The Rover

Emotional Hook Misses Mark

Anna Fuerstenberg — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:33:31 +0000

In Absentia at the Centaur is a play fraught with symbolism. There are bare trees, a frozen river, the endless winter and the barren (or is she?) heroine of the piece. When Collette’s husband goes missing in Colombia while working for an oil company, she hunkers down and plays psychic possum. Her older sister Evelyn, brilliantly performed by the unstoppable Susan Glover, comes to take care of her.

We hear the subtext – “The most depressing person in my family is here to cheer me up” – addressed to the absent (yet present) Tom, her perfidious husband. She has also planned some infidelity with an unbearably nice neighbour, Bill. At one point she even attributes the kidnapping of her husband to a kind of karmic retribution for her contemplated betrayal.

One day a mysterious young man (played with charisma by Jade Hassouné) appears on the frozen lake and waves to her. His new age psychobabble is one of several irritating aspects of the piece. But it is worth braving a cold February night just to watch him prance around wearing and not wearing the absent Tom’s clothing.

Paul Hopkins is perfect as the philandering kidnapped hubby. He plays the projected and imagined spouse with terrific elegance and takes the bland dialogue to depths of feeling. Carlo Mestroni as the neighbour described as “pathologically decent” is convincing, unfortunately.

Jillian Fargey has the habit of delivering all her lines, and they did feel like line readings, in a monotone. English is a tonal language and without adequate modulation the audience loses the thread of the sentence. Sadly there were a lot of these sentences and they were uniformly dull. It may be a minor point, but what costume designer would allow a Canadian woman to go for a walk on a frozen lake in a short skirt?

The set was spectacular and even before the lights went down several audience members said they wanted to move into the building on stage. In Toronto, “cottage industry” means buying and selling five bedroom cottages. This was one of those.

The beautiful shimmering trees and snow falling projections were spectacular. The moving bed was really fine, but underemployed. What was missing was the playwright who had written Gordon, a brilliant play which premiered at the Segal last year. This play was repetitive and cliché ridden and one had to struggle to care at all about the main character. Even Jasper, the mysterious young man, didn’t give us enough of a hook for any kind of emotional empathy, which made the ending moot. If this play is what passes for passion on the Pacific coast, it still does not cut the mustard in Montreal.

In Absentia, at The Centaur Theatre at 453 St. Francois Xavier St. in Old Montreal through March 4. Most performances are at 8 p.m., but some Wednesday and Sunday performances are at 1, 2 and 7 p.m. Box office at (514) 288-3161 or www.centaurtheatre.com to learn more.

Chekhov for Beginners

Natalie G. — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 20:39:05 +0000

The Three Sisters, Chekhov’s simmering drama about an army general’s family trapped in a provincial Russian town at the end of the nineteenth century, is brought to the stage by Dawson College’s professional theatre program.

Rich in subtext, Chekhov’s writing, to paraphrase the great Russian theatre director Stanislavski, is not about characters conveying their thoughts and feelings through words. Instead, this is done in pauses, between lines, or with simple one-worded replies. In other words, the family’s lives and interactions are not dramatized per se, but rather in reflective discussions between the characters. Friendship, love, marriage, work, infidelity, cruelty and fire are simply the backdrop against which the characters muse about the meaning of life and its suffering.

Even though a student production, the set design, costume and props are certainly on par with a professional production (I marvelled at the authenticity of the baby’s carriage!). The cast, comprised of student actors, effectively play roles far removed from their actual ages and life setting. With a little help from the great costumes, makeup and set design, the young actors are easily convincing as turn-of-the-century women, men, soldiers and house servants. I watched a Friday matinee performance of Cast Y and was impressed with the technical aplomb of the cast and crew as the play was performed without stutter, stumble, or mistimed cue. Entrances, exits and scene changes were seamless.

