Back in Manhattan after an awesome dance-filled Labour Day Getaway Cruise, feeling great except for my tired feet. I am ready for another 5 days of dance, theatre and fine food. First thing on the agenda will be to pick up a pair of practice shoes for the next couple of lessons. Somehow on board ship my feet must have grown  from a  dainty size 4½  to something huge. By the end of the voyage I felt like one of Cinderella's sisters,  trying to squeeze my foot into a shoe that was suddenly far too small. Oh well, no prince for me I guess.

New York is one of my favorite cities – it has a unique buzz, an electric feel, that is unlike anywhere else I have visited. Each time I visit New York I feel like a humming bird, hovering just above the surface of culture and cuisine, dipping down for a taste, but never able to perch long enough to experience more than that brief and tantalizing taste.

Vancouver,BC:  One would have to have a heart of steel, or maybe no heart at all, not to adore feisty little orphan Annie and her unshaken belief that her parents will return to take her away from Miss Hannigan and the orphanage.  The story of Annie and Daddy Warbucks, however implausible (it was based on a comic strip after all) taps into the dream of  any lonely, lost or abused child; namely that someone big and strong and loving will come to rescue them. And then as well as its optimism and emotional appeal,  the musical is jam-packed with well known songs that stay in your head, long after the curtain falls. Annie  is great family entertainment.

Summer in Vancouver means lots of theatre out of doors. I have seen seven al fresco productions and all are currently still running for you to enjoy.

It is hard for me to believe that it is three and a half  years since I wrote my first Rants, Raves and Reviews post for Immediate Theatre. Somewhat ironically, it was titled Our Town, as it was partly about seeing the Thornton Wilder play but in Toronto, not Vancouver - my town! My first posted travelblogue (I really should copyright that word!) London and Languedoc about studying travel writing with Angela Murrills in France, was written in the fall of 2006.  And the first theatre review officially posted to ReviewFromTheHouse.com  was The View from Above in April 2008, just over a year ago.

Vancouver, BC:  I was really happy to be able to catch the closing night performance of Toronto Mississippi, the day after I returned after three weeks away from Vancouver. The play itself is one that I had often heard discussed but had never read nor seen performed and I expected that Dean Paul Gibson would draw strong performances from the cast of Colleen Wheeler (Maddie),  Meg Roe (Jhana), Bill MacDonald (King) and Alessandro Juliani (Bill). 

Soulpepper Theatre Company. Young Centre for the Performing Arts, 55 Mill Street, Building 49 Ph: 416.866.8666 TORONTO ON. - “The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely. All art is quite useless.” Oscar Wilde