AIN’T TOO PROUD – REVIEW OF GRAND ENTERTAINMENT AT THE PRINCESS OF WALES

Reviewed by James Karas

Ain’t Too Proud – The Life and Times of THE TEMPTATIONS is the quintessential entertainment extravaganza.

It is tells the story of one of the most talented and successful groups who sold millions of records and left their mark on American R&B music. That tells us nothing about the thrilling show created by the artistic team.

The show is a concert of songs performed by The Temptations with actors representing the original five and a number of changes that occurred over the years. The Temptations did not so much sing as release vocal, bopping, hopping and physical energy of outrageous proportions.  And that’s just the beginning. 

Ephraim Sykes,  Jawan M. Jackson, Jeremy Pope, Derrick Baskin & 

James Harkness in AIN’T TOO PROUD. Photo by Matthew Murphy

The story of the formation of the group in Detroit in the early 1960’s and its subsequent rise can be long and complex but writer Dominique Morisseau has gleaned incidents and stories from the lives of the men (from Otis Williams’ book The Temptations) that range from the humorous, to the tragic, from the infighting among the group, to drugs, drinking, infidelity, to the toll taken by age, and generally to the “heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to” as Hamlet put it. That is a good step in the right direction but not enough to create a grand show.

The creators have raided The Legendary Motown Catalogue for music and songs from the era and that is a great step forward. For many in the audience songs from the ‘60’s and 70’s are trips down memory lane but for many more they are borrowed memories that are just  as keenly felt and enjoyed given the exuberant performances.

There are other components that bring the whole package together.

Sergio Trujillo’s high-spirited, indeed boisterous choreography provides part of the energy already alluded to.

Howard Binkley’s lighting design and Peter Nigrini’s projection designs provide an almost continuous sense of motion. Projected images are seen at the back of the stage and on the sides of the theatre and there are a few pauses but the idea of never letting the audience alone for more than a few minutes is maintained.

This is very much and ensemble effort that many parts come together to create the show, if we must award an olive wreath it must go to director Des McAnuff. The show glitters from the start and the performers have the audience in the palm of their hands but there is also a buildup to more frenzied showmanship and audience involvement and finally a denouement where we get the disintegration and death from old age or suicide or even more tragically from an industrial accident. 

Christian Thompson, Saint Aubyn, Ephraim Sykes, Jeremy Pope, Derrick Baskin, 

Jawan M. Jackson and James Harkness. Photo by Matthew Murphy

The behind-the-scenes creators of Ain’t Too Proud need a large, talented, disciplined and energized cast to bring the show to life. Singing, dancing, comic scenes, dramatic scenes are all de rigueur in a show like this and they are all delivered to an appreciative audience.

The original five members, Otis Williams (Derrick Baskin), Melvin Franklin (Jawan M. Jackson), Paul Williams (James Harkness) and Al Bryant (Jarvis B. Manning Jr.), and Eddie Kendricks (Jeremy Pope), went through numerous changes for artistic purposes and because of personality clashes. David Ruffin (Ephraim Sykes) became lead singer. They found a song writer in Smokey Robinson (Christian Thompson) and manager Shelly Berger (Joshua Morgan) who knew how to promote them.

Candice Marie Woods plays Dianna Ross and performs with supreme energy with the Supremes and there is a large ensemble to light up and fill the stage when necessary.

Did I say this is an entertainment extravaganza? You can see it here or go to Broadway next year or wait for a road show return some time in the future. But that’s entering into the field of prophecy and I bow out.

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AIN’T TO PROUD: The Life and Times of THE TEMPTATIONS by Dominique Morisseau (book based on The Temptations by Otis William)), The Legendary Motown Catalogue (music and lyrics), runs until November 17, 2018 at the Princess of Wales Theatre, 300 King St. West, Toronto, Ontario. www.mirvish.com

EUGENE ONEGIN – REVIEW OF CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY PRODUCTION

James Karas

The Canadian Opera Company has launched its 2018-2019 season with a production of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin to be followed by Hadrian, a world premiere of a new opera by Rufus Wainwright. This production of Eugene Onegin was directed by Robert Carsen for New York’s Metropolitan Opera and premiered at Lincoln Centre in 1997. The COC has borrowed all scenery and costumes from the Met.

Tchaikovsky’s lush score requires a baritone (for Onegin), a soprano, (for the lovely, romantic Tatyana) a tenor (for the poet Lensky) and a mezzo-soprano (for Tatyana’s sister Olga). I am not denigrating the secondary characters at all and listen to them with pleasure. The COC is quite well equipped for all the roles and what’s more, they are mostly Canadians.

