Tag: Theatre Passe Muraille

Try A Little Tenderness

On November 30, 2015

Full cast of King Lear. Photo by Anthony Leclair

King Lear is one of my favorite plays. The 1606 work examines ideas of family, responsibility, motivation, and obligation in a cutting way few other theatrical works do. The premise is basic: Lear, wanting to divide his kingdom between his three daughters, asks them to express their love. Goneril and Regan go over-the-top in their declamations, while the youngest, Cordelia, says she loves him “according to my bond, no more, nor less.” The former are rewarded for their proclamations; the latter, banished for her honesty. Therein ensues a monumental family tragedy, one that incorporates another family’s drama (a nasty one involving two sons, each from different mothers), and a dance of damaged children and hurting parents that spirals toward an inevitably tragic conclusion.

In light of my mother’s passing earlier this year, I wasn’t sure that seeing Lear live wouldn’t be a slightly painful ordeal. The dramas, the breakdowns, the unseemly machinations and manipulations, the reconciliation between Lear and Cordelia happening too late and being all too brief – Shakespeare’s great work was difficult for me to contemplate watching live. And yet something pulled me in the direction of Theatre Passe Muraille when I heard about the Watershed Shakespeare Festival Collective production.

Ostensibly set in Upper Canada in 1837, director Rod Carley uses the theatre’s intimate surroundings to incredible effect, with a pared-down cast, simple set design (by Frank Vona), dramatic lighting (by John Batchelor) and sound effects (by Brian Nettlefold), creating a deeply moving portrait of a family in crisis. The tensions between the characters are brought to vivid life via stellar ensemble work, particularly the growing animosity between sisters Goneril (Maureen Cassidy) and Regan (Jennifer Ritchie), and their overall disgust with younger sister Cordelia (an endearingly earnest Kelsey Ruhl). Joshua Bainbridge, who plays Edmund, bastard son to Gloucester (a fantastically earthy Charlie Tomlinson), offers a deeply fascinating portrait of deceit, using a combination of easy joviality and wide-eyed “integrity” to convince his father that legitimate son Edgar (Ethan Chapman) is up to no good. Hume Baugh is a bitingly angry Fool, frustrated as much with his master as with his own failing health (Carley’s production simply, powerfully answers the lingering question of what happens to the Fool), and nicely contrasts with Ethan Chapman’s sparky take on Edgar’s “Poor Tom” disguise.

David Fox as King Lear and Hume Baugh as the Fool. Photo by Anthony Leclair

The chemistry between the cast is indeed electric, a feeling intensified by the close quarters of the performance space itself; when Regan’s husband, the Duke of Cornwall (Jeff Miller), goes to forcibly remove Gloucester’s eyes, one winces more than usual — the players are only mere feet away, after all, and though there is no blood or gore, there is a visceral sense to the proceedings made all the more keen because of the immediacy of the players, their words, their conviction to the text and to the world director Carley has placed them in. This is a King Lear that feels very real, its family dramas and power plays disquietingly close, both literally and figuratively.

What powers much of this intimacy, outside of the space itself, is the central performance of David Fox, an actor perhaps best known for his portrayal of school teacher Clive Pettibone on the television series Road to Avonlea. His portrayal of Lear, by turns spitting orders and then stumbling over words, standing over an intransigent Earl of Kent (Tim Nicholson) and then doddering barefoot along wearing a crown of branches later, is shattering. Fox, who is 74 years old, uses his own gangly physicality to complete advantage, standing imperiously at the start of the work, and fumbling in a wheelchair by its end. He plumbs the depths of Lear’s failing health, mentally and physically, and bases much of the character’s outrage on a very real and palpable sense of damaged pride.

