Video of the Week, March 19, 2014

Pacific Theatre gets all spooky with this marvellous trailer for The Seafarer.

(Read our review)

After Dark, March 18, 2014

Our Transgressions

Where our performing arts get it wrong

by Gaëtan L. Charlebois

As I am falling asleep, I like to play little games with my memory. One of my favourites is trying to remember the time and place I learned certain words. For instance, I learned the word "assassination" the afternoon JFK was killed. I got home from school to discover my stricken mother in front of the TV (which would stay on for three days solid) and asked her what that word - used over and over again on the tube - meant. Another word, "tautology", was shared with me by a young coworker - one of those admirable people who don't just devour books but keeps a dictionary nearby to look up every word they don't understand. 

I always knew "transgression" (I was raised Catholic, after all) but "transgressive" and its application to art was during an interview I was doing with an art critic at Village Voice, C. Carr, who was explaining the burgeoning phenomenon of performance art. Our wondrous talk was a little all over the place - as there was (and never would be) a true definition of performance art.  But she did suggest that one of its hallmarks was that it was transgressive. I guessed the meaning of the word but added, "Like Andres Serrano's Piss Christ?" She explained, yes, that's what she meant. (But she also explained - and this few knew - that Serrano was a devout believer and that Piss Christ was simply a thematic which rose from Christ the Redeemer - His blood and ostensibly all other bodily fluids were forms of salvation.)

The Question... Ariel Ifergan on Le Dernier jour du condamné

Death and The Privilege of Writing

by Estelle Rosen

Since 1999, Ariel Ifergan has performed in 15 Montreal productions including Pièce d'identité, Dossier Prométhée, Montréal la blanche. From 2007 to 2011, Ariel Ifergan produced Z comme Zadig, an adaptation of Zadig de Voltaire, co-written with director Anne Millaire in which he played all characters. M Ifergan was also involved in the touring production of Devinez-qui, les dix petit nègres, directed by Michèle Deslauriers. In 2013 he directed L'Augmentation de Georges Perec at Segal Centre. Young peoples theatre plays an important part in his career.  

CHARPO: Victor Hugo's novel Le Dernier Jour d'un Condamné (The Last Day of a Condemned Man) is about the thoughts, feelings, and fear of a man awaiting execution with a sub-text about abolishing capital punishment. How do you prepare for a complex role like this?

IFERGAN:  Victor Hugo wrote this story at the age of 27. This production was also an occasion for me to rediscover this master of French language; to take a look at Hugo's impressive biography and bibliography. He died at 85 and probably wrote every day of his life... and had an important political implication.

Sunday Feature: I Can Dream Theatre Group

Dream It. Live It.
by Merrill Matthews (Social Media Manager/ Promotions, Committee member, I Can Dream Theatre Group)

Founded by three educators Ada Masciarelli, Michele Matthews and Tricia Bartley, the I Can Dream Theatre Group is a community based organization that gives young adults with special needs the opportunity to develop their talents in the area of the performing arts. At the same time promoting commitment, responsibility, self-confidence and friendships in order to enrich the lives of the individuals involved. Ada, Michele and Trish have over 70 years combined experience working with individuals with special needs. 

"If you can dream it, you can live it!"

This has now become the official motto for the I Can Dream Theatre Group, an English language performing arts group for special needs adults. With over six productions under their collective belt (and a new one underway), their shows are a mix of pop culture fun, original dialogue, some fancy footwork and powerful singing the likes of which you have never heard before. On April 26th, 2014, the group will be performing  'unplugged & ONE NIGHT ONLY' music showcase show that will highlight songs from past productions, as well as some new songs. And on November 14 and 15, 2014  the group will be performing their latest production entitled Hannibal The Musical (yes, we're taking about that Hannibal, as in Hannibal Lecter) at the Oscar Peterson Hall at Concordia University.