Joyce El-Khoury as Tatyana. Photo: Michael Cooper

Robert Carsen (he is from Toronto) is one of the best opera directors in the world and has done brilliant work using minimalist sets. I think this production of Eugene Onegin would rank as one of his less successful efforts.

During the overture, we see a man on the empty stage seated in a chair reading. We assume it is Onegin and it is an appropriate image of the loner and perhaps eccentric “hero” of the opera. 

The opera opens on a Russian country estate where the peasants sing some pleasant songs. It is harvest time and Carsen and set designer Michael Levine use fallen leaves and orange walls to suggest the season. Aside from a table and a couple of stools there is nothing else on the stage. Except for indicating the season, the set does not communicate anything about time, place or atmosphere.

The famous Letter Scene where Tatyana spends most of the night composing a letter to the haughty Onegin is likewise done on a bed with no other furniture and again it looks pretty barren and the moon does not help.

For the ball scene in Act II a part of the stage is enclosed with chairs and the well-dressed guests try or pretend to waltz. The space is tight and most of the guests either do not know how to waltz or there is not enough room for any twirling.

For the dawn duel between Lensky and Onegin, we see only silhouettes of the men in the morning fog which may be acceptable but not really necessary.

We have much better luck with the singers. Soprano Joyce El-Koury has a lovely, supple voice and exudes youth and innocence as the teenager who falls in love with an older man who is not interested in her or perhaps any other woman.

Bass-baritone Gordon Bintner has an impressive voice and physique but he sang under the disability of a cold. There were times when he did not have the vocal power to dazzle us and no doubt it was because of the cold.

 (centre) Joyce El-Khoury as Tatyana and Gordon Bintner as Eugene Onegin. 

Photo: Michael Cooper

Tenor Joseph Kaiser sang a moving and finely-toned Lensky. He sings tenderly of his lost youth, of his love for Olga and the possibility of his death in the duel with his friend Onegin.

Mezzo-soprano Varduhi Abrahamyan has marvelous voice that can be described metaphorically as plush dark velvet or delicious dark chocolate especially in her lower register (and damn the mixed metaphors). She sang the role of Olga and I hope I did not understate my delight in hearing her.

A final note about the direction. Several years pass between the duel and the next scene in the opera which takes place in a palace in St. Petersburg. While the orchestra plays the polonaise that opens Act III, half a dozen servants fuss over and put together Onegin. This is right after the duel with no pause to indicate the passage of time or the change of scene. Onegin’s first words after the polonaise is that he is bored.

Johannes Debus conducted the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra in a production that has far more plusses than reasons for grouchiness and was received quite heartily by the audience.    

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Eugene Onegin by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky is being performed eight times between September 30 and November 3, 2018 at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, 145 Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario. Tel:  416-363-6671. www.coc.ca

THE NETHER – REVIEW OF STUDIO 180/COAL MINE THEATRE CO-PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

Playwright Jennifer Haley helpfully tells us that the Nether realm is a world for mythical creatures, a demon world or a dimension of Evil or Imagination. At one time Nether was called the Internet and porn was its most popular content.

Haley’s play The Nether, now playing at the Coal Mine Theatre, is about an ugly world of child pornography that has become a new dimension of existence. It is sexual contact with children in the Nether world where you can do the most repugnant things with children without any consequences.

 

Hannah Levinson and David Storch. Photo: Tim Leyes

A businessman named Sims has created the Hideaway, a place of beauty in the Nether, where men visit and meet a pretty nine-year old named Iris and have fun. According to Sims, the Hideaway is nothing but a world of images and having sex with a child or an elf is nothing but images and there are no consequences for doing that or worse.

Detective Morris (Katherine Cullen), who lives in the real world, has set out to find information about Sims and the Hideaway and shut it down. But the Hideaway is in the world of high tech and information is hard to come by and finding where the physical server is located is almost impossible.

The play is structured around Morris interrogating three men – Sims (David Storch), Doyle (Robert Persichini) and Woodnut (Mark McGrinder) who is a special case. The interrogations take place in a dark, forbidding room with Morris playing the tough cop.

The interrogations alternate with scenes in the Hideaway, a pleasant room, a fireplace, views of trees at the back – simply idyllic surroundings. Sims is called Papa, a loveable, well-dressed man who is somewhat severe but he is loved by all. You hear of a spanking room, of favourites and you know that this is a place for paedophilia but it is virtual paedophilia. The problem is the eternal one of image versus reality. Virtual paedophilia encroaches on real child abuse and reality begins to lose its moorings.

