Dorianne is a graduate of the Theatre and Drama Studies joint program between University of Toronto, Erindale campus and Sheridan College. She writes short stories, plays and screenplays and was delighted to be accepted into the 2010 Diaspora Dialogues program and also to have her short story accepted into the 2011 edition of TOK: Writing The New Toronto collection. She is also a regularly contributing writer on http://www.sexlifecanada.ca. You can follow her on twitter @headonist if you like tweets about cats, sex, food, queer stuff and lefty politics.
Becky Shaw, playing at the Sterling Theatre Company in Toronto, misses the comedic mark
Becky Shaw is billed as a comedy, but the Sterling Theatre Company‘s current production garnered only a few laughs on opening night. The emotional entanglements of the characters played out like melodrama most of the time. I can see the potential in the script to be satire, but this production’s teeth were too dull to bite. Continue reading Review: Becky Shaw (Sterling Theatre Company)→
Cine Monstro, produced by Why Not Theatre as part of the 2015 Progress Festival, is a Brazilian adaptation of Canadian playwright Daniel MacIvor’s 1998 show Monster. It’s a challenging piece for a performer – one actor, several characters, ninety minutes – and Enrique Diaz, bearing an impressive resume from his home country, tackles it with skill. As with MacIvor’s original productions (and indeed any of his one-man shows), the shifting perspectives in Cine Monstro are facilitated by excellent tech design; lighting and sound cues are perfectly choreographed to changes in time, place and persona. Continue reading 2015 Progress Festival Review: Cine Monstro (Why Not Theatre)→
World Stage presents All Our Happy Days Are Stupid, anon-traditional comedyby Toronto’s Sheila Heti
World Stage is known for producing non-traditional theatre that eschews conventions of plot and characterization. All Our Happy Days Are Stupid, a home-grown play by Sheila Heti, is no exception. Famously considered “unstageable” for many years, it’s been taken on by Jordan Tannahill, a local artist whose star is rapidly rising. The result is a quirky show with cartoonish comedy, a piecemeal plot with absurd undertones, and charming (if scattered) meditations on the nature of happiness.
