Theatre

Blessed is the inventive Sarah Rodgers for she has taken Godspell, an already irreverent musical based on the gospel according to Saint Matthew, and really socks it to us by placing it within an episode of Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-in.

There is no question that writer Meg Holle has a way with words.  Based on her electronic book, You Are Not Dead: A Guide to Modern Living, Black Pants Productions moves her words to the stage and while for me it actually works better as a piece of ‘theatre’ than in its original written form, both suffer from being a little one-note.

Sometimes an actor seems destined to play a certain role.  For actor Zachary Stevenson that role is the title character in Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story, currently on stage at the Arts Club's Stanley Theatre.

It's no secret that religion and the gay community can make strange bedfellows. Add an award-winning playwright into the mix and you not only get a musical based on the gospel of Saint Matthew but also a same-sex relationship that was viewed by many as an early effort to define the rights of gay couples.

With a lesser actor in the lead role, Becky’s New Car, simply would not have enough gas to get us to playwright Steven Dietz’ final destination.  Fortunately though that is not the case in the current Arts Club production, where Deb Williams carries the show to the finish line in style and a great deal of fun.

Harry Partch is a name few would recognize, but if Playwright Conrad Alexandrowicz has anything to say about it that is about to change as his new show, The Boy Who Went Outside, premieres in Vancouver May 26-30, 2010.

The Vancouver Playhouse serves up an oxymoron with their current production of JB Priestley’s Dangerous Corner as Director Bill Dow gives us a beautiful looking radio play performed by a stellar cast.

While audiences may leave the Jericho Arts Centre wondering “where’s the beef?” like I did at the end of the Fighting Chance Productions presentation of The Wedding Singer, the show still managed to be a fun evening of “awesome” 80s music, fads and fashion.

There are usually two ways I know when a piece of theatre thoroughly sucks me in: a total immersion into the story that blocks out the usual annoyances from my fellow theatre-goers, or, as was the case with the Twenty Something Theatre production of Prodigals last night, when I find myself so connected with some of the characters that I want to scream out and provide them with what I consider sage advice.

Metro Vancouver’s visible minorities account for approximately 40% of the region’s population including a large number of Indo-Canadians. Given this demographic, it has always been a mystery to me why more of our diverse population is not represented on Vancouver’s stages. While this is slowly changing, there have been few mainstream theatre productions that represent this population transformation and resulting shift in our cultural landscape. Hopefully that is about to change starting with the Arts Club’s production of My Granny the Goldfish, currently on stage at the newly remodeled Revue Stage on Granville Island.