Benjamin Walsh’s 60-something, eccentric, relapsing alcoholic Doctor Chebutykin was excellent and he managed to execute a believable drunkenness – no easy task. Vershinin, the sad-romantic and optimist of the play, is given a strong, yet gentle, voice by Anton Golikov who pitches it at much the same level throughout, yet manages to colour with sadness and joy (sometimes at the same time). I hope he continues to share his sublime voice with theatre audiences for years to come. Liana Bdewi pulls off a good transition from victim to bossy victimiser with her Natasha.

As for the three sisters, whom I enjoyed overall, I couldn’t help but feel that they did not display enough growth/change in character as the play moved through the years and events. I would really have enjoyed a more notable slide of Masha’s loss of love and respect for husband; of Irina’s loss of child-like hope and optimism; of matriarchal Olga resigning herself to the spinster role and the effect of Natasha’s growing control. Most of all, I would have loved to see expressed that invisible bond that exists between sisters, instead of their energy digressing and diluting into the characters around them. Sherina Forte-Jones’ Olga displays most of this powerful love for her family.

It has been said that one of the most difficult tasks of an actor is to figure out what to do with their hands, and while this was most noticeable with Jones, it was apparent with most of the cast, save the soldiers who could at least hold their hands behind their backs. Forgivable because they are learning, but I hope they take note that less is more.

Special mention must be made of Marc-André Dagenais, whose timing and vocal characterisation of awkward social mishap Captain Solyony creates endearing moments that solicit most of the play’s laughs.

In four acts, the play is approximately two and a half hours in length (with intermission), and because of its nature is not light entertainment. Instead, it is an existential drama that provokes an empathy for the characters as they come to realize that the things we long for and aspire to may not materialize, may indeed be out of our reach, forcing us to reconcile longing with reality.

Because of this, it seemed too much to handle for some of the high school audience I was watching with, as some did not return for the second half of the play. This may be more a reflection of the social network generation. Are they up to the task of sitting through a classic without resorting to immediate returns, instant satisfaction, and tweeting?

Just as Chekhov’s characters deal with their desperation by hoping that the future might be a little more beautiful, audiences might want to support productions such as Three Sisters if only to encourage further theatrical bravery. Oh, and they might want to sit through the whole thing.

Anton Chekhov’s Three Sisters is on at Dawson’s Theatre (2000 Atwater Street) until 4 February. (There are matinee performances at 12:30pm on some days)

For more: dawsoncollege.qc.ca/theatre-box-office

Natalie is a 28 year-old fresh inhabitant of Montreal, having moved here from South Africa in December 2011. She has both an honours degree in dramatic arts and a law degree from the University of the Witwatersrand (in SA) and thoroughly enjoys Montreal’s artistic and culture rich atmosphere.

Student Operas, Best Operas?

Lev Bratishenko — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 22:15:09 +0000

Butler and I were at stalemate over my pneumatic tube subscription. He thinks it’s a waste of money, but he doesn’t know opera companies. Yesterday I had my glorious revenge when the old tube rattled and spat out an invitation. There, I screamed from the lavatory, not everybody went over to email. I went, of course, and though the ticket lady found my canister suspicious she judged it unwise to argue. Four stars for the ticket lady at Pollack Hall.

Opera at McGill’s Schulich Music School is always a pleasure. The size of the hall is relief from the squinting and craning of Willfred-Pelletier, and it suits the young voices better. It might suit a lot of voices actually, if we could get away from the stupid idea that opera must be very big. Even a very big opera, like Don Giovanni, a massive club sandwich of the repertoire, can suit a chamber space.

Mozart composed Don Giovanni in 1787 when the story of the famous lothario’s conquests and punishment was at its height, having already been treated in dozens of forms. Lorenzo Da Ponte’s libretto mixes silliness and sermonizing, avoiding an entirely narrow Christian interpretation as well as the then dangerous political implications of a freethinking libertine hero.

The story includes another half-dozen major characters, so one difficulty, especially for a student production, is the density of talent required. Though the Don sings the most, and baritone Jonathan Christopher made sashaying but splendid effort, Donna Anna (soprano Carolanne Bouchard), Zerlina (soprano Stephanie Hradsky), Masetto (baritone Lukus Uhlman), had more work than they could sustain.

