The past year was a banner one for theatre
What does a year as a cultural capital look like? If you’re a performing arts fan, the past year, in which Calgary has acted as an official Cultural Capital, offers a series of images as the dizzying events of 2012 roll through your brain.
There was that night way back in January, when Zach Oberzan channelled Jean-Claude Van Damme in Your Brother, Remember? at the High Performance Rodeo, before suddenly vanishing. Dozens of pairs of hockey gloves spilling from the rafters of the Martha Cohen Theatre on opening night of the sensational Playing With Fire: The Theo Fleury Story. Buckets of blood splattered against walls in Vertigo’s awesome and amazing Sweeney Todd. Big, pink roses filling up Max Bell with the distinct aroma of romance during Theatre Calgary’s sellout hit production of Pride and Prejudice — and lots more.
Time to take out your rear-view mirrors and glance back at the hits, misses and memories of an epic year in Calgary’s performing arts scene. Twelve memorable moments from Calgary performing arts
in 2012
1. Theo Fleury: Playing With Fire, Alberta Theatre Projects. In an odd intersection of sports and theatre, we had Shaun Smythe (as Theo) hoisting the 1989 Stanley Cup and skating (on fake ice) around the stage of the Martha Cohen Theatre in Kirstie McLelland-Day’s exhilarating adaptation of her bestselling book about Theo’s insanely dramatic life. As it turned out, it was also the only local hockey highlight of 2012.
2. Sweeney Todd, Vertigo Theatre. Kevin Aichele, a muttonchopped murdering barber, used his strap razor to wreak a little vengeance on London’s elite in Vertigo’s sizzling production of the classic Sondheim musical. Director Mark Bellamy’s innovative use of a bucket of blood was truly inspired stage directing.
3. Jack Goes Boating, Sage Theatre. In a beautifully acted ensemble piece about a quartet of low-hopes New Yorkers searching for love and happiness, this gorgeous little show pivoted on Frank Zotter’s mesmerizing monologue in which he explains his complex relationship to a guy named The Canneloni.
4. Hamlet, Shakespeare Company. Christian Goutsis’s Hamlet was a man of many mood swings as he navigated the machinations of the Danish court following the murder of his dad by his uncle — either that or he was nuts. Either way, The Shakespeare Company’s sold-out production — the first under new artistic director Haysam Kadri — was a smash.
5. Pride and Prejudice, Theatre Calgary. Mr. Darcy (Tyrell Crews) and Elizabeth Bennet (Shannon Taylor) made an irresistible love match, but the hidden delight this superb adaptation (by Victoria playwright Janet Munsil) of Jane Austen’s classic romance was Elizabeth Stepkowski Tarhan, as the Bennet matriarch who wheeled and dealed her daughter’s affections with the glee of Toronto Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke swapping future draft picks for temperamental snipers.
6. Paper Series, Magnetic North Festival. David Yee’s collection of short plays created one of the more enduring images of Toronto seen on stage recently, particularly his story of an immigrant cab driver physician who tapes his medical degree over his hack licence as he saves a life in a traffic jam.
7. One, Magnetic North Festival. Mani Soleymanlou’s dazzling, funny solo show expertly spoofed solo shows and identity politics at the same time as it told a hugely affecting story about Soleymanlou’s own journey of inauthenticity as a quasi-Iranian-Canadian actor. For icing on the cake, Soleymanlou performed in both English and French.
8. We’re Gonna Die by Young Jean Lee, Theatre Junction. For four nights in March, the Theatre Junction Grand was transformed into a cabaret as we were treated to the talent, vision, humour and (self-confessed) bad acting of Young Jean Lee, a superb new New York playwright to watch. Lee’s band was catchy and selfeffacing, too.
9. A Steady Rain, Ground Zero and Hit & Myth Productions. Joel Cochrane and Brian Jensen memorably played a pair of Chicago cops navigating murky moral waters that drag one cop’s life into hell. Jensen and Cochrane both delivered strong performances in a play for dudes if ever there was one.
10. Intimate Apparel, Alberta Theatre Projects. Karen Robinson’s Esther was one of the most memorable characters to take the Calgary stage all year — a turn-ofthe-century, soon-to-be spinster African-American woman taking her last, best stab at finding someone to love. It was beautiful storytelling by Lynn Nottage, gorgeously staged by director Nigel Shawn Williams.
11. Next to Normal, Theatre Calgary. A musical about a bipolar woman’s search for normal turned out to be one of the pleasures of 2012, even if it traded in musical theatre wish fulfilment for a cold slap of brittle reality.
12. Drama: Pilot Episode, Alberta Theatre Projects. Calgary
playwright Karen Hines took 13 years to write it, but Drama: Pilot Episode — a wacked-out satire of Calgary yuppie culture, the Banff Television Festival, Hollywood, gurus and contemporary life — featured some of the funniest lines of the year.
And let’s not forget these memorable efforts:
Christopher Duthie’s nOOb, Calgary Opera’s La Boheme and Moby Dick, Lunchbox Theatres’ Second Chance, First Love and Aviatrix: The Untold Story of Amelia Earhart, Theatre Calgary’s Shirley Valentine, Crystal Pite’s Tempest Uprising (Fluid Festival), Old Trout Puppet’s Ignorance, She Has a Name and Red Headed Stepchild from the Calgary Fringe Festival, Forte Musical Guild’s Jeremy de Bergerac, Ground Zero’s Race, the High Performance Rodeo’s presentation of Laurie Anderson’s Another Day in America and Zach Oberzan’s Your Brother, Remember?, Ubuntu, Madelaine Sami’s Number 2, John Murrell’s Taking Shakespeare and Onalea Gilbertson and David Rhymer’s Only Love Knows Love, Ghost River’s Everything is Terribly Nice Here, Mayor Nenshi white hatting the cast on opening night of The Jersey Boys, Col Cseke’s Jim Forgetting and Verb Theatre’s Noise, Downstage’s Bashir Lazhar, and Decidedly Jazz Danceworks’ Flare.
Happy holidays.