Category Archives: Reviews

Fascinating, and nerve-wracking: Cycle pedals a provocation. A review

Posted on December 13, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca There is something valiant, energizing, and scary as hell, about the show that’s currently spinning its wheels faster and faster at Mile Zero Dance. The man we meet in Cycle does something we all know how … Continue reading →

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There’s magic in those high-strung puppets: Little Dickens, the Ronnie Burkett Theatre of Marionettes at Theatre Network, a review

Posted on December 6, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca As Bah Humbug!s encircle the globe at this time of year, know this: There is nothing in the world like Ronnie Burkett’s riotous adults-only Little Dickens, in which the high-strung marionette artistes of the Daisy Theatre, … Continue reading →

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The fury of desperation: the punk rock play Brother Rat at Edmonton Fringe Theatre, a review

Posted on December 5, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca If there ever was a show that demanded the audience ‘listen to me!’ and won’t take no — not to mention maybe, or we’ll see and maybe get back to you later — for an answer, … Continue reading →

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Hello! The Book of Mormon rings our doorbell again, at the Jube. A review

Posted on November 20, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca Hello! They’re back. There was a time — 14 years ago when The Book of Mormon instantly became the hottest ticket on Broadway — that assorted cultural prophets predicted fearlessly that the puckish lampoon of religion, … Continue reading →

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Big, fun, the craziest show in town: the Mayfield celebrates the big 5-0 with Flashback Fever, a review

Posted on November 18, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca It’s the craziest show in town. Flashback Fever: the Mayfield Dinner Theatre is throwing a time-travelling bash onstage in honour of the theatre’s 50th anniversary. It’s big and it’s fun. Think about the improbability of it … Continue reading →

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‘Staying together is the happy ending’: The Ballad of Johnny and June at the Citadel, a review

Posted on November 15, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca What happens to a happy ending “when it comes in the middle”? The’s what John Carter Cash, the only son of Johnny Cash and June Carter, wonders as he speculates onstage about his lineage and his … Continue reading →

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“I have become God”: Trevor Schmidt’s thriller Monstress premieres at Northern Light, a review

Posted on November 9, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca You enter the Studio Theatre through fog, and discover you’re in a mysterious chamber, glowing with jewelled colours and overhung with dozens of scissors, blades pointing down at us. The centrepiece, a slab that might be … Continue reading →

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In a staccato barrage of scenes, a star is born: The Two Battles of Francis Pegahmagabow at Shadow Theatre, a review

Posted on November 8, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca In the opening moments of Neil Grahn’s The Two Battles of Francis Pegahmagabow, to the strains of Rule Britannia, a top soldier is getting a military medal from the Prince of Wales. Seconds later, as Francis … Continue reading →

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Heartbreaking and funny, Stars On Her Shoulders premieres at Workshop West. A review.

Posted on November 2, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca Every once in a while you find yourself in the theatre fully absorbed in a world that’s both distant and utterly close at hand. And you laugh through tears. It happened for me at Workshop West … Continue reading →

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Lethal power games as performance art: The Maids introduces a new indie theatre

Posted on November 1, 2024 by Liz Nicholls

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca There’s something exactly right about entering the theatre through an unmarked door, down the stairs and into a space that invites reinvention and expands before your very eyes. It’s a world ready and waiting for actors … Continue reading →

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