Soprano Jessica Scarlato had occasional difficulty controlling her cruise ship of a voice but added crucial energy as Donna Elvira, and bass-baritone Peter Walker sauntered away with the evening as Leporello, charming us all with an exceptionally mature, sumptuous voice and an easy manner.

The cast changed completely between the first two and last two performances. I have no idea how you rehearse something like that. Having the McGill Symphony Orchestra onstage was a clever touch that improved the sound, while the sets were atrocious, a finicky, ugly, intrusive business. Budget productions can usually avoid this, but I think Montreal might have the worst opera stage designers in the world. The costumes, on the other hand, indicated significant thought.

Director Patrick Hansen’s production starts from a literal interpretation of ‘monster’, one of the many names the Don is called in the opera. The vampire conceit is not new, the Don was a bloodsucker in tributes and small stagings at least as early as the 19^th century, and it casts the violence and eating in a grim new light. Opera McGill carried it off nicely, but I wish they had taken it further and dared to edit the libretto, removing some of the resulting inconsistencies. Bravery needs to come from small productions as well as big ones if opera is to avoid becoming a statue in the graveyard of ancient arts.

The Schulich Year of Early Music presents Montiverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea March 15-18. For more information, visit www.mcgill.ca/music/events

“Ain’t But One Kind of Crazy”

Kate Orland Bere — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 05:01:10 +0000

As one reads Half-Blood Blues, the terse, vivid vernacular of the aging Baltimorian light-skinned “black,” Sidney Griffiths, the first person narrator of Esi Edugyan’s Giller-winning novel, becomes a captivating force. A powerfully persuasive instrument, the bassist’s laconic voice boldly sings throughout this novel.

Early in the book, a young virtuoso horn player and fellow musician, Heironymus Falk (Hiero, or “the kid”), is arrested and abducted by the Gestapo in occupied Paris, 1940. Sent to the Mauthausen concentration camp (used for labour extermination of the intelligentsia), Heiro is believed dead by his bandmates. Sid feels guilt and helplessness, particularly as Hiero does not give away his own presence to the Nazis.

To be black in Paris under the Nazi occupation was to live in perpetual fear, with or without identity papers, even for fair-skinned Sid. Someone like Hiero, a half-blood — half German, half Sengalese — is seen by the Germans as tainted, impure — a mongrel, micshling. Which is what the Nazis think of jazz; because it is often created by blacks and Jews, Nazis believe jazz to be a suspicious and corrupting music.

The brilliant conceit by Edugyan, whereby the creation and recording of one 3 minute and 33 second jazz number (“Half-Blood Blues”) provides a haunting metaphor for the chaos of war, is starkly delivered in visceral, vibrant prose. The survival of the recording is the mystery, the miracle and, eventually, the possibility for redemption within the narrative. Jazz music as the document of memory, of authenticity.

The survival of Hiero is another matter. Only much later does the reader learn that Sid’s guilt is caused by his betrayal of his friend – arguably the ultimate betrayal. Or is it? Edugyan invites us into Sid’s mind and we soon like him all too well. Yet, by the end of Half-Blood Blues, we are questioning whether this musician was a true artist who makes a sacrifice for the sake of art, or merely a weak man jealous of a gifted artist while pretending to be his protector and friend. Or is Sid simply driven temporarily mad by jealousy, lost love, an imputed lack of talent, and by Hiero’s crazed drive to create the perfect recording, destroying every cut version even as they finish it? All of Edugyan’s characters place the creation of jazz on a plateau higher than health, wealth, friendship, or safety. How much ambition is too much ambition?

Then there is the mounting theme of racism and the murky, dangerous politics of hue and blood:

The tall Boot done soften his voice, too. It was odder than odd: these Boots was so courteous, so upstage in their behavior, they might’ve been talking bout the weather. Nothing like how they’d behaved in Berlin. There was even a weak apology in their gestures, like they was gentlemen at heart, and only rough times forced them to act this way. And this politeness, this quiet civility, it scared me more than outright violence. It seemed a newer kind of brutality.

