London’s Grand Theatre is a crown jewel in the non-Toronto Ontario theatre scene. The historic Spriet Stage is a gorgeous venue that hosts an ambitious and well-balanced season of crowd pleasers while the company’s secondary space, the versatile Auburn Stage, allows the company some much-needed creativity with slightly more daring programming. The Grand has an […]
Chaos Menu: Disorder Up! (The Second City) The latest revue from Toronto’s Second City brings in four very strong new cast members to join returnees PHATT Al and Andy Assaf in a very silly crowd pleaser of a show at the comedy giant’s fabulous new space. I’m that weirdo who likes a little sadness in […]
My love of the National Ballet of Canada started when I saw them dance Onegin. It was a very different company back in 2010 when this production made its debut with Santo Loquasto’s rich and moody redesign and the starriest of all-star casts for opening night, but the Onegin magic is alive and well even […]
Coming into this show, I didn’t quite know what to expect. Reading the synopsis, I didn’t see how the concept related to the real Billy the Kid (which the title clearly alludes to), and the poster’s allusion to the trans pride flag completely went over my head. But I came out thoroughly impressed. Gez Mercer and […]
The opening production of The National Ballet of Canada’s 2023/24 season pairs two short ballets about passion. Ironically, it’s Passion that is the least passionate of the pair, feeling disjointed and overly busy. The world premiere of Emma Bovary, on the other hand, is a cohesive triumph that led me and my guest to turn to each other towards […]
A Poem for Rabia (Tarragon Theatre) Spanning three continents and three generations, Nikki Shaffeeullah’s world premiere currently on stage in the Tarragon Extraspace is an intimate epic full of big ideas. The capable cast performs an exceptional array of accents- some executed with precision and nuance, others less successful- as they each take on multiple […]
The historic Campbell House is creaking open its doors for another seasonal romp. Based on Edgar Allan Poe’s Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque, this production – like the Netflix series bringing some of Poe’s collected works to a new medium this spooky season – centers around the ill-fated House of Usher. Audience members are […]
At the Small World Centre in the Queen W Artscape Youngplace building, Apothecary Theatre & Dandelion Theatre have teamed up to create a new adaptation of Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus, onstage now through Halloween. Slimming the epic down to two performers and a single hour, adapter/stars James Llewellyn Evans and Augusta “Gus” Monet aka […]