Dorianne is a graduate of the Theatre and Drama Studies joint program between University of Toronto, Erindale campus and Sheridan College. She writes short stories, plays and screenplays and was delighted to be accepted into the 2010 Diaspora Dialogues program and also to have her short story accepted into the 2011 edition of TOK: Writing The New Toronto collection. She is also a regularly contributing writer on http://www.sexlifecanada.ca. You can follow her on twitter @headonist if you like tweets about cats, sex, food, queer stuff and lefty politics.
When I found out that the stage adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad was being produced in Toronto by Nightwood Theatre at Buddies in Bad Times I was very intrigued, as I had read the book and wondered how it could be staged. To be perfectly honest, I thought the book was a little didactic and was saved from being dull only by its humour. It has a clear feminist agenda, which I entirely agree with, but I want books – and plays – to entertain me, not to preach to me.
In the book Penelope, Odysseus’s wife from the classic tale by Homer, tells her story with choral interruptions from her twelve maids, who Odysseus had killed when he returned from his long journey. The story is meandering and many characters make appearances in many different settings. I thought that a stage version would have to be very theatrical, and I was correct. Continue reading Review: The Penelopiad (Nightwood Theatre)→
It‘s an absurdist piece, which I like. Yet the genre can come with some pitfalls, such as unlikable characters who repeat themselves a lot. Hugo, played by Simon Bracken, is maddening for most of the show. He goes on and on about his crazy neuroses saying the same thing over and over, much of this in a very aggressive tone. This grated on my nerves. Yet that tension led to hilarity every time Madeleine, played by Leah Doz, told him to “shut up”. Continue reading 2012 Next Stage Theatre Festival Review: Tomasso’s Party→
Morro & Jasp: Go Bake Yourself, produced in the Next Stage Theatre Festival, is a clown version of a cooking show. The first course is hors d’oeuvres, which is funny; the second course is comfort food, which is funnier still; the final course is a special homemade recipe which is ludicrously, laugh-a-nanosecond funny.
The performers, Amy Lee and Heather Marie Annis, are very adept at clowning. They and director/dramaturge Byron Laviolette are obviously well-versed in what a clown show entails and what makes it work. One of these aspects is the dynamic of the duo: Morro and Jasp are sisters and Morro is the younger, wilder one while Jasp is older and more practical. (Note that in clowning, “practical” can be the person who restrains their partner from doing bodily harm to themselves or others via fun but ill-advised antics; the character of Jasp is certainly not “practical” in any real-world sense.)
Nichola Ward is someone whose work I greatly admire, so I was very interested when she told me that she was transforming her newest work, Jackie’s Not A Real Girl into a graphic novel. I was further intrigued when she announced she was mounting it at Buddies, as a one-woman show with images from the graphic novel projected onstage.
Jackie’s Not A Real Girl is based on the true story of a transwomansex worker Nichola knew personally, who was first abused and then sent to a men’s prison by a spiteful and malicious police officer. The story is narrated by Sadie, another transgender woman who works in a bar and was Jackie’s friend. Sadie puts the police officer on trial and various characters pop up to give their testimony. All characters are played by Nichola, standing at the front of the stage while the graphic novel pages are projected on the back. Continue reading Review: Jackie’s Not A Real Girl (Nichola Ward)→
