Theatre

Theatre Review – 4th Line Theatre/Sky Gilbert’s St. Francis of Millbrook

Sky Gilbert writes timely plays. St. Francis of Millbrook is about growing up gay in rural Ontario. Gilbert provides a good dose of humour to make his message of acceptance and tolerance more palatable, but the scene where the father savagely beats his teenage son for being gay is a sobering moment. The fact that […]

Theatre Review – Mirvish Productions/Backbeat: The Birth of the Beatles

Be prepared. This show is loud, but then it is about rock ‘n’ roll. Backbeat: The Birth of the Beatles is the 2010 stage adaptation of a 1994 movie that details the legendary group’s early years between 1960 and 1963. Iain Softley, one of the movie’s writers, has penned the book of the musical with […]

Theatre Review – Soulpepper/David Mamet’s Speed-The-Plow

American playwright David Mamet is all about language and rhythm. Characters like to hear themselves talk. They go off on riffs. Just a word from someone else can trigger the verbal diarrhoea. Other people can barely get a word in edge-wise. When something akin to dialogue happens, the words are fragments of thoughts which makes […]

Theatre Review – Outside the March Theatre Company/Noah Haidle’s Mr. Marmalade

Thirtysomething American playwright Noah Haidle is known for his “strange and off-kilter” plays. Outside The March Theatre Company is remounting Haidle’s Mr. Marmalade, a huge hit at last year’s SummerWorks. And what’s the play like? Not surprisingly, strange and off-kilter. But it is also dark, disturbing, provocative, poignant and satiric. OtM has set the play […]

Theatre Review – 4th Line Theatre/Shirley Barrie’s Queen Marie

Marie Dressler was a force of nature whose fascinating life was crying out to be made into a play.  The Oscar-winning actress/comedienne was born in Cobourg and raised in Lindsay, and that made her the perfect subject for a 4th Line Theatre production. The company only does original plays anchored in Northumberland and Peterborough counties […]