How To Disappear Completely
Starring Itai Erdal
Written by Itai Erdal in collaboration with James Long, Anita Rochon & Emelia Symington Fedy
Directed by James Long
At the Wosk 2nd Stage, JCCGV
February 17 - 27, 2011
Guest review by Sean Cummings
Vancover, BC:
To say How To Disappear Completely is theatre is correct. It is definitely theatrical. But the narrator is not a character in a play. Rather he spends his time telling the audience an intensely personal story about his journey back home to his native Israel to be with his mother for the final months of her life.
What could have been a self-centered spiral into the depths of grief turned out to be a well executed story whose artistic achievement is to seemingly place the audience smack dab in the middle of the narrator's experience.
Brown Girl in the Ring
Performer/Playwright: Valerie Mason-John
Director: Linette Smith
Presented by Queenie Productions
at the Vancouver Fringe Festival
Guest review by Rachel Scott
I love the idea of this play: what happens with the black baby descendent of the royal British family suddenly crops up? Inspired by the African-German queen who married George III and the rumors of a black baby offspring to Louis XIV, “Brown Girl in the Ring” has all the makings of a wild ride and hilarious satire.
Dirt. Written by Robert Schneider
Directed by David Robinson
Performed by Christopher Domig
Designed by Daniel Domig
Translated by Paul Dvorak
Presented by Dreck Productions and incarNATION
at the Vancouver Fringe Festival
DIRT, presented by Dreck productions and INCARnation at this year's Vancouver Fringe, is the disjointed, emotional portrayal of an Iraqi immigrant's alienation in the West. This one-man show was written Robert Schneider in the 1990's as an expose of the tensions surrounding immigrant Iraqis during the first gulf war. Twenty years later, the story still resonates, as relations between the Arab world and the West remain complex and fraught.
Dangerous Corner by J.B. Priestley
Directed by Bill Dow
Vancouver Playhouse Theatre Company
Vancouver Playhouse
May 1- 22, 2010
Vancouver, BC: Talking with a friend after seeing Dangerous Corner I realized just how quickly time can obscure fame. While we both liked the production, my friend admitted, much to her chagrin, that she did not realize we were going to see a play by the British writer J.B.Priestly. Rather, she thought the play was starring Canadian actor Jason Priestley.
SPINE, by Kevin Kerr
Directed by Bob Frazer
A Realwheels and University of Alberta co-production
Experimental Theatre, SFU Woodwards
March 10 to 20, 2010
Spine originated as a follow-up to Skydive, seen two years ago. James Sanders, wheelchair-bound, sought another part; Kevin Kerr would write again and Bob Frazer would switch from actor to director. Twelve members of the University of Alberta graduating acting class would take part. No less than 34 more are credited with 'production,' from 'dialect coach' to 'audio supervisor.' Cultural Olympiad money came in.
Kerr and Frazer, as they record in the program, look for inspiration to Prometheus, Frankenstein, Cyrano de Bergerac and Midsummer Night's Dream! Kerr demonstrated what he could do with conventional theatre in 'Unity, 1918' ; here he writes an intelligent collection of fragments.
The Greatest Cities of the World
Creative Team: James Long, Maiko Bae Yamamoto (directors); Nneka Croal, Ruben Castelblanco, Susan Elliott, Young-Hee Kim, Andrew Laurenson, Michael Rinaldi, Tanya Podlozniuk (performers)
Theatre Replacement
Vancouver East Cultural Centre 13-17 March, 2010 Vancouver, BC: The Theatre Replacement company have a reputation for being at the cutting-edge, part of a movement in Vancouver which is 'pushing the envelope': with Electric Company, Boca del Lupo, Radix, The Only Animal and Leaky Heaven Circus. This year Theatre Replacement won the big Alcan Rio Tinto award.
Their idea was to go to the small towns of Tennessee which have the names of great European cities, Paris, London, Athens and Moscow. They taped interviews, while staying sensitive to themselves as outsiders. They must have hoped that this fieldwork would provide a subject - it hasn't. Though staying close to verbatim theatre, they evidently ignored 'The Farm Show' and 'Laramie Project' as models.
The Drowning Girls
by Beth Graham, Charlie Tomlinson and Daniela Vlaskalik
Directed by Charlie Tomlinson
A Bent out of Shape production
Studio: Gateway Theatre, Richmond
March 4 to 13, 2010
Vancouver, BC: The Drowning Girls prompted for me a question rarely asked: why did these people write, or devise, this? The subject is the ‘Brides in the Bath’ murders in Britain of 1912-14. George Smith drowned three wives after they had made wills leaving their money to him, and the first two were initially found to be accidental. Smith's technique for killing comes at the end, a kind of climax. Canadian audiences must be presumed to know nothing of these facts, which probably were found in the old Penguin series, ‘Famous Trials.’
Was the starting point a feminist one, woman as victim? The girls allude briefly to the inferior position of women at the time, though the authors appear not to know of the Married Women's Property Acts of 1870-82.
EVIL DEAD - THE MUSICAL (The Vancouver Production) Book & Lyrics by George Reinblatt Music by Frank Cipolla, Christopher Bond, Melissa Morris, George Reinblatt Music Supervision by Frank Cipolla Additional Lyrics by Christopher Bond Additional Music by Rob Daleman Director: Mark Carter Choreographer: Ken Overbey Musical Director: Sylvia Zaradic Norman Rothstein Theatre A Down Stage Right (DSR) Production October 29th to November 7th
Vancouver, BC: THIS CHEESE IS FUN! The set is crappy (and very cleverly designed), the costumes are deliberately tacky, there have not been worse wigs since Dynel was invented, the props fall apart, the acting is over the top, and my cheeks ached from grinning through the whole show. This is cheesy as an art form. The evening is a riot of bad puns, brilliantly bad acting, great singing and fun choreography.
Director Mark Carter keeps this paper-thin musical airborne for the by keeping his attractive cast racing at breakneck speed so you are hardly aware of the dead spots in the script.
Based on the cult classic Sam Rami movie, which is a send up of horror films, the musical is a spoof of a spoof...tricky territory for a director with less skill than Carter. But he pulls it off with the help of a smart set designer, John Bessette and the wacky choreography of Ken Overbey ... and that cast.
Scott Walters plays the manic Ash with bulging biceps, bulging veins and bulging eyeballs. He has the nice guy, potential psycho thing nailed. He is ably abetted by Meghan Gardiner as both dumb blonde Annie and not so bright Shelly, who is so good in both parts that she should be given away as Christmas presents.
ANY NIGHT Created by Daniel Arnold, Medina Hahn and Ron Jenkins Vancouver East Cultural Centre (The Cultch) A DualMinds Production October 6th to 17th
Vancouver, BC: "We live our lives forward, but only understand them backward", says Anna (Medina Hahn) who then takes us on what becomes a waking nightmare, increasingly haunted by seemingly benign, Patrick (Daniel Arnold). These two intensely talented actors, who are always surprising, are also the playwrights of this roller coaster ride of a play that explores the observer and the observed, the victim and the perpetrator, the dream and reality.
Dirt. Written by Robert Schneider
Guest reviewer Amanda Lockitch
Guest Reviewer: Malcolm Page
The Greatest Cities of the World
ANY NIGHT
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