David Fox as King Lear. Photo by Anthony Leclair

This is, as many with aging parents will know, a very big thing with the elderly. Dealing with pride amidst failing health is no small matter. There was something so utterly familiar about the mix of vulnerability, confusion, shame, and theatrical show of pride in Fox’s performance of the old King, that more than once I found myself gritting teeth to control tears. A companion who joined me at the performance said something at the intermission about the ungrateful daughters needing to “humour” Lear, but, as I watched the second half, with each appearance of Lear revealing more and more of his fragility, all I could think was, tenderness is key. It is everything in dealing with a failing parent. Tenderness is what Cordelia offers, in abundance; the expression on Ruhl’s face as she interacts with Fox brims with this very quality, even as her character must swallow the deep grief at seeing his deterioration. We remember how our parents used to be, and it’s hard, if not impossible, to reconcile that with the small, sickly person before us; no matter how large a parent might’ve loomed in our lives, the fact they shrink, literally and figuratively, bowed before age and infirmity, is heartbreaking. This is what Cordelia deals with when she sees her father again, after he’s been rejected by his elder daughters and has wandered the heath in a storm. Time has sped up, only to be stopped, mercifully, in order for the two to beautifully, poetically reconcile. Seeing who he is, past the physical, and embracing it, as opposed to rejecting it, manipulating it, making a play based on personal want, is what makes Cordelia such a unique and moving figure.

Tenderness is the slow, gentle engine that allows great if quiet love to make itself known. It means putting our own ego wants — what we think the parent should be saying or doing or believing or choosing — aside. Tenderness only asks for and manifests in loving presence, little more. Anyone who’s experienced the deterioration of a parent, whether through illness or age (or both), will tell you it isn’t the easiest thing in the world, not by a longshot; one has to have Herculean levels of patience and fortitude, and, being only human, none of us can manage to be saintly 100% of the time. And when that parent has a moment of self-awareness, and asks for your forgiveness, as Lear does with Cordelia, there is really little to be said or done, but to hold hands, gently, and to simply be there, tenderly, as they make their way into another realm. King Lear reminded me of the importance of tenderness, earlier this year, and now, and moving forwards. All hail, King Tenderness.

Folk, Present And To Come

By Catherine Kustanczy

On March 4, 2010

In interviews

Future Folk is a challenging title; it implies a vision to the future, but also a glance to the past. The play, now on at Toronto’s Theatre Passe Muraille, centers on the lives of Filipino nannies who come to work in Canada. Produced by Canadian company Sulong Theatre Collective, the show is a reminder of the silent caregivers who populate households and often endure terrible treatment in order to support their own families back home. The word “sulong” means “battle cry” in Tagalog and is a suitable match for the show’s angry undercurrent; it’s described as a piece that “shouts, wails and screams on behalf of brown women everywhere“.

Great, but there’s been some criticism that the play is too agitprop in its depiction of live-in nannies’ struggles in Canada. One Canadian newspaper recently ran two interesting pieces contrasting actual nanny reactions with their theater critic’s view; it was a good insight into the ways celebrated slice-of-life theater isn’t always reflected with exuberant critical acceptance. Not that Catherine Hernandez cares.

Sulong Theatre Collective’s co-founder wrote Future Folk without worrying over whether balance was being served. As she told me (below), balance and truth aren’t always friends. Hernandez is a feisty one-woman theater dynamo whose first play, Singkil, was nominated for an astounding seven Dora Awards. She’s worked with a bevvy of celebrated Canadian theater companies, including fuGEN, Buddies in Bad Times, Native Earth, Aluna, and many others. Hernandez set out with the intention of challenging stereotypes and shaking people out of their comfort zones -all while remaining respectful (read: loving) toward the original women’s stories.

How much of Future Folk is based on direct experience?

All of it is based on direct experiences of women we interviewed. Most of these women were still in the caregiver program, others had just completed it.

Any specific inspirations?

The use of Filipino folk arts to tell the story of Filipinos now. I realized there were so many “harvest” dances in our dance canon. I wanted to see if we could use the same vocabulary to tell the story of our women harvesting money for their families back in the Philippines.

What was the main challenge in theatricalizing nanny experiences?

First, it was actually speaking to the caregivers. I would book time to speak with them on their day off, only to have their employers cut their day off due to their own busy lives. Next, was to be absolutely honest about our -as in the collective’s -position of privilege. We had to remember that we were not them. Although I worked as a caregiver, I was never live-in, nor was I a mother at that time wondering about the safety of my children while caring for others. When we admitted this to ourselves, we were able to delve deeper into their experiences with curiosity and open-hearts instead of assumptions.

How do you balance the bad experiences with the good ones in the work?

