Always a theatre lover Sam realized in middle age that there's more to Toronto theatre than just mainstream and is now in love with one person shows, adores festivals, and quirky venues make her day.
Funny friendly banter gets personal in Winners and Losers playing at Toronto’s Berkeley Street Theatre
For some people Winners and Losers, which opened at Berkeley Street Theatre last night, will remind them of an evening spent with family or friends debating and arguing a wide range of subjects. In the beginning the topics are innocuous but they get political and then personal as the evening goes on and the need to win asserts itself.
For others the evening will build to a stomach-clenching crescendo of nastiness.
An eye-opening story about assisted suicide, Coma is playing at Toronto’s Al Green Theatre
Coma, a production of the AfriCan Theatre Ensemble, tackles a timely subject given the renewed debate about assisted suicide, euthanasia and death with dignity.
Nana, played by Lorraine Klaasen, has been in a coma in a vegetative state for 15 months. Her daughter Ifueko, played by Bridget Ogundipe, has been taking care of her and paying her hospital bills and has decided that it’s time to take Nana off life support.
Birth of Frankenstein leaves the stage behind and invites the audience to play in a Toronto church parlour
As soon as I heard that Litmus Theatre was staging their production of Birth of Frankenstein in a 19th century church I knew that I had to see it. Matchbox Macbeth, which they performed in a garage in 2011, was wonderful. Litmus is an inventive, imaginative theatre company and I expected that Birth of Frankenstein would be special.
It was. From the minute that I walked through the doors into the church it felt like an adventure.
Soulpepper Theatre presents Farther West, a play about a woman’s journey for freedom, now playing at Toronto’s Young Centre
John Murrell’s play, Farther West, the Soulpepper production which opened last night, was first performed in 1982. I always wonder if an older play will stand the test of time; Farther West does.
You certainly can’t help but notice the stage as you go to your seat – a woman and a man asleep together, both of them naked. That’s more 1982 than 2013, there doesn’t seem to be as much nudity and sex in plays now. In the ’70s and early ’80s there was often nudity that felt gratuitous and a lot of gratuitous sex too.
An emotionally heart wrenching story about Canada’s tainted blood scandal, Tainted is playing at Toronto’s Aki Studio Theatre
On Friday evening I saw Tainted at the Aki Studio Theatre at Daniels Spectrum. It’s a powerful play; the story of one family deeply affected by the tainted blood scandal and how they deal with it.
It puts a human face on an inhuman chapter in recent Canadian history. The tainted blood crisis was the worst public health crisis that Canada has experienced. Almost 30,000 people contracted HIV and/or Hepatitis C as a result of receiving transfusions of tainted blood. Hemophiliacs were especially hard hit.
This is a play that everyone should see, not just for the story but for the writing, the direction and the acting. It’s a beautiful production.