Edugyan illustrates that racism IS war, but perpetrated in vile, casual, slyly cutting words meant to destroy people from the inside, and also inpassively violent displays such as Sid found in Hamburg at the Hagenbecks, a “green, shady park” where Hiero takes him to show him the “dangerous animals”:

Black folk. Barefoot dressed in rags and bones. A group of jacks squatted on flat rocks in the mud, smoking crude pipes, discs hanging from their huge earlobes.” “They keep people here? (Sid exclaimed) “They got one for Samoans, for Esquimaux.”… “A human zoo,” I mumbled. “Shit.”

Examining the atrocities of racism in a direct manner, this moment is perhaps the most unsettling of the entire novel. Both Sid and Hiero are rendered near speechlessness by this outrage.

As Edugyan narrows to her close, the novel has delivered a stylistic coup de grace, showcasing such an understanding of jazz, and the ability to aptly describe it, that this reader was firmly in thrall. Half-Blood Blues delivers overwhelming achievements in style, language, plot, characterization, mood, depth. Edugyan closes on a moment of grace:

Maybe I was just finally forgiving myself for it. For failing. Maybe that was the sound of forgiveness I heard in my old axe. Cause that night, swinging by candlelight in that cramped room…we was all of us free, brother. For that night at least, we was free.

Esi Edugyan has written a bold, brilliant, passionate novel exploring the search for dignity in times where dignity, and too often life itself, was refused or denied by madmen to those human beings who were deemed to be of the “wrong” race or of “mixed” blood. Not since reading Arundhati Roy’s God of Small Things have I enjoyed a novel so thoroughly. Yet, as of February, 2011, Edugyan had yet to find a publisher for her now celebrated novel. Today, less than one year later, Half-Blood Blues has been nominated for several awards besides the Giller it has won, including a nomination for the Man Booker prize. What does this say of the publishing industry today? What does it say to writers? Go with your instincts and do not give up. Bravo.

A jazz and blues aficionado, Kate Orland Bere is a Montreal fiction writer currently working on her first novel and a collection of short stories.
www.walkingwords.com/
www.facebook.com/montrealunplugged

Road to Nowhere

James Gartler — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 07:46:16 +0000

There was once a time when oil companies, politicians and car manufacturers wanted any notion of a mainstream electric vehicle dead and buried. Director Chris Paine chronicled it in his popular 2006 documentary Who Killed the Electric Car? and is now determined to declare the tides have turned with the release of his latest, Revenge of the Electric Car.

The thing is…they haven’t. At least not totally. As the film explains, in recent years GM and the like have finally come around to the idea that electric cars are the future, and are even competing with one another to get an attractive model out to customers. Yet it’s obvious that electric cars haven’t become the norm on highways around the world, so declaring that they’ve had their “revenge” seems a bit premature. “Return of the Electric Car” would have made for a more fitting title, though it’s clear why Paine opted for something flashy and bold. Like the Big Wigs and designers he interviews, the director is merely capitalizing on an old idea and throwing confetti around to distract for its shortcomings.

The biggest problem with Revenge is that it doesn’t really have a compelling, completed story to tell. Paine begins by stating that one of the biggest opponents to the electric car movement – GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz – simply reversed his position, but fails to capture him in an interview explaining what prompted this dramatic change-of-heart. Given that Lutz has offered such previous quotes as “global warming is a crock of sh*t”, this is especially disappointing.

From there, three other participants in the race are introduced: Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk, Renault/Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn and LA car converter Greg “Gadget” Abbott, who seems to have been included purely to fill the role of Ordinary Joe, as he’s decidedly not in competition with the others. Though narrator Tim Robbins never shares how Abbott can afford this expensive hobby given that he lives out of a trailer, a quick Google search reveals he’s the holder of ten Guinness World Records for his work as a craftsman, has appeared on several Discovery Channel programs and is prepping a series of his own, called Gadget’s Electric Garage…some of which probably should have been mentioned.