Hannah Levinson and Mark McGrinder. Photo: Tim Leyes

That is the issue that Haley raises in this outstanding and fascinating play.

Hannah Levinson exudes all the innocence and beauty of a nine-year old that would attract a paedophile in real life or as a high tech virtual creation. Storch and Persichini are paedophiles who know they are paedophiles and the real world may not know what to do with them or be able to even catch them.

Peter Pasyk does exceptional work in directing the fine cast in a play that pushes the boundaries between virtual and actual reality leaving you astonished. This is truly outstanding theatre. 

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The Nether by Jennifer Haley, in a production by Coal Mine Theatre and Studio 180 Theatre, opened on October 11 and will continues until October 8, 2017 at the Coal Mine Theatre, 1454 Danforth Ave. Toronto, M4J 1N4. www.coalminetheatre.com

AIDA – REVIEW OF LIVE FROM THE MET BROADCAST

Reviewed by James Karas

The Triumphal March from Aida is probably the defining image of opera for many people. There are productions that give the impression that the local zoo was raided for large animals to march across the stage as the heroic Radames returns from the war with the captured Ethiopians and their king in tow. Verdi’s thrilling music, the Metropolitan Opera Chorus, the large number of extras and the imposing set provide an electrifying scene that is simply overwhelming. And yes there are horses for good measure but no other animals such as elephants and giraffes.

Sonja Frisell’s production with Gianni Quaranta’s monumental sets premiered in 1988 and   has held its place in the Met’s repertoire ever since with numerous cast changes. The attention this time was directed on Anna Netrebko who is singing her first Aida. She has the magical combination of vocal and star power to rivet attention on herself and she does not fail.     

A scene from Act 2 of Verdi’s "Aida" Photo: Marty Sohl/Met Opera

Listen to her first act great aria, “Ritorna vincitor!” for a bravura performance. She wants Radames, her lover and commander of the Egyptian forces, to defeat the Ethiopians and her father King Amonasro. It is a passionate and wrenching aria that requires vocal heights and emotional breadth and Netrebko delivers on all accounts.

“O patria mia” is another demanding aria in which fear, nostalgia, longing pain for the loss of her home and a desire for death as the only escape are mixed as Aida considers her future. She is a captive Ethiopian princess who must choose between love of country and love of a man, an Egyptian hero no less, with her father the King of Ethiopia thrown in for good measure. Netrebko captures all of the emotional turmoil passion and vocal splendour.

Aida’s competition for the love of Radames is the Egyptian princess Amneris, the daughter of the King. In this production Georgian mezzo soprano Anita Rachvelishvili provides a balance if not competition for Netrebko.  She has a splendid mezzo voice that can produce a wonderful dark notes and emotional range as a woman torn with love, jealousy, anger and in the end rejection.

Tenor Aleksandrs Antonenko is an outstanding singer who does a much better job as a military leader than as an emotional lover. With Netrebko and Rachvelishvili as his opposites, he tends to get buried but he deserves full credit for his performance in the Act II duet.

Quinn Kelsey sings the role of King Amonasro who is captured by the Egyptians and has the tough job of convincing his daughter to convince her lover Radames to betray his gods and his country. Kelsey pulls on all the motional heartstrings and succeeds in a fine performance.    

Anna Netrebko as Aida and Anita Rachvelishvili as Amneris in Verdi's "Aida."

Photo: Marty Sohl / Met Opera

On the huge Lincoln Centre Stage, the massive Egyptian sculptures, the lifts that can move sets around and the army of people created by the chorus and the extras give the impression that this is not a live performance in a theatre but a scene from, say, Cecil, B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments. You almost expect the Red Sea to part.

Nicola Luisotti conducted the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Chorus and Ballet in spectacular performances becoming the production.

Aida is the first opera to be broadcast from Lincoln Centre for the 13^th season of Live in HD from the Met. For people who are unlikely to go to New York or have no opera available within reachable distance or cannot afford the price of a ticket anywhere, Live from the Met provides a great solution. You get to see ten operas every year at a sensible price from one of the world’s great opera companies.

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Aida by Giuseppe Verdi was shown Live in HD at select Cineplex theatres across Canada on October 6, 2018 and can be seen again on November 3, 5, 7 and 11, 2018. For more information go to: www.cineplex.com/events

WHAT IF ROMEO AND JULIET… – REVIEW OF YOUNG PEOPLE’S THEATRE PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

What if Romeo and Juliet… is a retelling of the story of the star-crossed lovers including the rhetorical questions asked in the title. The play is put on by Montreal’s Thêâtre DynamO at the Young People’s Theatre.

