OTELLO – REVIEW OF CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY 2019 PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

The Canadian Opera Company rounds off its current season with a grand production of Verdi’s 27^th opera Otello. The stars of the production are Canadian bass-baritone Gerald Finley as Iago and the COC Orchestra conducted by Johannes Debus.

David Alden’s production is quite solid but it has enough eccentric touches to send your eyebrows to the back of your head.

Otello starts as a great love story between a black general in the Venetian army and the high-born and pure Desdemona. The story and the conflict are driven by the malevolent Iago whose hatred of Otello for passing him over for promotion leads him to destroying the loving couple. 

 Tamara Wilson as Desdemona and Russell Thomas as Otello. Photo: Michael Cooper

Finley with his big, sonorous voice and commanding presence quickly establishes vocal and personal dominance. The Venetian gentlemen Roderigo (Owen McCausland) and Cassio (Andre Haji) cower under his authoritative persona. Otello, a successful general is no fool but Iago manages to find a way to drive him insane with jealousy to the point where he follows instructions on how to murder his beloved Desdemona. Finley makes every aspect of Iago clear and alive for us.

All of that cannot be said about tenor Russell Thomas’s performance as Otello. Thomas has the physical attributes of the Moor. He is noble and impressive in the beginning and when he becomes ugly in his jealousy, he is frightfully menacing. Unfortunately, he is not always up to the vocal demands of the role. What we see physically is not translated into vocal power and emotional splendour. He is not helped by Alden’s directing and there is little passion and not enough fury in his dealing with Desdemona. In the end, and this is one of Alden’s idiosyncratic stagings, he dies “upon a kiss” about ten feet away from Desdemona.

Soprano Tamara Wilson as Desdemona is good in some of the almost Wagnerian outbursts but she does not quite measure up to all the emotional expressions demanded of the role.

The production gains a great deal from the playing of the COC Orchestra. From the initial burst of music representing the storm to the final death of Otello, we are treated to magnificent playing under the baton of Johannes Debus.

Verdi provides some heroic singing for the chorus and the COC Chorus responds with a splendid performance.

The set by Jon Morrell consists of large concrete walls that could represent a fortress or a port and they serve for all the scenes of the opera with minor adjustments. The costumes suggest 19^th century attire and they are fine. 

Gerald Finley as Iago and Russell Thomas as Otello. Photo: Michael Cooper

A couple more examples of Alden’s idiosyncrasies. At one point, Otello brings an icon of the Virgin Mary on the stage and hangs it on a wall. That seems quite appropriate because we are expecting Desdemona to sing “Ave Maria.” Instead we see Cassio shooting a few darts at the Madonna and the icon is soon removed. Why the display of such sacrilege by Cassio is a mystery to me.

Otello commands Desdemona to go to bed in her white wedding nightgown. There is no bed in this production and we see Desdemona crouching on one side of the stage and Otello across at the other side. Eventually he strangles her in the centre of the stage on the floor.

Otello kills himself after realizing what Iago did to him and what he did to Desdemona. Otello usually stabs himself with a dagger and falls upon Desdemona and his last words are “a kiss…another kiss…another kiss.” In this production Otello slashes the side of his neck and falls about ten feet from Desdemona. One is grateful that he does not do the completely comic act of slashing his throat and continuing to sing but slashing the side of his neck is almost as bad and dying that far from Desdemona is pretty ridiculous.

These directorial quirks need not be more than eyebrow raisers but Alden really packs them in and I am not quite sure why. Once your eyebrows return to their natural place, some gripes aside, the production becomes thoroughly enjoyable.

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Otello by Giuseppe Verdi is being performed eight times on various dates until May 21, 2019 at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, 145 Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario. Tel: 416-363-6671. www.coc.ca

James Karas is the Senior Editor – Culture of The Greek Press. www.greekpress.ca

ANTIGONE: 方 – REVIEW OF YOUNG PEOPLE’S THEATRE PRODUCTION

By James Karas

The Royal House of Thebes has left its mark on the artistic imagination of the world from time immemorial. From Laius to Oedipus, from Creon to Antigone, the tragic fate of ites members has been told in every art form countless times.