As the film bounces between these four players and the various setbacks they encounter, it also loses track of its timeline. For several minutes, Paine focuses in on Musk’s inability to deliver a batch of long-promised electric cars to his loyal Tesla customers, only to then treat the subplot as an afterthought by jumping forward to an unspecified point when it’s all been resolved off-camera. Only auto enthusiasts who have closely followed these events in the media truly stand any chance of making it through the movie without scratching their heads at least once.

In search of some narrative drama, Paine makes the jarring decision to focus his cameras on Musk’s private life halfway through the film, with a special emphasis on his divorce from the mother of his five children and engagement to British actress Talulah Riley (who – spoiler alert! – filed divorce papers earlier this month). Though there’s nothing relevant to the electric car there, the sight of twenty-something Talulah carrying one of Musk’s sons and joking about their ten-day courtship is certain to distract audiences for the remainder of the film.

An attempt is made to bring the narrative full-circle by having Danny DeVito bemoan the loss of his first electric car in the opening scenes and then happily set foot in his new Chevy Volt before the closing credits. Still, with an epilogue that promises a million plug-in cars come 2015, one can’t help but feel that Paine should have held off on this sequel until 2020, by which time the big picture would have emerged. With no clear winner and a race still in progress, Revenge is a meandering road-trip only the most auto-obsessed will enjoy.

Revenge of the Electric Car recently screened at Cinema du Parc, and can be purchased by visiting revengeoftheelectriccar.com.

Les bourgeois, c’est comme les cochons (bis)

Mélanie Grondin — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 13:57:27 +0000

Décidément, on se paye la tête des bourgeois ces jours-ci. Autant Le Dindon, de Feydeau, qui joue actuellement au Théâtre du Nouveau Monde, est un petit vaudeville gentil où la sexualité est plus verbale que visuelle, autant La noce, de Bertolt Brecht, est une satire des plus dévergondées. Peut-être trop, même.

Un jeune couple (Stéphanie Cardi et Frédéric Lavallée) vient de se marier et reçoit parents et amis pour célébrer la noce. Tous les meubles sont fabriqués avec soin par le marié qui en est très fier. Le souper commence dans la joie, mais plus il progresse, plus les quatre vérités de chaque personnage ressortent sans retenue — mais alors, vraiment sans retenue — et la soirée dégringole tout comme les meubles du marié.

La noce est l’une des premières pièces de Brecht et elle transpire sa jeunesse (il avait 21 ans à l’époque) et son anarchisme qui veut tout détruire sans exception. Mise en scène par Gregory Hlady qui, visiblement, aime bien tout détruire lui aussi, La noce commence trop bruyamment pour que le crescendo final ait un effet quelconque. Il est impossible de voir évoluer la pièce, les personnages et la décadence quand, dès le début, les personnages nous en mettent plein la vue et que les connotations sexuelles (pas subtiles du tout) sont lancées à qui mieux mieux. Comment faire un crescendo à une pièce qui commence déjà trop fortement? En parlant d’autant plus fort et en parlant plus vite, évidemment. Tant et si bien que certains dialogues importants qui ont lieu vers la fin de la pièce sont mutilés et énoncés de manière quasi inintelligible.

Le jeu des acteurs est tellement exagéré, comme s’ils veulent s’assurer que l’auditoire comprend bien qu’il s’agit de décadence, qu’il sonne complètement faux. Par moment, j’avais l’impression d’assister à une pièce d’école plutôt qu’à une pièce jouée par des acteurs chevronnés (Paul Ahmarani, Alex Bisping, Diane Ouimet).

La noce est une pièce franchement décousue, présentée en fragments qui se répètent trois, quatre fois à l’occasion, comme si les personnages et l’auditoire étaient pris dans un huis clos où les soupers de famille sont toujours les mêmes. Oui, la pièce fait rire, mais le désir de Hlady de choquer à tout prix la rend parfois infantile. Était-il vraiment nécessaire de demander à un acteur d’utiliser un coussin de farces et attrapes (« whoopie cushion ») alors qu’il est aux toilettes?