There are four actors who play multiple roles form Shakespeare’s play and we also hear Shakespeare’s voice played by Christopher Gaze. The story is told through acrobatics, dancing and spoken words but there is very little actual dialogue.

 

The cast of What if Romeo and Juliet... Photo: Guy Carl Dube

The play starts at the end of Romeo and Juliet when Romeo and Juliet and the other victims of the play are dead. They all revive to go to the ball at the beginning of the play where the lovers meet. They go through the balcony scene, fights and murder of Tybalt, Romeo’s banishment and the letter that never reaches him resulting in the death of both lovers.

The four actors who play the parts are highly athletic (three of them are in fact gymnasts) and the audience is treated to some very fancy acrobatics. Some of the scenes are in effect balletic and we get a very different rendition of the story. Romeo, Juliet, Tybalt and Benvolio are the main characters but the actors do represent some other entities.

The four actors/acrobats/dancers are Rosalie Dell’Aniello, Jéréie Earp, Agathe Foucault and Rémy Savard and they displayed talent and ability in the physical movements of the production. Creator Jackie Gosselin is very economical in the use of spoken words and most of them are directed towards the audience and there is very little interaction among the characters.

The set by Pierre-Étienne Locas consists of two ladders on wheels on a revolving stage. They provide for fluidity and motion. The colour red is emphasized but the lighting by designer Martin Sirois emphasizes dark tones almost throughout. The stage is almost never fully lit and watching the play for an hour in semi-darkness becomes ineffective. 

                                     The cast of What if Romeo and Juliet... Photo: Guy Carl Dube

The What if part of the title is never activated. I think we have the right to see Romeo and Juliet making different decisions or choices and even giving the story a different ending. All we have is a voice at the end asking what would have happened if the lovers had made different choices. Well, why don’t you give us your opinion?

I find audience reaction to YPT production interesting and at times highly enjoyable. For the 10:30 a.m. opening the centre section of the theatre was full of students and I felt that the reaction was muted and the applause at the end more polite than enthusiastic. I think they are the best judges of productions that are aimed at stimulating and entertaining them and the verdict on What if Romeo and Juliet… despite some fine features and display of talent must be less than enthusiastic.

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What if Romeo and Juliet… created by Jackie Gosselin based on William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet opened on October 10 and continues until October 19, 2018 at the Young People’s Theatre, 165 Front Street East, Toronto, Ontario. 416 862-2222. www.youngpeoplestheatre.ca

THE CHILDREN – REVIEW OF CANADIAN STAGE PRODUCTION OF KIRKWOOD’S PLAY

James Karas

The Children may well be described as a domestic drama dealing with the eternal triangle. Robin (George Johnson) and Hazel (Laurie Paton) are a middle-aged couple living in a cottage by the sea in a remote area. They are visited by their old friend Rose (Fiona Reid) and share memories including a romantic relationship between Robin and Rose. There is still some sexual electricity between them but the wires are seriously frayed.

A domestic drama? Playwright Lucy Kirkwood slowly and meticulously reveals the main subject of the play as she interweaves facts about the outside world amid the memories of the past of the three characters. The subject could not be more terrible. 

 Laurie Paton and Fiona Reid. Photo: Dahlia Katz

When Rose arrives at the cottage, she has a nose-bleed. The cottage is situated just outside the exclusion zone and there is a nearby nuclear power plant. There is limited electrical power and there is radioactive contamination all around them Rose and Robin keep a dairy farm inside the exclusion zone but he goes there every day to “milk” the cows for some reason. I won’t tell you why.

There is much talk about children in The Children but there are no children.

Oh, yes, the three people in the cottage are physicists who had a hand in the design of the nearby nuclear power plant that imploded causing a massive earthquake and a tsunami. There are young scientists trying to repair the plant and stop the radioactive poison that is still seeping out causing unimaginable diseases.

Rose has not arrived at the cottage to reawaken a romance with Robin. She wants to disturb life in “the happy cottage” by inviting the couple to join her at the power plant.  I will not reveal more lest I spoil some dramatic moments.

Kirkwood’s interweaving the personal lives of the three people with the unimaginable catastrophe just outside the cottage is simply masterly. The old and current relationships of the couple and Rose keeps our attention as the real story unfolds before us of a world at its end.

 Fiona Reid, Laurie Paton and Geordie Johnson. Photo Dahlia Katz

Johnson, Paton and Reid, under the expert direction of Eda Holmes, give superb performances. They hide as much as they reveal and at the same time subtly disclose much more than we suspect. But all is done gradually and judiciously and, at times, almost imperceptibly.