The latest retelling is in a play entitled Antigone:方 by Jeff Ho, a writer from Hong Kong who is now based in Toronto. The title of the play is followed by a colon and a Chinese symbol which indicates some kind of Chinese connection but nothing more for those who are unlettered in that language.

Pictured (L-R): Rachel Mutombo, Jasmine Chen and John Ng in Antigone:方. Photo by Cylla von Tiedemann.1

The play is produced by Toronto’s inimitable Young People’s Theatre and is intended for ages 12 and up. Introducing young people to one of the great myths of Western civilization is laudatory to the point of a standing ovation.

We are helpfully informed that the play is based on the Greek myth but that it is influenced by the Umbrella Revolution of 2014 in Hong Kong and the infamous Tiananmen Square protest of 1989. Both events were significant demonstrations against oppression and are worthy of remembrance especially since nothing has changed and in fact the situation has become worse.

In Sophocles’ Antigone, perhaps the best known version of the story, Antigone’s brothers Polyneikes and Eteocles kill each other in battle. Eteocles is fighting for King Kreon and is a hero. Polyneikes is fighting against him and is a traitor whose body should be left unburied to be eaten by the dogs. The brothers do not appear in the play .Antigone defies the king’s edict by giving a ritual burial to Polyneikes and her punishment is to be walled up in a cave to die.     

Ho keeps most of the characters in Sophocles’ play and adds the two brothers as characters adapting their names to Teo (Aldrin Bundoc) and Neikes (Jeff Yung). Kreon (John Ng) is the father of the two brothers and of course Antigone (Jasmine Chen) and Ismene (Rachel Mutombo).

All the characters, including Tiresia (Soo Garay), and Haemon (Simon Gagnon) are also a part of the public and crowd of protesters that Ho calls Chorus in a bow to Ancient Greek tragedy.

The uprising is against the Supreme Leader’s regime and the Re-Education Centre. The objective of the regime is to control not just what people do or say but how and what they think. It is the most terrifying type of oppression.

Kreon and Teo support the Supreme Leader. The brothers are killed and Kreon forbids anyone from giving his son Neikes a proper burial. Antigone with her friend Haemon disobey his edict.

This is a fast moving and very dramatic production. The attention of the teenagers in the audience is never allowed to lag. Red flags and umbrellas are constantly visible, there is combat and a great deal of energy generated on the stage. One can sense the drama of protests that we see in snippets on television enacted convincingly in front of us. Even if the high school students in the audience cannot relate to protests in Hong Kong or Tiananmen Square, they can certainly relate to local marches and demonstrations.

I do have a problem with the grafting of the Greek myth to modern oppressive regimes’ indoctrination and mind control of people. There are countless Antigones but simply giving the name of an ancient rebel to the play and Greek names to the characters adds confusion rather than clarity or focus. The characters in Ho’s plays would have done just as well with simple Chinese or other modern names without the muddle of the blind seer Tiresias becoming auntie Tiresia. Very well done by Garay, by the way.

Directors Stephen Colella and Karen Gilodo do the play in a theatre-in-the-round which adds to the intensity and energy of the performance. The cast as Chorus and in the various roles do superb work.

On an optimistic note, maybe the youngsters will go home and read Wikipedia about Sophocles and Antigone and, (why not?) even read Ancient Greek Tragedy.     

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Antigone: 方 by Jeff Ho continues until May 16. 2019 at the Young People’s Theatre, 165 Front Street East, Toronto, Ontario. 416 862-2222. www.youngpeoplestheatre.ca

James Karas is the Senior Editor – Culture of The Greek Press. www.greekpress.ca

OLD STOCK: a refugee love story – REVIEW OF TARRAGON THEATRE PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

Near the end of Old Stock: a refugee love story, The Wanderer asks the audience if they are wondering “Why the f… did I come to see this show?” The answer may be that it is a play by Hannah Moscovitch at the Tarragon Theatre and that counts for a dozen good reasons.

Moscovitch is one of Canada’s best playwrights and between the dross and the noise of Old Stock there is a beautiful love story about a Jewish couple who came to Canada in 1908. It is moving, humorous, humane and a part of Canadiana that is not told often enough. 

