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Category Archives: Reviews
“You have to put it right!” Matilda the Musical, at the Citadel. A review.
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca Wicked, I tell you. Wicked fun, that is, the smart, joyful musical that’s currently promoting anti-authoritarian resistance, empowerment, and self-determination — for children! — from the Citadel’s Shoctor stage. Based on Roald Dahl’s delightfully dark 1988 … Continue reading
The road to Mesa: a buddy pic with a difference. A review.
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca Funny how the concept “road trip” conjures two sets of images, almost entirely contradictory. One is fuelled by sheer romance, the cinematic sweep of conquering vastness in a first-hand way: the questing spirit with car keys, … Continue reading
Posted in Reviews
Tagged 12thnight.ca, Atlas Theatre Collective, Doug Curtis, Edmonton theatre, Julien Arnold, Varscona Theatre Ensemble
Élise contre l’extinction totale: a new L’UniThéâtre show for and about kids – and the planet – hits the road
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca Anxiety about climate change and the fate of the earth isn’t the exclusive domain of adults. And “save the planet” isn’t vaguely theoretical, or metaphorical, or political: 16,306 species of animals are currently at risk of … Continue reading
Posted in Reviews
Tagged 12thnight.ca, Catalyst Theatre, Edmonton theatre, kids theatre, L'UniThéâtre, Paula Humby, the Donnellys, Vigilante
The tricky question of belief: We Are Not Alone at Theatre Network. A review
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca “What am I doing here?” asks Damien Atkins more than once in the course of his smart, sly, funny solo show We Are Not Alone. Its declared subject is one that raises either your hopes or … Continue reading
Posted in Reviews
Tagged 12thnight.ca, 2b theatre company, Crow's Theatre, Damien Atkins, Edmonton theatre, The Segal Centre, Theatre Network, UFO congress, UFO sightings
Songs My Mother Never Sung Me: a coming-of-age deaf/hearing chamber opera at Chinook
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca “This is the story of how my mom helped me find my voice,” says the narrator (the excellent Kieran Martin Murphy) in Songs My Mother Never Sung Me, a touching, and ingenious, new bilingual chamber opera” … Continue reading
Lend Me A Tenor: a classic ’30s door-slammer at the Mayfield. A review
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca “These things happen, sir,” ventures Max, the rabbity assistant manager of the Cleveland Grand Opera Company, trying to look on the bright side. In view of the premise of Ken Ludwig’s ingeniously engineered old-school 1986 farce … Continue reading
Posted in Reviews
Tagged Dave Horak, Edmonton theatre, Ken Ludwig, Mayfield Dinner Theatre, Verdi's Otello
Lake of the Strangers: a magical mystery tour of a vast universe. A review
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca Last night I had a haunting experience. It was the summer of 1973. And a young Indigenous boy and his little brother, on a fishing expedition together, were sitting in a pool of water up among … Continue reading
Miss Teen premieres at Shadow Theatre: game actors, tired script. A review
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca In Miss Teen a strapped, single mother enters her awkward, bookish daughter in a local teen pageant. “It’ll be good practice … for life,” argues Coco brightly, undeterred by Margaret’s reaction, a mixture of appalled and … Continue reading
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Tagged 12thnight.ca, beauty pageants, Canadian sitcoms, Edmonton theatre, Michele Riml, Shadow Theatre, Varscona Theatre
The Cardiac Shadow: where the soul goes under extreme duress. A review.
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca In the theatre, the dim light glints off the barbed wire that separates us from the stage. At the back we can just make out a kind of altar, draped in bulbs. It turns out to … Continue reading
Sweat, a blue-collar tragedy of work and race, at the Citadel: A review
By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca If you’ve ever wondered why disenfranchised workers seem to vote, time and again, against their own economic self-interest — and it’s a moment in history to be awestruck by that — the play currently onstage at … Continue reading
Posted in Reviews
Tagged 12thnight.ca, Citadel Theatre, Edmonton theatre, Lynn Nottage, Pulitzer Prize, Sweat, Vancouver Arts Club Theatre
