Reviews of shows in the Toronto Next Stage Festival
Begin Again – a combination of song and spoken word now playing as part of the 2021 virtual Next Stage Community Booster – is about the act of prayer.
Loud or quiet, large or small, desperate or calm, these pleas to a higher power are what creators Cat and the Queen and Sasha Singer-Wilson believe we all turn to in moments of need.
Continue reading Review: Begin Again (Next Stage Community Booster 2021)
Thou Shalt Not COVID Thy Neighbour’s Wife, written and performed by Christine Estima, is one of the stories presented as part of the Next Stage Community Booster.
Storytelling is hard. Everyone in the audience probably has different expectations; some want a ‘performance’ with lots of movement and vocal and facial expressions. Others may want intimacy, a gentle voice, accompanied by a seated body leaning towards the audience. Estima is more towards the performance end of the scale, without being over the top.
Timely. Tragic. Powerful.
With the Iranian plane crash in the headlines and tense US-Iran relations in the news, I knew it was going to be a tough night with a timely work.
Winter of 88, presented by Nowadays Theatre and part of the Next Stage 2020 festival, follows the faces and families behind the eight-year war between Iran and Iraq from 1980 to 1988.
Continue reading Winter of 88 (Nowadays Theatre) 2020 Next Stage Review
Drowning in big ideas and hard truths could be a real downer. Luckily, Luxury Goods’ Consumption Patterns – playing at the Factory Theatre as part of the 2020 Next Stage Theatre Festival -delivers a social deep-dive into despair with a sharp sense of humour and a welcome sprinkling of hope.
Continue reading Consumption Patterns (Luxury Goods) 2020 Next Stage Review
Pearle Harbour’s Agit-Pop! is playing as part of the 2020 Next Stage Theatre Festival. The show features a cabaret-style evening of music and storytelling with a political and often dark edge. She aptly describes it as “musical meditations on the pre-post-apocalypse.”
Underneath a warm and glamourous persona, Pearle Harbour delivers social commentary that is incisive, biting, and a little melancholy.
Continue reading Pearle Harbour’s Agit-Pop! (Justin Miller) 2020 Next Stage Review