 Ben Caplan  Photo: Stoo Metz Photography

Unfortunately that story is crushed between ear-shattering noise, singing and stand-up comedy reminiscent of a second-rate comedian desperately trying to get a laugh and ruining even good material.

The narrator, singer, stand-up comic is The Wanderer (Ben Caplan) who tells the story from today’s point of view, replete with four letter words and references to current issues. With his long beard and hair, he looks patriarchal, almost a parody of a Jew. He sings some melodic songs about Jewish life and traditions but at such decibel levels that you wish you had brought ear plugs with you. The Tarragon Theatre is quite small and use of loud, very loud speakers and talking into a microphone as if you were about to eat it is unnecessary, no, make that annoying.

The real story. Chaim (Dani Oore) and Chaya (Mary Faye Coady) arrive in Halifax and meet at Pier 2 in 1908. He is shy, diffident, inept and full of hope. He has escaped after the pogrom. Chaya is intelligent, outspoken and realistic. She has escaped before the pogrom with most of her family. Her husband and child died in Romania and she will never stop loving them or forget her old country.

Haltingly, humourosly, movingly, the two get married and after some very awkward steps manage to have a child. Their marriage is not perfect but they remain together and have four children. In the last few minutes of the show the story of Chaim and Chaya is told down the generations to the present as the family grows in numbers and success stories. 

Dani OOre and Mary Faye Coady. Photo: Graeme Braidwood

The story of Chaim and Chaya Moscovitch is the beginning of the family history of Hannah Moscovitch. It is a marvelous tribute to the first members to arrive in Canada and face bigotry, anti-Semitism and hardship (only gentiles allowed to go to the cinema) and yet survive to have a Hannah as a descendant.  

A four-person band is on stage all the time helping with some of the beautiful songs ruined by excessive loudness and a ridiculous Wanderer. Oore plays woodwinds and Coady plays the violin. They simply step away from their instrument when they act out the story of their characters. Graham Scott plays keyboard and accordion and Jamie Kronick plays the drum set.

Old Stock is created by Moscovitch, Ben Caplan and Christian Barry and the latter two are responsible for all but one of the songs. Barry also directs the show and most of the responsivity for the production rests on him. The volume and the miking are clearly unnecessary, to put it politely. Turning the history of a family and hence a story about a significant part of Canada’s past into a work for the theatre is a great idea. Old Stock is not.

We came to see the show for many good reasons and got seriously shortchanged.

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OLD STOCK: a refugee love story by Hannah Moscovitch, Ben Caplan, and Christian Barry, in a 2b theatre company production, continues until May 26, 2019 at the Tarragon Theatre, 30 Bridgman Ave. Toronto, Ontario.  www.tarragontheatre.com

James Karas is the Senior Editor – Culture of The Greek Press. www.greekpress.ca

LA BOHÈME - REVIEW OF CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

The Canadian Opera Company has brought back John Caird’s 2013 production of La Bohème for its spring season, together with Verdi’s Otello. It is a sound decision that was greeted enthusiastically by the audience.

The revival is served superbly by the cast. Brazilian tenor Atalla Ayan has a supple voice that can express emotion and soar to the high notes with ease. The night I saw the opera (April 26), we were advised that he was singing Rodolfo under the effects of a cold. There was no evidence of any adverse consequences and his performance was topnotch. After the tomfoolery of the poor artists in the attic and the arrival of Mimi, Ayan delivers a superb “Che gelida manina” combining youthful bravado with a wonderful melody and we were hooked. 

A scene from the Canadian Opera Company’s production of 

La Bohème, 2019, photo: Michael Cooper

American soprano Angel Blue seemed initially not to have a big enough voice for the Four Seasons Centre but that impression was quickly dispelled. She starts haltingly with “Si, Mi chiamano Mimi” and pours forth her life leading to the inevitable – love. The one, two, three punch comes with the love duet between Rodolfo and Mimi, “O soave fanciulla,” and we got our money’s worth. The rest is a bonus.