Review: (Toronto / Theatre) Blackbird

Direction is in the Details
Blackbird goes Missing
by Jason Booker

An edgy two-hander from the turn of the century, Adam Rapp’s Blackbird explores the humanity that leads Froggy and Baylis – a pair of almost anonymous lovers – to their heroine addictions and questions where should they go next, this snowy Christmas Eve. At least, that’s what Rapp intended it to do. In this staging at Hub 14, a tiny downtown indie space where all those bodies lead to a very warm room, the play doesn’t quite work.

Yes, the two actors, Alona Metzer (Froggy) and Eric Regimbald (Baylis), have to take some credit for the failure for this play to connect to its opening night audience, especially as the two of them confess to being the show’s producers as well, making this another vanity project. The pair do an acceptable job portraying these gritty roles but it isn’t enough.

So what’s my problem this time? The direction.

Review: (Kingston) A Beautiful View

A Beautiful Play

by Will Britton

(Republished in collaborating with Kingston Theatre Reviews

It is through the partnership of Theatre Kingston and Volcano Theatre that A Beautiful View, Daniel MacIvor’s play about another partnership, is currently playing in the Baby Grand Studio.  Two women appear on stage and tell the story of their relationship.  Sound simple?  Of course it does.  But of course it’s not.

As is typical of MacIvor’s work, A Beautiful View is far from a neatly packaged, linear and straightforward night at the theatre.  In this case, though, such is entirely suitable because the same can be said of the nature of self-identity, friendship, and love as explored in the piece.  Just like any meaningful relationship, the play demands a level of commitment – a combination of effort and perseverance to see it through to its end.  For it’s only at the end that the various elements of the narrative come full circle and truly make sense.  For those who manage to navigate the entire journey of the two performers, it is a beautiful and touching experience.  The risk, however, is that there will, no doubt, also be some audience members who find themselves left behind, with more questions than answers – quite possibly appreciating the artistic merit of the production, but not fully understanding it.  Kind of like a box of light.

The Abominable Showman, March 15, 2014

The ensemble cast of Glengarry Glen Ross at Montreal’s Segal Theatre (L to R):  Tristan D. Lalla, Mike Paterson, Brett Watson, Daniel Lillford, R.H. Thomson, Michel Perron and Graham Cuthbertson

Photo credit:  Photo by Richard Burnett

Down but not Out 

CharPo asks the ensemble cast of the Segal Theatre’s new production of Glengarry Glen Ross – a play about desperate salesmen trying to make a living – what they did when their own careers were in the toilet …

by Richard Burnett 

@bugsburnett

Theatre lovers the world over are familiar with David Mamet’s classic 1983 play Glengarry Glen Ross, which won the 1984 Pulitzer Prize and the New York Drama Critics Circle Award in 1984. The hit play was then turned into the 1992 cult film starring Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Alec Baldwin and Alan Arkin.

Glengarry Glen Ross was also last performed in Montreal at the Centaur Theatre in 1986. So the play’s limited-engagement run at the Segal Theatre is welcome, and its cast of seasoned actors shared a few war stories of their own when this week I asked them all what they did when their own careers were also in the toilet. 

Brett Watson, who plays Richard Roma: “When I started out some 20 years ago I auditioned for a role in a film. I’d heard the director was a big reality guy and the character I was audtioning for was supposed to be drinking from a bottle of white wine. I was so desperate to get the part, I thought I’d be bold and do the morning audition with a real bottle of wine. Just to be different. But I had to do the scene over and over. After 15 minutes I had finished the bottle of  wine and left absolutely tanked. I didn’t get the part, but I got a hangover at two in the afternoon.”

Mike Paterson, who plays James Lingk: “I was living with two comedians who didn’t pay their rent or the gas bill. They left and here I was in the huge 7 ½ trying to pay rent. I had to boil all of my baths and I had no money to eat. But one thing I had was a little bit of margarine, ketchup and mustard. So I went to the store with $1.15 and bought a jumbo loaf of white bread and made my first ever ketchup and mustard sandwich. That was my staple for a long time. It was rough, but at the same time it was wonderful because it builds character.”