This is one of the major comments about our work: the balance. Hmmm… I think it’s telling when every caregiver I met has complaints about the power struggle with their employer. It’s even more telling when people outside of the caregiving community and those who are employers bring up the “good” side. What it means to me is that there is an obvious disconnect with the realities of these women. I had a conversation with playwright Maja Ardal about this, and she said, point-blank, that it matters little to show balance. What matters is giving voice to the voiceless. These women are definitely voiceless. So balance be damned. I am not in the business of making people feel okay about themselves. I am in the business of helping people be self-critical. Balance doesn’t do that. Truth does.

Who did you write this for?

I wrote this for both the caregivers and for those outside of the caregiving community. For caregivers, I wanted them to see their story onstage and to know that their lives were remembered and honoured by someone… I wrote this for the average Canadian who might have a range of emotions seeing the show, anything from “I’m not like this” to “These women are so lucky for the chance to be here -why complain?”

How have you felt at various nannies’ reactions?

It has been overwhelming. When we first performed a ten-minute excerpt at the Kultura Filipino Arts Festival at the Kapisanan Centre, we had two caregivers in the audience. They came backstage sobbing and thanking us for portraying them. We knew we had to continue, no matter what. When we perform on March 7th, we will be performing for free to a house full of caregivers. That’s when I feel our job will be done.

What do you hope audiences come away with?

I want each audience to come home that night, look right inside their hearts and ask themselves what they truly think about migrant workers. They’ll probably be surprised by what they find. We, as the collective certainly were. Throughout this process of development, I can’t tell you how much respect I have gained for these people. I will be forever humbled.

Future Folk runs at Theatre Passe Muraille through March 13th.

The Outsider

By Catherine Kustanczy

On January 6, 2010

In opera

Next month will mark ten years since I’ve moved back to Canada.

Prior to that, I’d been living abroad, first in Ireland, then England, for close to two years. I learned so much during my time away, though in the midst of it, I couldn’t shake the feeling of being an outsider. In my youth, I truly fit the role of a misfit; I was the girl who’d skip class to go to the art gallery or, in elementary school, intentionally forget gym clothes to read Kerouac. But being in a completely new environment presented a new, much more frightening challenge. It was uppermost in my mind to fit in as much as possible with my new chosen countries and their inhabitants, while at the same time maintaining my individuality and identity (which was a very shifting, transforming thing). Keeping balanced amidst those cataclysmic changes was a high wire act I didn’t always perform successfully. Never has Dickens’ “best of times / worst of times” dialectic been more obviously manifest in my life than it was when I lived abroad.

So it was with a lot of fascination that I read about Canadian theatre artist Maja Ardal‘s work You Fancy Yourself, a classic fish-out-of-water tale. In the one-woman show, award-winning Ardal uses pieces from her own background as a transplanted Icelandic native growing up in 1950s Edinburgh to tell the tale of friends new and old, memories made and forgotten. I had the opportunity to exchange some ideas around the ‘outsider’ label with her, and to glean her thoughts around an aspect of theatre that’s always fascinated me: the solo show.

Where did the idea for You Fancy Yourself originate? How much of it is personal?
I loved to dress up when I was a kid. My Mum had a trunk full of fabulous forties gowns and blouses. When I put those clothes on, I imagined myself to be completely transformed-as if I was the most glamorous film star in Hollywood. One day, I wore an amazing puffy frilly “off the shoulder” blouse to school, thinking that all the girls in the playground would worship and adore me. Instead, I was ridiculed, and pushed around by a mob of girls who all shouted “Who do you think you are!? YOU FANCY YOURSELF!!”

About six years ago I started to think about those awful childhood moments that throw the cold light of day onto our dreams. I began to write story/poems about other children I remembered from my childhood, and the public humiliations they went through at the hands of bullies. I decided to try turning those poems into a play. The world of the play came alive around Elsa, a little Icelandic girl who has to learn how to fit into the rough world of the Edinburgh playground. As I wrote the play I compressed it all into fictional scenes. When I performed all the characters, I knew I’d made the right choice, as it is truly a joy to perform them all.

What are the best and worst things about doing a one-woman show?
The best things about doing a one person show are that I don’t have to compromise to other cast members when we have a gig or a tour, I am free to invent new things on the spur of the moment and I get really fit because the show is so physical! Also, I have an intimate relationship with the audience. I can’t hide from them and they can’t hide from me, and they start to realise how much I need them to play with me, and frankly their surprise and delight feeds me with joy and energy.

