Before we announce the winners of the 2016 MyTheatre Awards, we’re proud to present our annual Nominee Interview Series. Prolific sound designer and composer Debashis Sinha is nominated for the third time in two years for his stirring and complex work on Stratford’s epic Breath of Kings. We caught up with him to discuss his latest Outstanding Sound […]
Kate Hennig’s contemporary history play traces the story of King Henry VIII’s sixth and last wife, Catherine Parr (Kate) – beginning with his awkward and aggressive pursuit of her, her negotiation of their marriage (and sex life, which was pretty impressive), to Kate’s attempt to be both a mother and political advocate for Mary and […]
Little Night Music All I knew about A Little Night Music going in was “Send in the Clowns”, arguably the crown jewel of Sondheim’s canon. It would have been best to leave it that way. It turns out that Hugh Wheeler’s book has none of the subtle ache or bittersweet poetry of the musical’s standout […]
All My Sons This Arthur Miller drama feels a-typical for the company that’s made its name on Shakespeare and its money on musicals. Though modern drama isn’t Stratford’s usual racket, Martha Henry’s smartly cast and emotionally wrought production might be the best thing at the festival this year (well, maybe second to Breath of Kings: […]
The Aeneid Under the guise of greek mythology, playwright Olivier Kemeid (with translator Maureen Labonté) and director Keira Loughran have snuck an honest-to-god contemporary piece of full-length theatre into the Stratford Festival. A shamelessly modern story about the refugee crisis told through physical theatre (something you rarely see even in the studio) with a young, […]
The Tom Patterson theatre is great; it allows for fully in-the-round staging (or in-the-rectangle, rather) and it’s big enough that the kings aren’t undermined by a crowd too small for their thundering speeches but it’s small enough that we can see them up close for the men they are underneath the crown. I wouldn’t wish […]
I have just one rule about adaptations and that one rule makes or breaks my assessment of said adaptation’s worth, every time. I need there to be a reason it’s been adapted. In adapting Victor Hugo’s novel into the Schönberg & Boublil musical, Les Miserables gains the group-think momentum of a rousing war anthem and the haunting ache […]
Set in Newfoundland in 1985, director Jillian Keiley’s production of Shakespeare’s irresistible pastoral is simple, lighthearted and creative. A bare stage gets its sense of place from the actors (designer Bretta Gerecke‘s comical ’80s costuming, accents of varying effectiveness) and the audience. The crowd is armed with grab bags full of participatory aids like bleating […]