Hazel describes her first impression of the oncoming disaster: eggs shaking and a rising tide, but nothing to worry about. That is how the play and this marvelous production struck me. But then she realized that the eggs shaking was the result of an earthquake and the rising tide was destructive tsunami. We also realize that this is no domestic drama.

The set by Eo Sharp represents the kitchen and sitting room of a simple cottage somewhere on the English coast. As with everything about the play, it is the undercurrents that count.

A superb production of an outstanding play.   

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 The Children by Lucy Kirkwood in a Canadian Stage and Centaur Theatre co-production continues until October 21, 2018 at the Berkeley Street Theatre, 26 Berkeley Street, Toronto, Ontario. www.canadianstage.com  416 368 3110

THE DYBBUK - REVIEW OF GESHER THEATRE PRODUCTION OF NEW VERSION

Reviewed by James Karas

How about a play performed in Hebrew with English and Russian surtitles put on by an Israeli theatre company that was founded by actors from Russia? Welcome to a new version of The Dybbuk in its North American premiere produced by Gesher Theatre at the elegant Elgin Theatre. If you did not make it to the Elgin Theatre on Saturday and Sunday, you are out of luck.

S. Ansky wrote The Dybbuk in 1914 in Russian and subsequently translated it into Yiddish and the play was later translated into Hebrew. It has gained iconic status in the theatrical pantheon which means it is manna for translators and adapters. The current version is written Roy Chen, “inspired by S. Ansky, according to program, a playwright and translator who is credited with translating some 40 plays into Hebrew.

 

                                Israel Demidov as Khanan on top of the synagogue roof. Photo: Daniel Kaminski

The Dybbuk has a fascinating plot about small Jewish community in the nineteenth century where a young woman is possessed by an evil spirit, a dybbuk.    

The play opens Fiddler-on-the-Roof style with a young man called Khanan sitting on the roof of the synagogue telling God that he is in love with Leah. Khanan is passionate and determined but he is described as a gimp. Whatever the precise meaning of that word, it is derogatory and in the opinion of Leah’s father Sender, he may be described as a loser. Sender wants Leah to marry the more sociably acceptable Menashe. Khanan joins the dead.

We observe Jewish rituals and traditions surrounding a wedding but before the marriage ceremony can be concluded, Leah is possessed by Khanan’s spirit. The Dybbuk is subtitled Between Two Worlds and indeed we go to the Underworld where Khanan joins the ghost of Hanna, Leah’s mother and other people from village.

Leah’s grandmother Frieda tries to exorcise the spirit that possesses her granddaughter and Menashe insists on marrying her.   

Marriage of Leah (Efrant Ben-Tzur) to Khanan's ghost. Photo: Daniel Kaminski 

Director Yevgeny Arye with Set Designer Simon Pastukh and Lighting Designer Igor Kapustin stage the play in a dark, foreboding, smoke-filled and ghostly atmosphere. Much of the action takes place in a small glass cubicle while other scenes are in the gloomy and bone-chilling cemetery. There is some humour in the play especially as Frieda attempts to find some formula or recipe to expel the dybbuk but aside from that this is the murky world of the twilight zone.

Efrat Ben-Tzur plays the unfortunate Leah and she dominates the play. Leah is the product of a patriarchal society where she must obey her father and she is a woman in love who becomes possessed by her lover’s spirit. The latter is almost a mad scene reminiscent of Renaissance drama. These scenes place high demands on the actor and Ben-Tzur fulfills them with exemplary talent.

Israel (Sasha) Demidov as Khanan goes from the hapless gimp to a ghostly spirit in the underworld, all passion and determination against insurmountable odds. A dramatic performance.

Doron Tavori as Sender is the classic patriarch, controlling, demanding, unbending. In that tradition and in that world he cannot be anything else and Tavori is thoroughly convincing.

Fira Kanter turns in a fine performance as the sympathetic grandmother who tries what she can to free Leah from her demon.

There is a fiddler and there is a roof in The Dybbuk but there is no Tevye to sing “If I were a rich man” or “Do you love me?” But there is an absorbing and highly dramatic play featuring superb performances and fine-tuned directing and providing a fascinating afternoon at the theatre.

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The Dybbuk by Roy Chen, inspired by S. Ansky was performed on September 29 and 30, 2018 in a production by Gesher Theatre at the Elgin Theatre 189 Queen Street, Toronto, Ont. www.ShowOneProductions.ca