Tarragon Theatre/Bremen Town

Bremen Town Set
Photo: Jae Yang

There are many reasons to see the world premiere of Gregory Prest’s Bremen Town at the Tarragon Theatre, but here are four of them: Nancy Palk, William Webster, Sheila McCarthy and Oliver Dennis.

Senior citizens of the Toronto stage. Whoever thought we’d ever see them all together in one production?

This is a play about aging, and it is melancholy at its core. You will come away feeling sad, but you will be profoundly moved.

Prest has re-imagined the Grimm Brothers’ tale The Town Musicians of Bremen, and as the name Grimm suggests, many of their tales were dark. While this tale begins darkly, it does end in hope.

In the original, four aging animals—a donkey, a dog, a cat, and a rooster—are cast aside by their masters for being useless. They flee and meet up on the road, hoping to reach Bremen, the utopian city where they dream of becoming musicians. They never arrive. Instead, they find a cottage in the forest, frighten away the bandits who occupy it, and make a new home for themselves—a family of outcasts finding belonging.

Bremen Town
Frau Esel and Herr Hund
Photo: Jae Yang

Gregory Prest’s Bremen Town transforms those four animals into four elderly people—discarded, lonely, and searching for purpose. But his parable does not end in comfort.

Like the old donkey, Frau Esel (Nancy Palk) who served as the faithful housekeeper of Völksenhaus for forty-five years, only to be cast out after a disagreement with the new mistress. The  name of the estate means “house of the people.” The irony is biting. Prest has turned the meaning inside out: his Völksenhaus is anything but of the people. It is a house of privilege that excludes them—a cruel inversion of the fairy-tale ideal.

As in the tale, Frau Esel begins the journey alone. She soon meets Dr. Hund (Oliver Dennis), the dog, a failed magician who has left debts everywhere but whose kindness and optimism make him irresistible. The trains aren’t running, so she hires him to help her reach Bremen where she plans to live with her estranged son, a musician she hasn’t seen in forty years, and so they set off on foot.

It is through Dr. Hund’s good heart that their small band grows. They meet Herr Katz (William Webster), the cat, returning to his ruined hometown—nothing left but foundations—and Frau Henne (Sheila McCarthy), the hen, Herr Katz’s sister, who is literally being sold by her own family because she is old and useless. Even Frau Esel, who has shown little humanity so far, is shaken by the callous behaviour of Frau Henne’s son and his wife. Together, these discarded souls form a new kind of family.

Bremen Town
Frau Henne and Herr Katz
Photo: Jae Yang

Three younger actors—Dan Mousseau, Veronica Hortiguela, and Farhang Ghajar—play a host of other characters with energy and invention, seamlessly shifting roles as needed. The stage itself is bare except for the occasional set piece, yet Gregory Prest’s direction keeps the eye alive. The actors walk in place, giving the illusion of travel; when someone “runs” to catch up to them, it looks astonishingly real. It is a deceptively simple but ingenious bit of stagecraft.

The last performer, Tatjana Cornij, serves as both narrator and musician. With her accordion, she becomes the itinerant folk storyteller, half singer, half chronicler. Her music has a dark folk undercurrent—haunting, minor-key, with a gypsy cadence that borders on singspiel. It drives the action while deepening the melancholy tone of the piece.

Throughout the play runs a recurring motif—the Kite Festival. Everyone mentions it. Good people, bad people, even the bandits who echo the original fairy tale. In Prest’s world, the Kite Festival becomes a symbol of hope and escape.

The travelers eventually arrive there, and for Frau Esel it marks a turning point. She meets the owner of a dancing bear, a charming showman who offers her perhaps the first compliment she has ever received. Yet she also witnesses his cruelty to the animal, and the moment becomes a revelation. The Kite Festival, shimmering and bittersweet, is both release and reckoning.

Bremen Town
The Storyteller
Photo: Jae Yang

The design work matches the story’s fusion of simplicity and depth.

Nancy Perrin’s delightful set is a slanted stage, filled with warm Persian rugs, framed by a proscenium arch inspired by the German folk art of Scherenschnitte—intricate paper-cut silhouettes of landscapes and animals that anchor the tale in its folkloric roots. Logan Raju Cracknell’s lighting bathes the stage in a warm glow, evoking the haze of memory and the faded warmth of the past. The effect is quietly stunning the moment you enter Tarragon’s Mainspace. Perrin’s costumes are equally imaginative. While Palk is dressed severely in a dark gray suit and bonnet from the early 1900s, she is surrounded by colourful traditional German peasant and town garb.

Palk gives a performance of flinty precision and darkness—foul-mouthed, hard-edged, and seemingly devoid of compassion. Dennis’s Herr Hund is her opposite: expansive, warm, and hopelessly irresponsible, a man of debts and open arms. Webster’s Herr Katz is tentative, wounded, gradually reawakened by rediscovered family. McCarthy’s Frau Henne is all charm and quicksilver wit, at first a fool, later the heart of the troupe. Together, the four veterans anchor the play with grace and authority.

Prest has written a parable about aging and obsolescence, inspired by a story from his own family: his great-grandmother, who ran her home with pride, was given small tasks by her daughter so she could retain her dignity. His mother in telling him this family story was in fact, giving an oblique reminder that, “When my time comes, give me something to do.”

Bremen Town is the result—a modern fable about usefulness, compassion, and the way society measures worth.

Everything about this production feels handmade and heartfelt. The direction is exacting yet tender; the performances ring with truth. As I said at the beginning, you may not leave happy—but you will leave deeply moved.

And when awards season comes, if Nancy Palk isn’t among the nominees, there will be no justice.