ATP'S 50th anniversary season promises big shows and laughs
Four plays include a children's classic and a story with a Calgary connection
Alberta Theatre Projects' artistic director Haysam Kadri promises golden memories will flow from the four plays he has chosen for the company's 50th anniversary season.
In October, the season will launch with Conor Mcpherson's The Seafarer, a devilishly funny play about four Irish friends who meet on Christmas Eve to play poker, reminisce, and pour out their souls, as well as a liberal helping of alcohol. There's a fifth guest, a dapper fellow who's not from these parts. The stranger will be played by Paul Gross, and it's a plumb role that's been inhabited by the likes of Ciaran Hinds and Matthew Broderick. It will be directed by film and stage director Peter Pasyk, whose latest collaborations at the Stratford Festival include the 2022 female Hamlet. Kadri says with Pasyk at the helm, audiences should expect the unexpected.
The holiday play will be E.B. White's classic children's allegory Charlotte's Webb, adapted by Joseph Robinette and directed by Rebecca Northan. This is the third time ATP has presented Charlotte's Webb, and it has always proved a hit with audiences, young and old. Kadri says Northan is “a homegrown serious talent. She is so inventive and she will bring the right energy and sensibility to this family classic. It's a big show, with a cast of at least nine people. I want to have at least one of these big shows each season to showcase the talent we have here in Calgary as we did with The Black Bonspiel of Wullie Maccrimmon.”
Kadri will direct King James in the February slot. It's a new play by Rajiv Joseph, whose plays include Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, and Guard at the Taj. This play has a Calgary connection. In 2014, Kadri brought in American actor Glenn Davis to star in The Shakespeare Company's production of Othello. Joseph wrote King James, the story of two strangers who become friends because of their love of basketball, for Davis. Kadri went to Los Angeles to see Davis in King James and told him he'd like to direct the play for Calgary. Davis and Joseph both agreed to give Kadri production rights to the play.
The season will end with Liars at a Funeral, an April/may production of the runaway hit from the Blyth Festival, written by Sophia Fabiili. It's the hilarious story of a grandmother who fakes her death so she can finally get her dysfunctional family members back in a room together. It's a wild farce, and Kadri wants to leave ATP audiences in an upbeat mood. He says Funeral is “a real, hilarious Canadian comedy, and we've seen at ATP how much people want to laugh. Well, this play will do just that.” He is still looking for a director “who knows how to direct farce. It's not a skill every director has.”