London Assurance

Another televised production from the National Theatre in London. A very frivolous play, but great fun and well worth watching. Sometimes it is nice to see a set of unfamiliar actors, although several of this cast are quite familiar faces from British television. And Michele Terry, who played Grace is familiar from the National Theatre production of All's Well That Ends Well, last fall.
Spectacular performances from Simon Russell Beale as Sir Harcourt Courtly (Brian Bedford's role in the Stratford production) amd Fiona Shaw as Lady Gay Spanker (Seana McKenna). richard Briers was charming as Adolphus Spanker and Matt Cross was a terrific Richard Dazzle.

One Touch of Venus

Ultimately a forgettable musical, although the promise of music by Kurt Weill and lyrics by Ogden Nash had me hoping for more.
the cast was great, the staging was great, but ultimately the whole was not enough. Leaving the theatre, the phrase about the talking dog came to mind : "it was not what he said, but the fact that he talked at all!". Maybe this play is the evidence that the restrictions of the mandate are getting in the way. Then again, maybe it was seeing "The Women" the same day that was the problem - you can only take so much New Jersey squealing!
I did really enjoy the dance number Dr Crippen> In fact I liked it all - just not enough.

The Women

Our first production at the Shaw Festival this year, the Women is a very dated and very unflattering view of women in groups. Gossip and bitchiness are the theme; affairs and divorce the subject. I certainly don't treat my women friends this way, nor do we spend all our time gossiping about the women who are absent. But I have to admit, the play has a lot of great lines, many of which caused the man two rows in front of us to bellow with laughter.
Jackie Maxwell has brought together a great cast of women, as usual. The settings were spectacular and the costumes made me sigh for a more formal life style so I could have an excuse to wear those dresses!
It was a light comedy, but somehow did not srike quite the right note for me.

Hommage

A slight play about an incident in which an artwork was destroyed and the artist sued for destruction of his copyright. He won, a judgement I do agree with.
The play was about this theme, but also about spending your life doing what is important to you.
Good cast and good peformances and a very effective set. But not really worth the trouble.

The Infernal Comedy

Subtitle is confessions of a serial killer. I wanted to kill someone before it was over.

We went to see this because it was starring John Malkovich. Unfortunately that was not enough.
He spoke with a fake Austrian accent - in my view unnecessary because he was supposed to be dead. Two sporanos sang a series of death arias all by different classical composers, but somehow they all sounded alike. Italian but no surtitles, although you didn't really need a translation.
Totally boring - one of those times when you really wished for an intermission.

Tragedies Romaines

On a whim, after reading a rave review, we booked tickets to one of three performances, made a hotel reservation and hopped on the train to Montreal. After all, who would not jump at the chance to see all three of Shakespeare's Roman tragedies (Coriolanus, Julius Caesar and Anthony and Cleopatra) performed non stop. In Dutch with French and English Surtitles!
Thank heavens we jumped! A truly stunning performance that took six hours, and was just amazing. No long intermissions at all - but every time there was a set change, you got four minutes (sometimes five) to get up and change seats. There was a bar on the stage, selling drinks and snacks. There were also seats on the stage, so you could see the play from a very different perspective. We sat in seven different locations. The longest break was ten minutes in the middle of Anthony and Cleopatra.
The cast were of course completely unkown to us, but were uniformly excellent.
Toneelgroep Amsterdam is the company, and one that we will watch for again. Ivo Van Hove, the general director of TA, created the production.
Coriolanus is still one of the weakest of Shakespeare's plays, but the other two are among his strongest and more than compensated. It is just impossible to warm up to Corilanus ( I had nver thought of him as a Nazi, but this performance brought that to mind.) but the staging was great. It starts with his mother and wife are in an airport waiting lounge, expecting him to return from the wars. This enabled the bar on stage, the use of video and other technology all in context.
The use of video was innovative and very important to the production.
You had to be thre to really get the sense of this production, but everyone who was there loved it. There was at least a five minute standing ovation at the end, in which we whole heartely joined.

Faith Healer

An Irish play with the usual Irish angst. But a formidable cast of three managed to pull it off, keeping us riveted throughout. You could not do this play with any weak cast, but Stuart Hughes, as Frank, Brenda Robbins as Grace and Diego Matamoros as Teddy were all superb. Who would think of Diego Matomoros as a Cockney? Now I do.
A story of faith, love and disappointment. The same story is told from three perspectives; you end up knowing all and knowing nothing.

The Chester Plays

The chance to see part of the cucle of medieval mystery plays known as The Chester plays was too good to pass up. After all, how often can you see three plays before 10:30 in the morning?
We started with "The Harrowing of Hell", then moved to "The Resurrection" and finally to "The Ascension". Staged on wagons on the grounds of Victoria University (U of T), the whole series took three days, involved 300 actors and many acting companies, most from universities across North America. The weather was beautiful and the diehard fans could settle in for the day and be entertained.
This format of production was more casual than the Lincoln mystery plays we saw a couple of summers ago, but still fascinating. It is easy to imagine how powerful these pays were in the days when this was the only entertainment (unless you counting a hanging or bear bating) available.
Definitely an acquired taste and one that might be developed after a few classes on the subject.