(Due to a calamitous computer meltdown, these mini reviews are the missing posts.)
Harold Green Jewish Theatre and Psik Theater Production/How Do We Get Out of Here?, written by Dudi Gordon, directed by Assi Shimoni, Greenwin Theatre, closed Nov. 23.
How Do We Get Out of Here?
Psik Theatre
How Do We Get Out of Here? is a production of Psik Theatre from Jerusalem that centres on a young woman on the autistic spectrum whose life has been marked by exploitation and misunderstanding.
The play unfolds in the unlikely setting of a butcher shop storeroom, where the owner of a chain of butcher shops and the young woman become accidentally locked in together. As she reveals the shocking history of how she has been used by the manager of this shop—unpaid, coerced into sexual favours, and even living in the storeroom—the owner’s growing disbelief mirrors the audience’s own response.
Her reliance on the rigid rules taught by a former group leader, which she repeats as “Simon says,” has led her from one disaster to another, and although she often catches the manager in comic contradictions, the humour never masks the brutal vulnerability of her life. The audience was fully absorbed as her story emerged, learning the sordid facts alongside the owner, and we were collectively shocked at how profoundly she had been mistreated.
Psik Theatre, known for work about people on the margins, brought an important, socially resonant play to Toronto from Israel. Written by Dudi Gordon, who also played the manager, the production was anchored by a marvelous performance from Tal Nativ as the young woman on the spectrum. Her betrayal lingered in the mind long after the performance that ended.
A Yarn or Two Arts Collective Production/ SPYCRAFT written and produced by Kirk Dunn and Claire Ross Dunn, directed by Richard Greenblatt, Incubator, Theatre Centre, closed Nov. 28.
SPYCRAFT
Photo: Heidi Chan
SPYCRAFT is an absorbing narrative that proves how satisfying it can be to sit in a theatre and be carried along by a well-acted, well-directed story without being pounded by didactic themes.
The plot turns on a woman (Diane Flacks) who receives declassified information from Britain revealing that her mother (also Flacks) was a spy in World War II, sending coded messages through her knitting while in occupied France. At fifty-three she was an unlikely recruit for the SOE, yet she scored the highest marks and was taken on, forming a chilling relationship with the Nazi commandant’s wife (Charlotte Dennis) under the guise of giving knitting lessons. Her male counterpart (Blair Williams) is uneasy with this older woman as his partner, but she proves resourceful at every turn.
Of course, the tension rises to unbearable pitch as the woman is photographing secret papers as the Nazi commandant (Devin Lee) arrives home.
Beneath the intrigue lies an underbelly of family reckoning: the daughter and granddaughter (also Dennis) discover not only the hidden espionage history but also that the grandmother concealed her Jewish identity, which means they themselves are Jewish. They must confront why this truth was hidden and what it means for them.
SPYCRAFT is an entertaining, absorbing play—well written, well-acted, and well directed—and sometimes that is exactly what you want from an evening in the theatre.
On the other hand, the last lines of the play,” What are we going to do?” and the answer “I don’t know,” takes us right to the growing antisemitism of today as the mother and daughter grapple with this most unsettling news of their Jewishness.