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GCTC launches a 2010-11 season full of character(s)

The GCTC is calling the 2010-11 season of drama (its fourth season at the Irving Greenberg Theatre Centre) “Theatre with Character.” You might as easily call it “Theatrical stew” for the melding of ingredients. The season includes a singularly appropriate play for this time, Vern Thiessen’s Vimy; two plays translated from French texts (“The List” by Jennifer Tremblay and translated by Shelley Tepperman and “Strawberries in January” by Evelyne de la Chenelière and translated by Morwyn Brebner), “The Shadow Cutter,” a new two-man production by Ottawa-based force of nature Pierre Brault about Ottawa-born magician Dai Vernon, and a play called “The Middle Place”, taken from source material gathered from homeless youth in Toronto, and a play by Canadian favorite Daniel McIvor.

In fact, theatergoers in Ottawa can see “The List” in September at the GCTC, then see “La Liste” en francais at the NAC in March. How often do you get to do that?!

Mix in to that co-productions with Theatre Passe Muraille, the NAC English Theatre (the first such collaboration between the two organizations ever), and Magnetic North, season sponsorship by Domicile Developments, which is putting a new condo tower up across from the GCTC’s home base, and the  new “Undercurrents”  festival in the smaller Studio Theatre and you have what promises to be a tasty gumbo.

The season launch featured excerpts from a number of the plays being produced read by a number of actors familiar to Ottawa Theatre audiences — including Pierre Brault, Annie Lefebvre, John Jonathan Koensgen (oops — too used to seeing and thinking of John!) and Kelly Rigole. Author of “The Middle Place” Andrew Kushnir Skyped in from Edmonton to talk about his play.

The graphic look for the season is a bold one, and one that some more conservative theatergoers may find childish. The GCTC asked graphic novelists from across the country (Ray Fawkes, Ethan Rilly, Faith Erin Hicks, Jeff Lemire, Salgood Sam, and Sadax) to render the plays in their own style. My only worry is that if I spend the year looking at graphics for a play, will the graphic look be so strong as to colour my perception of what actually happens on the stage.

Let’s hope this stew tastes as good in a few months as it smells now. But for now, let’s just enjoy the aroma and anticipate…

(The next play in the current season is Arthur Milner’s Facts, a “politically-charged murder mystery”, opening April 13.

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The Wrecking Ball is Swinging – November 16

PRESS RELEASE:  The Wrecking Ball swings in Ottawa once again!

Following last year’s sensational pre-election event, this one-of-a-kind co-lingual soirée of political theatre returns to the nation’s capital, in tandem with other wrecking balls swinging through cities across Canada this month.

This time around, we’re inspired by Yann Martel www.whatisstephenharperreading.ca to offer a few reading suggestions of our own. With a little help from our friends, we’ll consider what it really takes to win the hearts and minds of Canadians. And with our colleagues in BC now staring down the barrel of 92% cuts in provincial arts funding, we are spurred to step up to the plate and prove once again the power of art to affect political change.

This year’s writers, directors and performers include Ritallin, Benjamin Gaillard, Mélanie Rivet, Pierre Brault, Laurie Fyffe, Kris Joseph, Patrick Gauthier, Sonja Mills, Norman Armour, Waneta Storms, Kate Smith, Nick di Gaetano, musical guest Glenn Nuotio and fresh from the national slam in Victoria, the Capital Slam Poetry Team. And many more of your local favourites!! (we just don’t know which ones yet…)

About The Wrecking Ball
The Wrecking Ball was founded in Toronto in November 2004 to address a nagging imbalance: too much theatre in our politics, not enough politics in our theatre. There have been eight Toronto Wrecking Balls cabarets to date, and the October 2008 edition saw the WB go national – Wrecking Balls were staged simultaneously in ten cities across the country, in advance of the federal election. An unprecedented mobilization of artists and art lovers.

Writers are given no more than two weeks to come up with material that reflects the current state of affairs. They are free to write on whatever topic they wish: the global, the national, the local, the very local. The plays are then cast and staged at the last minute, and this immediacy is what makes the Wrecking Ball the rollicking theatrical nerve ending that it is.

 

Monday, November 16, 2009
Box Office opens at 6:30pm

Show starts at 7:30pm
Saint Brigid’s Centre, 314 St. Patrick St. (at Cumberland)
Pay-What-You-Can (no advanced sales) – proceeds to Les Prix Rideau Awards

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