better common experience than puberty is there? We have all been through it and if you haven't, get permission from your parents before you read the review.

The key elements of the set are not surprisingly the toilet, the bedroom and the telephone; all things of extreme import for the evolving adolescent. Heather Marie Annis and Amy Lee as clown sisters  Morro and Jasp respectively play all the moments of angst and discovery with comic zeal. Weaved into the mix are quiet secrets whispered to the audience, love fantasies and discoveries about feminine hygiene products set to the epic music of Richard Strauss.

Review: (Ottawa) A Quiet Sip of Coffee

(photo by Lily Jamali)

A Loud Mosaic
by Jim Murchison

The concept behind A Quiet Sip of Coffee is intriguing right from the get go.Theatre graduates and best friends, Anthony and Nathan, one Gay and one straight write a prank letter to a fundamentalist organization dedicated to reformation of Gay men. They are looking for funding of their play Never Cry Wolfman, a play that examines the monster within. Surprisingly, they get a favourable response provided that they agree to go through some Gay reversal therapy. The problem is they never actually wrote a play but they need the funding, so they accept.

Review: (Ottawa) The Tashme Project - the Living Archives

This Is the Unfolding of Life
by Robyn Lester
@RobynRobinRob

The Tashme Project: The Living Archives created by Julie Tamiko Manning and Matt Miwa is a play that demonstrates the true beauty of storytelling and the transformative power of memory.

Through the verbatim re-tellings of true stories, this play opens our eyes to the realities of the 2nd generation Japanese-Canadians (Nisei) who were interned during WWII as children. Through their memories of that experience, and the hardships they continued to face after the internment, we are given a living history lesson. One that is all too often overlooked.

Review: (Ottawa) Ciseaux (Undercurrents)

Two Lives Entwined
Some people are forever bound together…for better, or for worse
by Robyn Lester
@RobinRobynRob

There are some heavy themes at work in Lisa L’Heureux’s Ciseaux. Political upheaval, child soldiers, even sex trafficking. It’s all there, playing out before our very eyes, forcing us to consider the realities of our world.

Ciseaux follows two young girls, Phanie and Olivia. When we first meet these characters they are eight years old. Phanie is loud and abrasive. A bully. Olivia is quiet and timid. An easy target for Phanie. But every action has a consequence, and it just so happens that the choices they each make affect the other in unimaginable ways. And with that we are pulled from the comfort of the classroom and thrown into a world of war and child soldiers. 

Review: (Ottawa) Rider Girl (Undercurrents)

Game On (Life as Sport)
by Jim Murchison

Rider Girl is a play that works as a play and a pep rally all the while drawing analogies to the game of life. I can only imagine how it plays in Saskatchewan. Don’t get me wrong, the Ottawa audience was thoroughly entertained by creator/performer Colleen Sutton but a rabid CFL fan that had never seen a play in their life would be equally drawn to this piece that succeeds on two levels.

Sutton’s infectious enthusiasm pulls the audience in to the game, but it is the parallel that she draws to life’s four quarters and the flags that fall on the field of life because of financial and emotional pitfalls, that will cast the spell on the avid theatre goer. It is incredible how people get so ecstatic or crestfallen over the triumphs and disasters of their team and yet play tight defence on their personal problems when they should be calling on help from the team.

Review: (Ottawa) Broken (Undercurrents)

Remembering A Life

by Jim Murchison

Brian Fidler plays Will. A small box of his late grandfather's things is the foundation of memories of a wonderful man whose mind has eroded by the onset of Alzheimers. How does a boy handle the frustration, fear and anger of someone he loves who is losing his cognitive function? When does he first realize that he's not just being crabby but is actually losing who he is?

Review: (Ottawa) Little Illiad

Piecing Together Performance

Part man, part machine, wholly entertaining.

by Keely Kwok

I love an empty stage. Right before the show, you’ve taken your seat, the house lights are still on, you observe the space before you and imagine what sort of story you are about to witness. So needless to say it threw me off when I walked into the performance space of Little Iliad and creator/actor Evan Webber was tinkering away on stage. But then again, I’m usually not asked to wear headphones during a performance either. 