Canadian soprano Andriana Chuchman manages to sound sultry as Musetta, the teaser and abuser of men who has a heart of gold. Her signature aria is her “Quando m’envo” better known as Musetta’s waltz and Chuchman brings the vocal kick and manipulative bravura worthy of the show-stopper aria.

Rodolfo’s three friends deserve special mention. American baritone Lucas Meachem as the painter Marcello was vocally the most distinguished of the trio. He showed exuberance in his acting and singing as a sympathetic friend and the hapless former lover of Musetta. American bass-baritone Brandon Cedel was good as the philosopher Colline and Canadian baritone Phillip Addis as the musician Schaunard sounded as if he were not having his best day. 

Lucas Meachem as Marcello, Angel Blue as Mimì (in background), and 

Atalla Ayan as Rodolfo. Photo: Michael Cooper

David Farley’s set featured a hefty number of large canvasses in the first act. The set was turned around quickly for the scene change from the attic to a street in the Latin Quarter for the second act. The background was not well-lit nor a particularly prepossessing street scene but otherwise it was quite good. The third act scene by a tavern near the city gates at dawn looked somber. It is supposed to be snowing but, we had to settle for a few snowflakes. Clearly we have more important things to do like listening to the heart-wrenching Marcello-Mimi duet and her farewell to Rodolfo. Marvelously done.

John Caird took a conservative, traditional approach to the opera and it works superbly in the revival directed by Katherine M Carter.

Paolo Carigniani conducted the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra in a performance that got a well-deserved standing ovation. 

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La Bohème  by Giacomo Puccini with libretto by Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica opened on April 17 and will be performed ten times on various dates until May 22, 2019 at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, 145 Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario. Tel: 416-363-6671. www.coc.ca

James Karas is the Senior Editor - Culture of The Greek Press. www.greekpress.ca

HAND TO GOD - REVIEW OF COAL MINE THEATRE PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

Hand to God is a raunchy, exuberant, satanic, irreverent, hilarious and serious play now playing at Coal Mine Theatre. If you believe that good things come in small theatres, Coal Mine Theatre raises the bar well above that level.

Robert Askins’ play was first produced Off-Broadway in 2011 and made it to Broadway and London among numerous other venues.

The Southern drawl and the setting of a church basement tell you that you are in the American Bible Belt. It is supposed to be in Texas but I heard no allusion to that effect. The sexually explicit language in a church tells you to brace yourself for some very bawdy proceedings. Holy rollers may wish to give the production a very wide berth. 

Amy Keating, Francis Melling, Nicole Underhay and Ted Dykstra.  Photo: Kristina Ruddick

Margery (an outstanding Nicole Underhay) is attractive, deeply religious and a recent widow because her husband ate himself to death. Her teenage son Jason (Frank Cox-O’Connell) is shy but also slightly unhinged. The play opens with a puppet sticking its head from the curtain and relating the story of humanity from before society to the formation of social groups and the invention of the devil.

We soon realize that the puppet that Jason holds, Tyrone, is quite real (to him) and is the Devil that controls Jason. This is a marvelous theatrical ploy as Jason’s dual character dominates the play. Cox-O’Connell does the voice of Tyrone and his own with great speed and effectiveness as he controls the movements of the puppet which appears to control his mental and emotional states.

Timothy (Francis Melling) is a foul-mouthed, hideous-looking kid from the neighbourhood whose overactive hormones have no brakes. We also have Jessica (Amy Keating), the girl next door and Pastor Greg (Ted Dykstra) who has sexual ambitions towards Margery.

Remember we are in a church basement and Margery is preparing a religious puppet show for the Pastor and the congregation. And speaking of sexual attraction, make that tension, the carnal currents flowing among the characters would bust normal electrical cables. And I blush to tell you about violent sex, intra-human and intra-puppet. Hint: Jessica also has a puppet and Tyrone likes her/it.

Underhay gives an extraordinary performance as the holy roller who fights off the pastor’s sexual advances but succumbs to Timothy’s brutal idea of coitus with equal force. Margery is driven to hysterics more than once and Underhay handles the role with assurance and ability.

