Get thee to a dance floor

>> Hip hop Hamlet and other highlights

by AMY BARRATT

Last week, we looked at some of the theatrical blockbusters heading our way in the next few months. This week, a look at some stuff that comes with less fanfare, and a price tag under 50 bucks.
A press kit from a new company called Beyond the Cubicle has captured my imagination in a big way. In February, they’ll be presenting Denmark and Elsinore, a multimedia, multi-cultural interpretation of Hamlet at—get this—Le Swimming. The press kit includes a professional-looking music video and the full soundtrack (hip hop, trance, deep house, salsa…) on CD. It’s all-original music by Marlon G. and Jesus Perez and Orchestra. Does the bonus track, “Something Wicked,” featuring the weird sisters from Macbeth, signal a sequel already in the works? Paging Baz Luhrmann…

If you prefer your Shakespeare without the backbeat, Concordia’s Theatre Department is taking on Julius Caesar in March. That’ll be in the intimate F.C. Smith Studio space, directed by Greg Kramer. Then in April, Concordia presents the season’s second Six Characters in Search of an Author, following Wajdi Mouawad’s adaptation of the Pirandello work at Quat’Sous. Concordia’s version will be in the D.B. Clarke Theatre, directed by Eda Holmes.

The Saidye is straying from their format established over the last few years of hosting outside companies more than producing their own shows. Toronto company Soulpepper Theatre’s production of A View From the Bridge has been withdrawn from the season. In its place, in the April slot, is Damn Those Wedding Bells! by local writer Tony Calabretta. Is this change really inspired—as the Saidye is claiming with a straight face—by the events of 9/11, or by events on St-François-Xavier street, namely, an Italo-Canadian comedy that broke all box office records?

Also absent from the Saidye line-up this winter is the Montreal Young Company. Rumour has it they’ll be producing something at the D.B. Clarke this year, but at deadline I had no confirmation.

Perhaps the good people at the Saidye really did change the line-up, replacing a bleak classic with family-friendly comedy, because they realized it was too heavy? They’ll be providing us with a much-needed lesson in Canadian history in March with Blood on the Moon. Produced by Sleeping Dog Theatre in association with the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, it’s a one-man play written and performed by Pierre Brault about the trial of James Patrick Whelan, the man convicted of assassinating Thomas D’Arcy McGee. The courtroom drama, in which Brault plays multiple characters, will be presented with French supertitles. Directed by John Koensgen.
Théâtre d’Aujourd’hui is currently presenting Des fraises en janvier, by Evelyne de la Chenelière, winner of the Masque award for best text in ’98.
In March, T d’A has Jean et Beatrice, the latest text from Carole Frechette (Les Quatre Morts de Marie, La Peau d’Elisa).

Espace GO has an impressive roster of talent for its just-opened Juste la fin du monde, by Jean-Luc Lagarce. Co-directed by Pierre Bernard and Serge Denoncourt, the cast includes Denoncourt, Monique Miller and Luc Picard.
Finally, don’t forget This I Know, the Fringe-festival hit about the founder of a new religion and the damaged souls who attend his first meeting. Written by John Mounsteven, it’s at infinitheatre

Jan. 31–Feb. 10. Info and reservations: 987-1774. :