After putting our headphones on, Webber gives a polite smile and tests his mic to make sure we can all hear him. “And with that,” he says, “let the play begin.” 

And it really did. 

Review: (Ottawa) Hip-Hop Shakespeare (undercurrents)

Gangsta Shakes

Bringing the Bard to life through modern music styles

Valerie Cardinal

@vscardinal

David Benedict Brown and Melanie Karin don’t look like your typical rappers. Brown is bald and wears a lime green headband, while Karin is a short white girl. But through Hip-Hop Shakespeare, both show that they can hold their own with the rhythmic musical style. 

Review: (Ottawa) The Public Servant (undercurrents)

Toronto's Gift to the Capital
by Jim Murchison 
@JimMurchison

Toronto's Theatre Columbus has brought a production tailor-made for Ottawa. It is about Federal Public Servants. It would merely need to be good to be popular, but The Public Servant is far, far more than that. As well as being relatable to everyone that has ever worked in a government office environment at any level, it is satirical without losing honesty or insight.

Review: (Ottawa) Ladies of the Lake (undercurrents)

Too Many Concepts, Too Little Time

Ladies of the Lake drowns under its own weight

Valerie Cardinal

@vscardinal

Ladies of the Lake is a re-imagining of an Arthurian legend, developed by Skeleton Key Theatre during their time as GCTC’s company-in-residence from 2011 to 2012. Vivienne, a girl lost in her nightmares, inexplicably finds herself on the edge of a lake, between the odd man who saves her from drowning and the woman trapped on the bottom of the lake. 

Review: (Ottawa) Skin (undercurrents)

Smaller is Sometimes Better
by Jim Murchison 
@JimMurchison

The Undercurrents Festival which launched at GCTC last evening is designed to give voice to the brighter, edgier work of some of the smaller, cooperative less mainstream companies. Each play has been developed or created by at least two people and Skin which was the first play I saw, was written by 10 people. Interestingly, Skin is the only one of the seven pieces that describes itself as being written. The other plays merely refer to themselves as created. I suspect that is because when you have  ten minds improvising and developing a new work you have to write it down or you'll derail.

Skin is an amoebic piece about what alienates women from their lives. The form is ever shifting and keeps the audience guessing about where it is going next. I’m not sure if this is intended to be an analogy of how we shed and regenerate our skin throughout our lifetime, but that is what I read into it. 


The premise is based upon the maritime folk tale of the Selkie. A Selkie is a seal that comes to land, takes off its skin to reveal a beautiful woman who generally frolics on the land for a bit before putting her skin back on and returning to the sea. If one of these Selkies were to fall in love and live on the land, how long would it take before the homesickness for the sea and the dryness would compel them to return?  

Martha Ross has directed a piece that incorporates live instruments which those that have read me before know is always my preference where possible. A harp is played with a bow like a cello. Human voices and reedless recorders provide wind effects. The harp and fiddle are also played in the more traditional manner. The only male in the production, Nick Carpenter, accompanies on piano, for the most part in a thick white wig that looks like Beethoven having a bad hair day. It is also wonderful to hear the powerful operatic voice of Doreen Taylor-Claxton in such an intimate space. One really gets an idea of the power and beauty of the music at such close range. 

It would be impossible to give away the plot of Skin as it is more thematic than plot driven. Although the company, Deluxe Hot Sauce, is dedicated to telling stories about the complexities of women, the concept of stagnating or drying up and needing to go on is a theme that both genders can relate to.  The cast is uniformly strong, but I particularly related to the strength and vulnerability of Sarah Finn in a number of roles. I did get the sense that the play, if mounted again, will continue to evolve in much the way we all do as we grow into our skin.

Skin is at undercurrents to February 16