Keating handles the role of Jessica as well as her alter ego, the puppet. Like Cox-O’Connell she must handle quick and convincing voice changes as well as the puppet.

 Nicole Underhay and Ted Dykstra. Photo: Kristina Ruddick

Dykstra as the pastor has more than hormonal issues. He has to attempt to appear rational in an irrational world and must even attempt an exorcism of the Devil from Jason. As usual, Dykstra gives an unfailingly fine performance.    

Marcus Jamin handles Puppetry Direction and Design with superb results. Anahita Dehbonehie shows what a set designer with intelligence and imagination can do in a tiny theatre like Coal Mine. The church basement, the swings outside, the production of a car, division of the stage  in separate spaces are all handled with speed and are economical and simply outstanding.

Director Mitchell Cushman does masterly work in his execution of a highly demanding play that requires impeccable timing, emotional roller coasters, violence and a great deal of humour. He does not leave any aspect unattended and his sure hand is visible in every move.  

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Hand to God by Richard Askins opened on April 24 and will run until May 12, 2019 at the Coal Mine Theatre, 1454 Danforth Ave. Toronto, M4J 1N4. www.coalminetheatre.com

James Karas is the Senior Editor – Culture of The Greek Press. www.greekpress.ca

THE GLASS MENAGERIE – REVIEW OF A NOISE WITHIN THEATRE PRODUCTION

James Karas

Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie is a major milepost on the road of American

drama and it is no small pleasure to see a production that is superbly acted and meticulously

directed. That is what A Noise Within Theatre offers in Pasadena, California.

Director Geoff Elliott concentrates on the memories of the characters, their dreams, their illusions and delusions and the crushing and liberating effect of reality.

The lights go on, on an almost empty stage and Tom (Rafael Goldstein) tells us that The Glass Menagerie is a memory play and he introduces the characters, including his father who abandoned the family many years ago. We see the photograph of a smiling man on the back wall and he dominates the play without ever appearing. It is Tom’s father.

 Rafael Goldstein and Deborah Strang. Photo: Craig Schwartz

Tom snaps his fingers and furniture is brought on the stage to begin the action and tell us what he recalls from many years ago. He recalls his mother Amanda (Deborah Strang), a woman who pretends to remember a life of wealth and leisure when as many as 17 gentlemen callers came for her on one day alone. She was beautiful, genteel and sophisticated, and could have married well but she went for a man who worked for the telephone company. He fell in love with distance, she tells us, and put distance between himself and his family with no return address.

Deborah Strang gives an outstanding performance as Amanda, a woman who believes the myths of her past glories amid the reality of her life where she is pathetic and ridiculous. Everything Amanda does is pitiable and transparently pretentious but it keeps reality at a distance with no small effort. Strang makes a marvelous Amanda.

Erika Soto plays the tragic, pitiful and wretched Laura. She is excruciatingly shy as she limps and makes some delicate glass figurines her world. Soto captures Laura’s character fully and her fears, awkwardness, high school memories come out in a perfect pitch.

 

Kasey Mahaffey and Erika Soto. Photo: Craig Schwartz

Kasey Mahaffy plays Jim O’Connor, the gentleman caller superbly. We see his bravado as he waives his arms just a bit excessively and tries to capture some of his image of success that he had while in high school. As with the other characters, Elliott directs Mahaffy with precision so that we see his humanity, his pitiful post-high school failure and his dream of making it. Marvelously done.

Tom is, as the narrator, and the man that gives focus to the play, is our guide to his situation and to the personality of the other people in the play. He is there and not there during his recollection of past events. He becomes almost a phantom in his own story. He sees reality as he escapes it by going to the movies every night. He hides in a cubicle at work to write poetry and dreams of following his father by leaving his family behind. He drinks and is almost as pathetic as his mother and sister in his escape in the artificial world of Hollywood. But he also realizes its artificiality and unreality and takes steps towards joining the merchant marine and going to the South Seas. Is that not just illusory?

Elliot does superb work in his presentation of Tom and delivers an outstanding production of a great play.

