CENTAUR, SEGAL FACE OFF
Offerings include hockey stories
Say the word “puck” to your average theatregoer, and chances are their thoughts will immediately go to a mischievous fairy in a Shakespeare play. That might change soon, though, with two major shows in this fall season dedicated to Canada’s favourite sport.
The Segal Centre unveils its latest big musical, The Hockey Sweater, from Oct. 19 to Nov. 12. Based on the beloved short story by Roch Carrier, it centres on an ardent young Montreal Canadiens fan who, eagerly awaiting a Maurice Richard sweater as a gift, is devastated to find he’s been sent a Toronto Maple Leafs one instead. It’s been adapted by Emil Sher, whose adaptation of the Holocaust drama Hana’s Suitcase was put on by Geordie Productions a couple of years back, with Jonathan Monro on composing duties. It will be directed by musicals ace Donna Feore, whose production of Guys and Dolls is playing at Stratford. More information at segalcentre.org.
Centaur Theatre, though, gets its skates on first with Playing With Fire: The Theo Fleury Story, which plays from Oct. 3 to 29. It’s a visiting, multi-awardwinning production from Saskatoon’s Persephone Theatre (not to be confused with Montreal’s Persephone Productions), and stars Shaun Smyth as the legendary hockey player who was considered too short to play in the NHL, yet went on to Stanley Cup and Olympic gold glory. Smyth holds the stage alone as he acts out Fleury’s alternately exuberant and deeply disturbing story, with Centaur’s stage magically transformed into a functioning ice rink. A fun extra: selected participants will be invited to belt out O Canada before each performance. Visit centaurtheatre.com/playingwith-fire to see how you can get involved.
Playing With Fire is the first production to play here under the aegis of new Centaur boss Eda Holmes, who, fresh from her production of Dracula at the Shaw Festival (where she was associate director for seven years), will be helming the Olivier- and Tony Awardwinning spoof The 39 Steps. A zany take both on the 1915 novel by John Buchan (Canada’s 15th governor general, by the way) and the Hitchcock film version, it stars Andrew Shaver as the dashing, international-conspiracy-thwarting Richard Hannay. It runs Nov. 14 to Dec. 10.
Also at Centaur, the Brave New Looks slot is taken by Scapegoat Carnivale’s intriguing take on Sophocles’s Oedipus. In Andreas Apergis’s production, the action on the stage is accompanied by live feeds from multiple Montreal locations as local choirs provide the play’s chorus of plague-stricken Theban citizens. The play runs Oct. 19 to 22.
Talisman Theatre guests at the Centaur with Vic and Flo Saw a Bear (Nov. 21 to Dec. 2), a stage version of the Denis Côté movie about two female ex-cons and their growing relationship. Noir thriller, horror and magic realism combine in this adaptation from Michael Mackenzie, who also directs. Another guest production at Centaur is the return of the sexy circus piece The Goblin Market (Sept. 27 to 29), from New Zealand company The Dust Palace. The show will also play as part of Centaur’s gala fundraiser on Sept. 26. More information at centaur.com.
Hudson Village Theatre also has a change of personnel at the top. Artistic director Matthew Tiffin has stepped aside for Andrea Romaldi, previously literary manager of Toronto’s Tarragon Theatre, currently playwriting teacher at the National Theatre School, and Tiffin’s other half. Next week, the theatre hosts a reprise of Rustwerk Refinery’s META-winning, two-dimensional-puppet epic Louis Riel: A Comic-Strip Stage Play (Sept. 6 to 10). More information at villagetheatre.ca.
Circling back to the Segal, there’s the welcome return of Bad Jews (Nov. 8 to 26), Joshua Harmon’s coruscating comedy about warring cousins in a New York apartment. Original cast members Sarah Segal-Lazar, Jamie Elman and Jake Goldsbie are back, with Ellen Denny replacing Victoria Diamond as the ditzy gentile lamb to the slaughter.
The Segal also plays host to Black Theatre Workshop’s production of The Mountain Top, Katori Hall’s acclaimed twohander, which imagines Martin Luther King Jr.’s last night on Earth. Tristan D. Lalla plays the great man, Letitia Brookes the mysterious woman who knocks on his hotel door. The play runs Oct. 14 to 29.
Young people’s theatre company Geordie Productions will bring Anita Majumdar’s Dora Award-winning Boys With Cars to the Monument-National from Nov. 24 to Dec. 2. Directed by Brian Quirt of Toronto’s Nightswimming Theatre, it uses hip hop and Bollywood to explore, sometimes with wild humour, bullying and sexual pressures on teens. More information at geordie.ca.
Even younger theatregoers should be delighted by Wake Up Sleeping Beauty! from Live Action Theatre, which plays Sept. 23 and 24 in the West Island Arts Alive! festival at St. John Fisher Junior School, 87 Belmont Ave., Pointe-Claire. More information at 2017.arts-alive-quebec.ca.
Infinithéâtre has a new temporary home. It’s Espace Knox (6215 Godfrey Ave.) in N.D.G., where the company will host a guest production from Japanese company Theatre Office Natori. Godot Has Come (Nov. 28 to Dec. 2) is Minoru Betsuyaku’s reimagining of Samuel Beckett’s masterpiece, though it promises to be much funnier. It will play with English and French surtitles. And playwrights, don’t forget the deadline for Infinithéâtre’s annual Write-on-Q competition falls on Sept. 5. Top prize is $3,000, and winners and runners-up will receive staged readings in The Pipeline event, also at Espace Knox, from Dec. 7 to 9. More information at infinitheatre.com.
Two of the most popular shows in this year’s Fringe festival get an encore at MainLine Theatre this fall. Concordia graduate Buru Emeç took the MainLine Creativity Frankie Award for tldr; smh, a solo performance in which Emeç’s alter ego Lady Jîyan addresses Kurdish identity, safe spaces and female fighters against ISIS. Oh, and since you ask, the title is internet shortform for “too long, didn’t read; shaking my head.”
Precinct: An Improvised Cop Comedy was my favourite show of this year’s Fringe, a laugh-outloud cop-cliché fest set in the Plateau. Both shows play Oct. 4 to 6.
Further Fringe encores will be announced soon, as will the precise dates for MainLine’s annual Halloween Rocky Horror Show, as well as Snowglobe Theatre’s production of the classic screwball comedy His Girl Friday. More information at mainlinetheatre.ca.
On a grander scale, the Andrew Lloyd Webber behemoth The Phantom of the Opera will be dropping its chandelier on Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier of Place des Arts from Oct. 4 to 15. And for one night only at the same theatre, Buddy — The Buddy Holly Story rocks its way through a wealth of greatest hits on Nov. 26. More information at placedesarts.com.