The worst things are that it’s lonely in the dressing room -it’s lonely when I’m on tour, like in Prince Edward Island and Salt Spring, or Edinburgh, and have no one to share the sights with when I have the flu, and have to pretend to myself that I don’t, and just do the show because there’s no understudy. I did a run of the show in Hamilton starting with the flu. The bizarre thing is that I would always start to feel better when the adrenaline kicked in, then the next day it would all have to begin gain.

What do you hope audiences come away with?
Having done so many shows and received so many written and verbal responses, I think I can safely say that people come away feeling rewarded, that they were at a play that spoke to them so personally while at the same time making them laugh wildly-and shed the odd tear. The play seems to remind us that when we try too hard to belong we must be careful not to betray those we love.

You Fancy Yourself runs at Toronto’s Theatre Passe Muraille until January 23rd.

them & us & TPM

By Catherine Kustanczy

On January 16, 2009

In opera

Now here’s a neat example of the power of online media in the arts world.

Mention this blog to receive a $15 ticket for Tracy Dawson’s Them & Us, on now through January 31st. That’s for any ticket, any night, any time.

Them & Us is made up of a series of vignettes exploring the ins and outs of modern relating. By turns funny, poignant and… well, salty (the skit involving a 16-year-old propositioning her father’s business partner is one you won’t soon forget), Dawson’s work goes way past the boring “relationship drama” cliches. That can only be a good thing. And it features a quartet of awesome Canadian talent; as well as Dawson, there’s Sarah Dodd, Gray Powell, and Michael Healey (A comment about his performance I overheard at the opening: “If he were any more dry, he’d bleed sand…” True story.)

It’s cold and wintery. You’re not in Utah. So go to the theatre already.

Call the Arts Box Office (416.504.7529) or check out the TPM website.
Tell ’em Play Anon sent ya.

If You Want Something Done…

By Catherine Kustanczy

On November 12, 2008

In opera

Over at the wonderful theatre blog cleverly titled Tynan’s Anger, the idea of the intersection between art and commerce is examined, specifically through the lens of theatrical production. Ethan, the blog’s author, writes:

If you’re in theater, even using the term “commodity” in referring to theater will make you cringe. Yet, the fact that this cringe is nearly universal is a unique thing to theater, in terms of business and even in terms of the arts.

Maybe this is the problem the arts in Canada have: people who stomp about decrying the wasteful spending of their tax dollars see artists turning away from commercial models, from things like Dirty Dancing, Jersey Boys, and The Sound of Music. Sure, on one level, it’s apples and oranges comparing those sorts of shows to, say, something from Passe Muraille or the Tarragon or even Soulpepper, but still, those inside the arts community -not all, mind, but some -turn up their noses, and, to quote Jeremy Kushnier (who’s in Jersey Boys), regard musicals as the dirty cousin of the stage. Hello, unity?

Without getting into an argument about what constitutes either culture or commodity, I have to say, I’m a bit surprised at the amount of shock coming from artists over the cancellation of the National Portrait Gallery. Is it really that surprising? Culture is not on Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s priority list. Right or wrong, like it or lump it, it isn’t there. Period. That isn’t going to change.

Ergo, the onus is on us to promote our work in unorthodox, inventive ways. This is an opportunity. It means more than ever, arts companies -including theatre companies, of course -need to be more aggressive than ever to get the word out there -about who they are, what they do, how they do it, and why they do it. To quote an arts journalist friend who has covered this issue extensively, most voters who object to public funding of arts projects have a/ little to no idea of funding structures, and b/ are unaware that funding is less than half of the total operating budget of any project or company.

What does this mean? See above.

To quote Ethan again, “most theater people are introverts” -but it’s time we came out of our collective safety shell of our familiar community and started courting those people coming out of the Royal Alex. Call me naive, but I think it’s worth a shot, particularly since culture isn’t about to be promoted by our own government anytime soon. Just as I refuse to bitch and whine about the arts’ collective victimization in this country, I refuse to believe all hope is lost. It isn’t. Let’s go.