Tag Archives: soulpepper

A couple more interesting things this week

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I’ve only just found out about a couple of events this week that may be of interest.

Soulpepper has a free showing of Ingmar Bergman’s 1957 masterpiece The Seventh Seal.  It’s on Wednesday, November 12th at 7pm and it’s free.  If you have seen The Comeuppance and the movie you’ll get the connection!  If you haven’t seen the movie I would say it’s one of the most important post war films.  It has a fantastic performance by Max von Sydow as a world weary crusader and an equally fine one by Bengt Kerot as Death.  The cinematography, by Gunnar Fischer is exceptional.  No gimmicks.  No special effects.  Just a very beautiful and moving film.

Then on Sunday November 16th at 7.30pm at Arrayspace Lindsay McIntyre is performing and producing Morton Feldman’s Three Voices in which the live singer works with two pre-recorded vocal tracks.  It’s a most interesting hour long piece.  I recently reviewed a recording of it by Dory Hayley for La Scena Musicale.  Tickets for that are “at the door” or here.

The Comeuppance comes up a bit short

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Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ The Comeuppance is playing at Soulpepper in a production directed by Frank Cox-O’Connell.  It’s an enormously ambitious play.  It takes the relatively banal setting of a pre-party for a high school 20th reunion and uses it to explore a wide range of issues concerning memory, personal growth (or not), what we keep and what we leave behind and, ultimately, our relationship with Death.

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Coming up in November

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Here’s what’s coming up next month as best I know.

  • Canadian Stage’s presentation of Robert Lepage’s The Far Side of the Moon opens at the Bluma Appel Theatre on November 1st and runs until the 16th.
  • In the RBA lunchtime series we have the Wirth Vocal Prize winner in recital on the 6th
  • Branden Jacob-Jenkins’ The Comeuppance is playing at Soulpepper.  Previews are October 30th to November 5th with opening night on the 6th and the run continuing to November 23rd.

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The Welkin is compelling theatre that transcends time and place

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Lucy Kirkwood’s The Welkin is a rarity.  It’s a serious play with an overwhelmingly female ensemble cast that looks at issues of class, gender, power and authority almost entirely through a female lens.  It’s hard hitting, sometimes violent and often shocking which makes for compelling theatre.  It opened on Thursday evening in the Baillie Theatre at Soulpepper in a co-pro by Soulpepper, Crow’s and the Howland Company, directed by Weyni Mengesha.

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Falling into September

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Life slowly returns to some version of normal.. Here’s what I’m seeing so far for Sptember.

  • 5th September – Apocryphonia have a PWYC concert at St. Thomas’ Huron Street featuring music from the Hundred Years War.
  • 11th September – Lucy Kirkwood’s The Welkin opens at Soulpepper.  Previews are the 4th to the 10th with the  run extending to October 5th.

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Old Times

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Old Times by Harold Pinter is currently playing at Soulpepper in a production directed by Peter Pasyk.  It premiered in 1971 in London and i’s very much an artefact of its time and place besides being decidedly weird in a Pinteresque way.  A well off married couple living somewhere fairly remote on the English coast are being visited by the woman who, twenty years earlier, was the wife’s roommate when they were both young “secretaries” in London but who is now married to a Sicilian aristo.

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August is the quietest month

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After the relative busyness of July; Fringe, TSM, August really does look pretty quiet.  There are a few things on though:

  • Devon Healey’s theatre piece about his own journey into blindness; Rainbow on Mars, runs at the Daniels Spectrum from August 9th to 20th (official opening is the 13th).  It’s a collaboration between the National Ballet and Outside the March Theatre Company.  It’s been described as Pan’s Labyrinth meets The Matrix and it features the debut of a new technology; Immersive Descriptive Audio.
  • Soulpepper offers a comparatively rare opportunity (for Toronto) of seeing some Harold Pinter.  Old Times, in a production directed by Peter Pasyk, is playing at the Michael Young Theatre.  Previews are from the 6th to the 12th with opening on the 13th and the run continuing to September 7th.
  • And if you want an outdoor alternative to CanStage’s Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare in the Ruff are presenting Tiff’ny of Athens in Withrow Park from August 14th to 31st.

Quiltro

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Quiltro-Art by Tyra Hayward

Yasmine Agocs’ Quiltro, being presented by Basil Page Productions at Soulpepper as part of the Fringe is rather more than it seems.  Here’s the blurb:

“What would you do if you could experience the memories of your ancestors?  Following her parents’ divorce, 13-year-old Nina runs away to join a group of stray dogs in her town. On her journey of self-actualization and acceptance, the looming, ominous presence of a dangerous cryptic creature stalks her, preying on the fear within her deep, dark memories.”

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Me and You and the Highland Coo

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Sara Masciotra-Milstein’s Me and You and the Highland Coo presented by Happy as a Clam Productions presented in the TD Finance Studio at Soulpepper as part of the fringe sounds light hearted enough.  Jackie and Charlie, a couple of Canadians who have just got their Masters at Aberdeen plan a road trip in search of a highland cow plushie while waiting for their visa applications to clear.  But there is trouble at home.  Jackie’s father is in the last throes of cancer and Charlie’s brother hasd serious mental health problems.  They decide to ignore text messages because if something important happens “they” will call (no they won’t says my personal experience).

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Divine Monster

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Divine Monster, by Elena Kaufman, directed by Mary Dwyer, is currently playing in the RBC Finance Studio at Soulpepper as part of the Fringe.  Martha, a young, lesbian Canadian rock singer has just split up with her girlfriend on the Paris leg of a backpacking trip.  She finds herself in Père Lachaise, chez Sarah Bernhardt, late at night.  It’s one of the rare nights when an ancient ritual might free Bernhardt from her incorporeal existence if the right “victim” can be found.  Martha, who has basically decided that she is a failure with no future might be the ideal candidate.  At least she can see and talk to Sarah though not the other ghosts who lurk around.

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