Graphic design by Reilly Ballantyne-Smith
Well Seasoned Productions/ With a Song in My Heart, produced and directed by Lesley Ballantyne, music direction by Kieren MacMillan, choreography by the company, VideoCabaret, Deanne Taylor Theatre, closes May 10. Tickets: Eventbrite.
Well-Seasoned Productions has been quietly putting on shows in Toronto since 2020, flying well under the radar which is a shame, because their work is an absolute delight.
The name is apt: “well-seasoned” refers not just to polished, but to experience. Their casts are made up of Equity veterans — performers who have spent forty years or more in the business — and what the company offers is, quite simply, a showcase for older artists. There are so many of these Equity veterans that the cast changes with every show. This is not a fixed company, but a rotating assembly of performers drawn from a remarkably deep pool of experience.
And what artists they are. Look at their credits and you begin to understand the depth of what is onstage.
These are performers who have lived inside the great musical theatre canon: Les Miserables, Ragtime, Miss Saigon, Show Boat, Cats, Cabaret, Singin’ in the Rain, Gypsy, Jesus Christ Superstar, Beauty and the Beast, and of course Anne of Green Gables to name but a few. They have worked on Broadway, at the Stratford and Shaw Festivals and across the country — the Vancouver Playhouse, Rainbow Stage in Winnipeg, Charlottetown Festival, and closer to home, Drayton, Grand Bend and Port Dover. Needless to say, they have been fixtures in every Toronto musical for decades.
But the resumes do not stop there. They have taught and directed, sailed on Disney cruise ships, danced for the Raptors, and sung with groups like the Nylons. In other words, these Equity veterans have touched nearly every corner of the entertainment world including stints on film and television.
And now, they are still at it. Still with the urge to step onstage, to perform, to connect and Well Seasoned Productions gives them that space — as well as giving audiences the chance to encounter not just talent, but a lifetime of it.
The current show, With a Song in My Heart, takes the form of a good old-fashioned revue, with a cast of seven sharing the bill. It opens with a joint musical offering and closes the same way, but in between the structure is simple and effective: one performer, or occasionally a duet, takes the stage, finishes, and is immediately followed by the next. The result is a continuous, unbroken flow — a never-ending parade of talent.
And what a parade it is.
Mark Cassius delivers a deeply felt “This Nearly Was Mine” from South Pacific. Lisa Atkinson, still in possession of a bright, ringing high soprano, takes on “Man in the Moon” from Side Show. Janelle Hutchinson demonstrates her comic flair as the drunken typist set to Leroy Anderson’s orchestral classic, while Michael Donald reminds us that he can still command a song-and-dance number, whether with Irving Berlin’s “Stepping Out” or George Gershwin’s “I Can’t Be Bothered Now.”
Cassel Miles — a member of the original cast of Fosse — shows he can still magically contort his body into “Mr. Bojangles.” Jeffrey Prentice offers something entirely unexpected, accompanying himself on the ukulele while singing Paul Anka’s “My Way” in Spanish. And Trish Adams is deliciously funny in “Everybody’s Girl” from the Kander and Ebb musical Steel Pier.
What emerges is a steady succession of solos and duets — some heartfelt, some comic — but all delivered with the assurance that comes from decades of experience. It is entertainment in its purest form, carried by performers who know exactly how to hold an audience.
At the helm is producer/director Lesley Ballantyne, who brings 50 years as a director, choreographer, performer, producer, teacher, arts administrator and Dora Award winner to the project, supported by associate director Mark Candler, whose credits are equally extensive.
Live at the piano is the very versatile music director Kieren MacMillan who joined in singing at one point and also contributed a very funny song he had written. Needless to say, he has impressive credits up the ying yang as well.
Taken together, this is an extraordinary concentration of theatrical experience — artists whose careers span forty years or more, and whose collective credits cover virtually every corner of the entertainment world. And here they are, still performing, still connecting, still giving audiences the pleasure they have been delivering for decades.
Among the many highlights I must mention the opening of the second act, set to “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” Lee Hazlewood’s hit for Nancy Sinatra. The choreography, by Trish Adams (she gave herself the lead, of course), had the audience howling. You had to be there to see these veterans giving it the old razzle-dazzle — completely uninhibited, completely hilarious.
What makes this number land, not to mention the bizarre costumes, is their willingness to laugh at themselves. There is no attempt to pretend otherwise, no self-consciousness. Instead, there is a shared understanding between performers and audience, and a palpable sense of enjoyment. They are having a wonderful time entertaining us, and that pleasure is infectious.
These are artists who spent their careers onstage, not in marketing meetings — which perhaps goes some way toward explaining why a company of this calibre has remained under the radar. Putting on a show at this level is demanding enough — securing a venue, assembling a cast, managing the logistics — and here much of it is done on a volunteer basis. Even backstage, the depth of experience is striking: wardrobe coordinator Charlotte Moore is a Dora Award winner, and assistant stage manager Vinetta Strombergs is a highly respected director in her own right.
In retrospect, that is what makes With a Song in My Heart so special.
These Equity veterans are there because they want to entertain, and we are in the audience because we want to be entertained. They still know how to sell a song and a dance routine, and we are there to appreciate all those years they bring to the art of stagecraft.
The wonder of the evening is, quite simply, everything that’s old is new again.