La pièce est peut-être toujours pertinente, si « la fragmentation, l’incertitude, le danger, l’angoisse qui émanent de La noce sont des caractéristiques de notre époque », comme l’explique Hlady, mais elle aurait gagné à être plus subtile. Cette incertitude, cette angoisse n’ont jamais émané de La noce de Hlady, et je ne me suis certainement pas sentie concernée.

La noce joue au Théâtre Prospero jusqu’au 11 février 2011.

Les bourgeois, c’est comme les cochons

Mélanie Grondin — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 05:00:35 +0000

Certains diront peut-être que le Théâtre du Nouveau Monde, en tant que « théâtre national », se doit d’être un théâtre sérieux où le drame a plus sa place que la comédie. Même les grands dramaturges de ce monde — de Shakespeare à Molière en passant par Corneille — ont écrit des comédies, et il est vrai qu’un petit Molière ne fait jamais de tord, mais un vaudeville? Ce genre de comédie populaire a-t-il sa place au TNM?

Oh, que oui! Et tout comme il fait parfois du bien de prendre un petit rosé rafraîchissant l’été sur le bord de la piscine au lieu d’un vin du plus grand cru, un Feydeau énergique et bien mis en scène fait toujours plaisir.

Edmond Pontagnac (Alain Zouvi) est un coureur de jupons invétéré. Lucienne Vatelin (Linda Sorgini), la dernière femme sur laquelle il a jeté son dévolu, refuse ses avances, car elle est très heureuse avec son mari, Crépin Valetin (Rémy Girard), qu’elle croit fidèle. Le jour où il la trompera, déclare-t-elle, elle se vengera en le trompant elle aussi. Voilà que survient Maggy Soldignac (Violette Chauveau), une Anglaise avec qui Crépin a couché lors d’un voyage d’affaires à Londres, puis son mari, Narcisse Soldignac (Roger La Rue), un Anglais d’origine marseillaise (tout un accent!) qui a suivi sa femme dans le but de la prendre la main dans le sac. S’ensuivent d’autres personnages qui ne paraissent pas dans le premier acte, une série de malentendus (différents couples se voient donner la même chambre d’hôtel) et quelques douces vengeances. Le dindon de la face n’est pas celui que l’on croit.

Mis en scène avec brio par Normand Chouinard, Le Dindon se déroule à Paris pendant les Années folles, à l’époque où tromper sa femme était considéré comme un sport national (sport qui n’a peut-être pas tout à fait disparu si l’on pense aux DSK de ce monde…). Tant les décors, que la musique et le mouvement des personnages sur la scène enchantent. Même les maints clins d’œil — essentiels au genre —, faits aux spectateurs ont de quoi faire rire aux éclats.

Par moment, cette pièce très élaborée, tant en complexité qu’en durée (2 heures 45 minutes avec entracte), a des longueurs et le fil de l’histoire semble décousu. Bien sûr, tous les fils se rejoignent à la fin et les nombreux personnages sortant de nulle part finissent par avoir leur sens, mais comme l’on sait que Feydeau avait tendance à écrire sur le vif, à finir la rédaction de ses pièces alors que les acteurs pratiquaient les premières scènes, Le Dindon gagnerait à être révisé un tant soit peu. Ou alors à ne pas être jouée dans son intégralité, ce qui rendrait sûrement l’action encore plus dynamique et entraînante.

Le Dindon offre une soirée enjouée où le ridicule ne tue pas et où il fait bon se payer la tête de quelques bourgeois.

Le Dindon joue au Théâtre du Nouveau Monde jusqu’au 11 février 2012.

This Writing Death

Will Aitken — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 05:01:08 +0000

Writing non-fiction’s a bitch – a truth not universally acknowledged.

