NEXT CHAPTER
P.E.I. actor goes behind the scenes to present three nights of comedy, Nov. 22-24
After generating much laughter with his performances in “Annekenstein”, “Sketch-22’ and “The Popalopalots”, funny man Rob MacDonald is taking a step back from the spotlight.
In the past few weeks, he’s been working behind the scenes – writing, directing and producing “Four One-Act Comedies Did by Rob MacDonald”. The show runs Nov. 22-25 at the Guild in Charlottetown.
“It’s a new chapter. For the first time I’m involved in a production that I’m not acting in, and it feels weird,” says MacDonald.
For the first time, he’s also learning to let go.
“It’s thrilling. It’s like having a baby and knowing that, at some point, your baby is going to have to go on a date. And, as a parent, you’re hoping everything goes well. You’ve brought your baby up to this point and now you don’t have any control over the choices your baby makes.”
This is in contrast to a previous mindset where he felt that if he was on stage with the script he had some control over the things that happened.
“It’s terrifying. But, luckily, I have a super great cast,” says MacDonald, adding the troupe includes Alicia Arsenault, Adam Brazier, Kassinda Bulger, Kelly Caseley, Jay Gallant, Cameron MacDonald, Rachel MacLeod, Lennie MacPherson, Graham Putnam, Rory Starkman and Tim Wartman.
The evening will unfold in a typical theatre fashion.
“Basically, it’s two acts of oneact plays. Each play is under 30 minutes, so it’s two hours of comedy,” says MacDonald.
The program includes “The Cat Fight”, a play about a woman who faces competition when she brings her feline to a cat beauty pageant, “The Nappers”, which is the story of four kidnappers who, after taking a child, have trouble making the ransom call because of their own ineptitude and “St. Anne, Saviour of Lost Souls”, about two nice street people who decide to mount “Anne of Green Gables” on the street to see if they can make some money from it.
“We’ll find out whether or not it works out for them or not,” says MacDonald, with a twinkle in his eye.
The fourth or final play, “The Swedish Movie”, starring Adam Brazier and Kelley Caseley, is about a couple living in a cottage and the disintegration of their relationship.
“There are no jokes in the script, but I’m hoping that audiences will find it funny because of the actors, and the situation parodies a Swedish movie. There are purposeful, long pauses; time where nothing seems to be happening like you’d see in one of those movies.”
Long-time friend Dave Stewart has read “The Swedish Movie” and the other three plays and “can’t wait to see the transition from script to stage.”
“Rob has been a force in P.E.I.’s arts scene since the 1980s, but this project is really something else altogether. Here, it’s really all about his skills as a writer and a director, not as an actor who can save a piece by reading an audience and pulling out all the stops to help lift it if it’s not flying.
“By the time this is on stage, his work will have been done. I think that might be a kind of a scary notion, but that’s also part of what makes this exciting.”
MacDonald calls it risk-taking and hopes to do more of it in the coming years.
“I think I have at least one novel in me and maybe a musical.
MacDonald’s recent flood of creativity was inspired by a change in his personal life. Two years ago, when his job as a copywriter at a Charlottetown radio station became redundant, he shifted his attention to his own projects.
“I was happy to go…Now, the challenge is figuring out which of the avenues I want to take to take in my next step.”