Diving into stage

>> The Other Theatre, tall women and short plays, Chekhov mania and other seasonal highlights

by AMY BARRATT

Oh liebchen, I feel young again! One theatre season has been put to bed (see MECCA awards, below) and another is just springing to life, laden with possibilities.

It's hard not to get all giddy anticipating a new work by Stacey Christodoulou's The Other Theatre. Carlos in Therapy is being plugged as a companion piece to the company's highly acclaimed Human Collision/Atomic Reaction (1999). While that challenging piece drew on the work of Stephen Hawking regarding the workings of the universe, this new one purports to explore "inner space." It's about our entertainment-driven society, where "lying is the norm and confession is mandatory." Did somebody say Gary Condit? The Other Theatre has a decade of always interesting, occasionally brilliant work behind it. Carlos in Therapy is typical of their shows in that it is a collective creation, bilingual and directed by Christodoulou. Tonight (Sept. 13) to the 29th at Théâtre Prospero.

Also opening this weekend, Two Tall Women present Two Short Plays. Playwrights Celia McBride and Juliana Pivato have teamed up to present an evening of new work. McBride, whose plays have been produced by Infinitheatre and others, presents Her Only Customer, a piece about a woman who practices psychotherapy in a restaurant. Pivato's play, Oglers and Onlookers, is about a shut-in who spends her days spying on her neighbours. Sept. 14-15, 21-22, 8 p.m. at Studio 303 in the Belgo Building.

After a couple of years concentrating on readings and relatively small-scale projects, Teesri Duniya Theatre will finally produce Rahul Varma's play Bhopal in November. The play by the author of Counter Offence is based on the explosion at the Union Carbide factory in Bhopal, India, in 1984 in which 13,000 workers lost their lives and many thousands more were maimed.

It's hard to believe, but Teesri Duniya has been producing socially relevant theatre for two decades now. Jack Langedijk will direct Bhopal. Nov. 15-Dec. 9. Info: 848-0238.

Italian mambo, Irish beauty queens

Last season, Steve Galluccio's Mambo Italiano was produced in French at Duceppe; two seasons ago, The Beauty Queen of Leenane played in English at Centaur. This year, Centaur's got the English language premiere of Mambo--which the playwright in fact wrote in English--and La Licorne presents La Reine de Beauté de Leenane.

If Mambo has undergone some serious rewrites since the Duceppe production, this sit-com like play about an Italian man's coming out might just work in the more intimate Centaur space. Like I said, now's the time for starry-eyed optimism. Sept. 25-Oct 21 at Centaur.

Centaur's Beauty Queen was rather highly acclaimed at the time, but I personally found director Ben Barnes' unremittingly bleak vision hard to take. (Dubliner Barnes will be back at Centaur later in the season to direct another of Martin McDonagh's "Leenane" plays, The Cripple of Inishmaan.) I'm hoping that Martin Faucher, who is directing La Reine de Beauté for La Licorne will find a way to make us care about the blighted Maureen and her miserable old mother Mag in this black, black, black comedy. Sept. 18-Oct. 27 at La Licorne.

Check out the Chekhov

There's plenty of Chekhov on Montreal stages this season--not plays, but adaptations of his short stories are all the rage. The Saidye dives in with the cutely titled Chekhov's Shorts, a Smith-Gilmour Theatre production from Toronto. The minimalist, clown-inspired duo of Michele Smith and Dean Gilmour uses klezmer music and a train trip to link several stories featuring some of the master's most unforgettable characters.

It should be interesting to compare Chekhov's Shorts with Le chant du cygne et autres histoires d'Anton Tchékhov, an import from France playing at Théâtre du Rideau Vert in November. The TNP-Villeurbanne production focuses on an ageing actor. It features a cast of nine as well as live musicians.

Meanwhile, Théâtre de L'Opsis (Je suis une mouette, Les Trois Soeurs...) continues its love affair with the Russians, presenting two plays in repertory at Espace Go. La poste populaire russe by Oleg Bogaev is directed by Luce Pelletier and (Oncle) Vania, a "complication" by Howard Barker of the Chekhov play, is directed by Serge Denoncourt. Oct. 9-27.

Bon théâtre!

And the winners are...

The Montreal English Critics' Circle has awarded MECCAs in the following categories for the 2000-2001 theatre season:



Best Production, Professional: After the Dance (Montreal Young Company)

Best Production, Amateur or Semi-Pro: The Threepenny Opera (Yiddish Theatre)

Best Director: David Latham for Wit (Centaur)

Best Actor: Joe Cobden in After the Dance

Best Actress (tie): Rosemary Dunsmore in Wit and Uta Hagen in Collected Stories

Best Design/Look: Twelfth Night (Repercussion Theatre)

Best Visiting Production: In on it (Da Da Kamera at Usine C)

Best New Play: This I Know by John Mounsteven (Fringe Festival)

Best Ensemble: Crackwalker (Soulfishing)

Distinction: Heather Markgraf-Lowe of Village Theatre, Hudson

Revelation: Gravy Bath Productions



Members of the Critics' Circle: Stan Asher, Amy Barratt, Gaetan Charlebois, Pat Donnelly, Myron Galloway and Estelle Rosen. :