Steady stage

There were knockout performances all over
the city but no shake-ups in theatres this year

DARK AND SPRAWLING: Lion in the Streets

by NEIL BOYCE

This “year in review” stuff that I’m tasked with is strange for theatre-goers. Our season ended on Labour Day, so we’ve been in a new year for nearly four months already. But looking back at the last 12 months or so, there hasn’t been so much a techtonic shift in the scene as many subtle changes—most of which bode well for the English side of theatre in our divided city.

The big two

New Centaur artistic director Roy Surette guided a line-up set by outgoing AD Gordon McCall through the first half of the year, starting with the Daniel Brooks-directed Half Life in January, imported from Toronto and already a hit at Festival TransAmériques. Ripped-from-the-headlines work Relative Good followed, causing a stir with the story of a Canadian citizen of Middle Eastern origin detained and tortured by American authorities.

But the reign of Surette really started with his own programming, and the touring production of Wajdi Mouawad’s Scorched in October, an internationally acclaimed show that finally reached its native Montreal stage in English. Firmly established on the throne, Surette later directed the high-concept acrobatic work, Skydive.

In the more intimate Centaur 2 space, Scapegoat Carnivale and director Alison Darcy delivered a beautiful Spanish fantasy, Life Is a Dream, in the Brave New Looks series.

Meanwhile at the Segal, a newly renovated space and bold season began in February with the original musical Houdini (which would reappear later during the jazz festival)—and a stunner of a season closer as Greg Kramer directed Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Barry Flatman’s Big Daddy remains the most talked about performance of the year.

Festivals, events, out of towners

Visiting shows brightened things up considerably in 2008 as Ottawa ensemble A Company of Fools brought the delightfully disgusting Richard III in Bouffon to MainLine in February. Over at the MAI space, Toronto-based dub poet-playwright d’bi.young. anitafrika returned to Montreal for her “one oomaan story” blood.claat. The Just for Laughs festival picked a winner with Taking Over, Danny Hoch’s provocative one-man, multi-character play about gentrification set on the streets of Brooklyn.

The Fringe Festival was a beaut—the best in a series of recent vintage years—with the reappearance of Aussie faux-punksters Die Roten Punkte. There was a mature work from TJ Dawe called Totem Figures, about the heroes of one’s personal mythology and role models who have shaped Dawe’s character. Also a gem, the carefully wrought anarchy by the men in tights at Purple 9 Productions in Cobra II: Cobra Christ Superstar.

Relying on outdoor venues, Repercussion Theatre suffered from the rainy summer but their Old Montreal opener, The Tempest, was a charmer —a happy marriage between the play and the elements.

In September, Andy Warhol’s lasting influence was re-imagined in the cross-disciplinary Factory Project, a warehouse-full-of-artists concept realized with great style.

Small theatres, big talent, hustling young companies

Sidemart Theatrical Grocery hit their stride in a big way in 2008. Haunted Hillbilly: The Hyram Woodside Atrocity tore up the excellent Segal studio space with a brilliant psychobilly musical from Graham Cuthbertson and Andrew Shaver. The company later connected with Oooo!, a touching comedy-drama about a troupe of clowns performing in Nazi Germany.

The Infinitheatre production of Quebec playwright Trevor Ferguson’s Zarathustra Said Some Things, No? brought the play back from its “out-of-town tryout” in New York. Guy Sprung directed the critically acclaimed show about a couple damaged by addiction and abuse.

Tableau d’Hôte got their company rolling in high gear, beginning with Mike Czuba’s The Elusive at the Geordie Space in February. They followed up with the sharply imagined 7 Stories at Théâtre Ste-Catherine and the sprawling Lion in the Streets at MainLine.

The Baroness and the Pig at Théâtre La Chapelle gave us the female performance of the year with Nathalie Claude playing Emily “The Pig,” a juicy part for the actor who excels at physical theatre.

Montreal Theatre Ensemble, associated with John Abbott College’s department of theatre and music, presented Of Mice and Men. This began their Stage Two initiative, where the CEGEP collaborates with outside companies, opening rehearsals to fledgling theatre students.

New companies on the block show promise for the anglo scene, with singer-dancer-headhunter Carolyn-Fe Trinidad founding the company Altera Vitae and their inaugural production, ’night, Mother. Even little Gleams Theatre got into the act, with fun plays like Twisted Plots run from a tiny bookstore in NDG.

All this, plus the very recent launch of Theatre 314 on Pine avenue...who knows, we might just make it through another winter.