Tag Archives: the theatre centre

Sex T-Rex and falling out of love with sketch comedy

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I was brought up on the British TV sketch comedy of the 1970s; above all Monty Python, so I ought to love sketch comedy, right?  I’ve actually been trying to rekindle some enthusiasm for it.  I went to Spotlight at Srcond City and last night I went to Sex T-Rex; the featured act of Sketchfest at the Theatre Centre.  It’s not working for me.  Sketch comedy has changed or I have changed and likely, honestly, both.  Bottom line it really doesn’t do it for me.

It’s not that the current show Crime After Crime (after crime) doesn’t have any merit.  It does.  It’s cleverly set up as the multi-generational saga of the Stone family; colourblind crime bosses of Crime City.  It’s inventive.  There’s a recurrent joke about defusing the bomb that’s about to go off but nobody can tell which wire is the red one.  It manages the mood change from 1940s noir to 1980s James Bond to more contemporary super-hero genre movies with a clever nod to Star Wars Along the way; to whit a starfighter pursuit crafted out of coat hangers.  The movement; goofy simulated car and boat chases is funny but in the end it couldn’t hold my attention for 90 minutes.  YMMV. Continue reading →

Ninety fascinating minutes with a grumpy bastard

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RED by John Logan is a ninety minute play about Mark Rothko and the Seagram Building murals.  It premiered at the Donmar Warehouse in 2009 and it’s currently playing at the Theatre Centre in a production designed and directed by Kenzia Dalie.  It’s a two person show in which Lindsay G. Merrihew plays Rothko and Brendan Kinnon plays his young assistant Ken.

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Game of Life

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Game of Life is a two part exhibit/performance based on the personal story of bluemouth inc. artist Lucy Simic. Shortly before the pandemic she was diagnosed with brain cancer and the piece explores what it’s like to live with cancer against a backdrop of Lucy’s artistic life and relationships in Canada, and more recently, Brooklyn.

The first component of the piece is an installation; Lucy AI.  This consists of an interactive AI model into which aspects of Lucy’s personal history, beliefs and values have been fed (I understand an 800 question questionnaire was involved).  The piece loops for about 90 minutes alternating opportunities for audience members to interrogate the model with video clips, with voiceover, about Lucy’s life and journey.  I spent the suggested 90 minutes with the installation but I could probably have done pretty much as well with 20-30 for reasons that will become apparent later.

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Mukashi, Mukashi

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Mukashi, Mukashi; Once Upon a Time, currently playing at the Theatre Centre, is a collaboration between two companies; Toronto’s CORPUS and Osaka’s KIO.  It explores two characters who feature prominently in the folklore of Europe and Japan; the wolf and the crane.  This is done via a playful exploration of two well known folk tales; Little Red Riding Hood and the story of the Crane-Woman who weaves miraculous cloth.

Kohey Nakadachi in Mukashi, Mukashi_CORPUS_photo by Yoshikazu Inoue

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September 2024

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sept2024Well late August has been a bit thin in terms of live performances but September. sees things back with a bang.

    • Opera Revue has a Verdi and Weill show at the Redwood Theatre.
    • Coal Mine Theatre is opening with Annie Baker’s Infinite Life which played to rave reviews in London and New York.  Previews are on the 6th to 8th with opening on the 10th.  The play runs until the 29th.
    • Crow’s opens their season with Ibsen’s Rosmersholm.  Previews run from the 3rd to the 10th with opening night on the 11th.  The run continues to October 6th.

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Versus

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Versus-PresentationVersus is a one man show (more or less) by Adam Lazarus about a day in the life of the rather unfortunate (if distressingly normal) Gerald Bloom and worse the day is his birthday.  It’s part of Summerworks and playing at the Theatre Centre.  While it is mostly a monologue, Lazarus gets assistance from Nicholas Eddie and Irene Ly who do rather more than shift props.  He also ropes in audience members, from time to time, to, for example, make him a smoothie or clean up dog poo.  If being acutely embarassed is not your thing then don’t sit in the front row! Continue reading →

Mad Madge

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How different were sensibilities in seventeenth century England (at least after the Restoration) to contemporary mores?  Perhaps less than one might think.  Unless you are a woman.  And you want to be famous.  And you aren’t a queen.  All of which presents a problem for young Margaret who leaves her dull, impoverished, gentry family to try her luck at court just as Cromwell and co finally get around to giving Charles I a rather drastic haircut.

1 Rose Napoli in Mad Madge - Photo by Dahlia Katz

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As sketchy as it gets

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desktop_small_fwah_Lou_Laurence_-_9_16_-_Photo_by_Zoe_Brisson_TsavoussisYou might have noticed I’ve been expanding my horizons a bit recently.  Saturday night was no exception.  I was at The Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival at the Theatre Centre for a double bill of sketch comedy.  I don’t think I’ve seen sketch comedy live since university so I really didn’t know what to expect.

We were in the BMO Incubator which sounds like the sort of place one would clone investment bankers rather than see a show but whatever.  The first shock/surprise was the MC for the evening.  He was trying so hard to create “atmosphere”.  It was weirdly like a concert at the Zoomerplex only more so.  You know like when some hapless stage manager comes out and does a sort of Kermit impersonation… “Let’s hear it for Mozart’s Piano Sonata No.16 in C major, K.545.. YEAH”…CLAP, CLAP, CLAP.  It was like that but with dancing and more clapping. Continue reading →

On the Other Side of the Sea

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Aluna Theatre’s production of Jorgelina Cerritos’ On the Other Side of the Sea (translated from Spanish by Dr. Margaret Stanton and Anna Donko) opened at The Theatre Centre last night.  Cerritos is from El Salvador and the play is set on a beach somewhere in that part of the world.  There are two characters (three if you count the sea).  Dorothea is a no longer young civil servant sent from the capital to a remote fishing village to issue birth certificates, ID cards and the like.  Every day she sets up her desk on the beach but she has no clients until the Fisherman arrives.  He has come from the Other Side of the Sea in his rowing boat.  He needs a birth certificate; “something that shows who he is”,  but has none of the information needed for Dorothea to issue one.  She gets angry at his bugging her day after day; especially as he is her only client and she can’t do anything for him. They quibble about the possibility of names (he wants his ID to read “Fisherman OftheSea”) and argue the finer points of grammar concerning what may, or may not be, possible.  This is often very funny but it doesn’t seem to be going anywhere.

Bea Pizano and Carlos Gonzalez-Vio in The Other Side of The Sea_photo by Jeremy Mimnaugh_4808

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