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The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams runs until April 26, 2019 at A Noise Within Theatre, 3352 E. Foothill Blvd. Pasadena, California www.anoisewithin.org/

James Karas is the Senior Editor – Culture of The Greek Press. www.greekpress.ca

OTHELLO – REVIEW OF A NOISE WITHIN THEATRE PRODUCTION

James Karas

Director Jessica Kubzansky, like all good directors, puts her own imprimatur on this production of Othello by A Noise Within Theatre in Pasadena, California. It is a modern dress staging and the officers and soldiers may be ostensibly Venetian, but we see nothing but men and women of the U.S. Army.

She has made some rational gender changes in keeping with the modern setting of the tragedy. Desdemona’s father Brabantio becomes her mother Senator Brabantia (Bonita Friedericy), the Duke of Venice is a woman (Sally Hughes) and Iago’s wife Emilia (Tania Verafield) is an officer. Sensible changes.

She adds an opening scene where Othello (Wayne T Carr) pins officer’s stripes on Cassio (Brian Henderson) to the obvious displeasure of Iago (Michael Manuel). The impeccably dressed officers salute smartly and we notice Othello’s bemedaled chest. 

Angela Gulner and Wayne T. Carr, Photo: Craig Schwartz

With the protagonists being American, the emotional wavelength of the play is that of American officers and gentlemen. Othello may be black and there may be racism in the forces, but he is very much American and cannot be distinguished as a Moor, a foreigner, among the Venetians. This inevitably takes away something from the almost mythical Moor general who has fought strange battles in strange lands that Desdemona finds so fascinating during their meetings that led to falling in love.

Iago is a psychopath who plots revenge on Othello for being passed over for promotion but he shows no relish in his evil. In the opening scene Iago speaks directly to the audience and shows some flamboyance but the rest of his performance is more restrained. He and Emilia get along during most of the play. After all she is an officer and perhaps unlikely to be an abused wife.

Brabantia is racist to the core and her disapproval of Othello is based on her bigotry alone and not on his being an exotic foreigner as well who turned her daughter’s head with some type of black magic. She alleges it but it sounds hollow when directed against an American officer and a gentleman.

Angela Gulner’s Desdemona is a smart, modern woman who does not bother to take great care of her hair. She may be coquettish at times but it does not become her and she is no “delicate creature.” This changes the dynamics of Shakespeare’s play but we accept it in a modern view of the play.

Jeremy Robb’s Roderigo is a Venetian fool who is infatuated with Desdemona and decides to follow the troops to Cyprus in the hope of getting her. He appears with a large “Just Married” sign which he obviously pinched from the wedding of Othello and Desdemona. The wedding was done in secret, of course, but seeing Roderigo carrying it over his head expresses his character perfectly. Robb makes a perfect fool who is used by Iago and spends his money in hopeless wooing.

Most of Kubzansky’s changes are defensible in line with her take on the play. The problem arises in the emotional depths that must be reached by Othello when he loses his demeanor as a gentleman and becomes ugly and cruel in his fits of jealousy. Carr does a good job in the role but he does not reach the depths that we demand of Othello.

 

Tania Verafield, Angela Gulner and Michael Manual. Photo: Craig Schwartz 

Part of the problem is the lack of poetry in the actors including Carr and Gulner. When he intones “It is the cause” there should be a sonority and resonance that is carried by his voice and the poetry. In the final scene Othello’s last words contain similar sonority when he says “I took by the throat the circumcised dog/ And smote him, thus.” On the word “thus” he stabs himself. In this production Kubzansky cuts out “thus” and the line ends on the word “him”. The phrase loses its cadence even if the director devises a truly shocking way for Othello to end his life. He grabs a pistol and shoots himself in the mouth.

The production is done on a bare stage with minimal props. The stage floor is red and there is generous use of the aisles of the 320-seat theatre. Frederica Nascimento is the Scenic Designer.

In the end this is a well-thought out and praiseworthy if idiosyncratic approach to the play with some parts of it not fitting well. I found it fascinating and enjoyed the performance.

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Othello by William Shakespeare runs until April 28, 2019 at A Noise Within Theatre, 3352 E. Foothill Blvd. Pasadena, California www.anoisewithin.org/

James Karas is the Senior Editor – Culture of The Greek Press