Curtain closes on Oh Canada Eh
Pandemic forces closure of Niagara Falls dinner theatre after 26 seasons
A Niagara Falls theatre institution is closing its doors for good because of COVID-19.
Oh Canada Eh, the patriotic dinner theatre that has catered to tourists and locals alike since 1994, has gone dark before its 27th season could even begin.
General manager Eric Hitchcock gave the grim news to staff during a tearful meeting Wednesday afternoon.
“I’ve been fighting the battle in the background, trying to keep things going, but it was inevitable,” said Hitchcock when reached Thursday morning.
“It really is leaving a void in the entertainment world.”
The closure of the Lundy’s Lane theatre will affect eight full-time employees and about 40 cast members and musicians. In addition to the anchor “Oh Canada Eh” show, the company mounted several original musicals over the years, along with a long-running annual production of “The Rocky Horror Show,” which raised funds for Positive Living Niagara.
In recent weeks, the theatre has streamed past productions and even hosted an online benefit show for itself to stay afloat. But Hitchcock said the glut of refund requests for cancelled shows and not knowing when the theatre could open again was insurmountable.
“With the mounting debt and the loss of four months of revenue, (we’ve) lost one-third of our annual revenue and going into the summer where the bulk of your revenue is made to sustain you through the year … it just wasn’t going to sustain itself.”
Money raised through a recent GoFundMe campaign to
save the company will be returned to donors.
Working under the umbrella Canadiana Productions, Oh Canada Eh was one of the most successful dinner theatres to ever operate in Canada. Founded by local travel agent Ross Robinson and theatre performer Jim Cooper, the “Oh Canada Eh” show debuted May 19, 1994, at the now-demolished Pyramid Place.
The concept was simple: Give tourists a musical tribute to the country they were visiting. Taking a tongue-in-cheek approach to Canadian stereotypes (among the characters was Pierre Puck and Nanaimo Ned the Lumberjack), the show survived a rough first year to eventually win over tour bus operators, who were soon delivering customers right to the front door. Oh Canada Eh won several local Misty Awards as Niagara Falls Attraction of the Year and, in 1999, custom-built a log cabin-style theatre on Lundy’s Lane.
Over its 26 seasons, the show was updated but its spirit was intact. It was also home to several dozen local performers over the years, some who performed the show thousands of times. A second production of the show opened in Ottawa last year, owned by former cast members.
The company survived SARS and 9/11, but succumbed when it was forced to close by COVID-19.
Artistic director Lee Siegel, who has written 16 shows for the company since joining in 1997, said the company left an indelible mark on his life and the Niagara theatre scene.
“I’ve learned so much and gained so much from there,” he said. “It’s like losing a major family member.”
“When we sat around the manager’s room yesterday getting the information, it was a room full of tears. And then laughter, and more tears. You just realized how many (people) we touched … over a million people in the world, and what our job has done.”
Though the Lundy’s Lane building is now for sale, both Hitchcock and Siegel are hopeful a new theatre company can rise from Oh Canada Eh’s long shadow once the pandemic is over.
“If I can’t save Canadiana Productions, I’ll do whatever I can to save the cast members that we worked with,” said Siegel. “If that means starting a new theatre company, maybe that’s what happens.”