You’ll hear fiction writers, especially novelists (I’ve written five, published three), going on about their own heroism. How wrenching it is, day after day, to dredge up eternal truths from the dank depths of their souls. One man (it would be a man) even told me writing a novel is “like going to war.” I like to picture him deep in a muddy trench, rats nibbling at his toes, his laptop powered by only the heat from his cojones. Yet another writer maintained it’s the moral rigour of the long fictional haul that drives novelists to drugs and drink. That’s a man with, in addition to possible substance abuse issues, a bad case of post hoc ergo propter hoc. (Actually, it was drugs that drove me to write novels, but that’s another story.)

When Montreal journalist and Concordia Communications professor Matt Hays and Concordia cinema prof Tom Waugh proposed I write a brief (150-page) book about legendary Italian director Luchino Visconti (1906-1976) for Arsenal Pulp Press’s Queer Film Classics series, I thought, Why the hell not? How hard can it be compared to, say, a 500-page novel? How long can it take – a month or two?

I said yes on the spot, adding I’d like to concentrate on Visconti’s 1954 “Senso,” which isn’t ostensibly queer, being about a torrid hetero affair, but rather an historical costume drama replete with ballgowns big as battleships, extravagant arias from “Il Trovatore” and shameless passion – in my book, very queer indeed. Also, Tennessee Williams and Paul Bowles collaborated on the dialogue for the English language version, and many of its most memorable scenes star Hollywood gay (although he didn’t come out until he was 82) heartthrob Farley Granger’s wondrously formed buttocks encased in white military breeches. What’s not to like?

Tom wanted to up the ante. He wanted hardcore queer content rather than limp musings about queer sensibility manifesting itself in a straight film. He suggested I write about “Death in Venice” as well, Visconti’s 1971 adaptation of Thomas Mann’s early (1912) novella about an ostensibly heterosexual man in late middle age stalking a pubescent Polish boy through the venereal city.

I was appalled at Tom’s suggestion. My 23-year-old self had hated the movie when it came out – found it too slow, too pretty, too boring (the eternal complaint of uncomprehending youth), and the “Adagietto” movement from Mahler’s Fifth Symphony that played incessantly throughout was, after its third or fourth iteration, intolerable.

“Maybe you should watch it again,” Tom said. So I did. And immediately suffered one of the great conversions of my moviegoing career. “Death in Venice” was stunning – provocative, pellucid and, at the risk of alliterative overkill, profound.

Now all I had to do was write about it. And “Senso.”

I trotted off to the library, did my database due diligence, read all the Visconti biographies, endless articles by academic critics, magazine and newspaper critics, trolled the Net for improbable gems. Who knew, for instance, that the real-life boy who was the model for Tadzio in the book – the ten-year-old Mann became obsessed with when he visited Venice at the age of 36 – would turn out to be a dead ringer for Mann’s stalwart wife Katia?

I filled notebook after notebook, dismayed at how dreary much of the writing about this most stylistically flamboyant of filmmakers was – po-faced Visconti experts flogging their dreary little theories like so many dead horses. In much of the critical writing the sense of scale was all wrong: his life (aristocrat, anti-Fascist hero, communist, lover) and his work were full of sweep, grandeur and glamour, yet what was said about him and it felt so pinched and narrow.

After a summer and fall of research I sat down to write. And fell immediately into despair. My tears dissolved my ergonomic writing chair. As a novelist I do my research and promptly forget it, feeling that what’s crucial will ooze into my writing via unconscious osmosis.

I also have a novelist’s contempt for facts – if they’re inconvenient, make something up. That’s why they call it fiction.

Because so few people under 50 seemed to have even heard of Visconti or “Death in Venice,” I decided to devote the first third of the book to a potted biography of the irascible man. Abruptly I found myself a slave to facts. No insouciant flights of fantasy, no trilling of invention’s flute. Every fucking word I wrote had to be nailed down with a fact. Plodding doesn’t begin to describe the slough of lassitude I sank into.

When I’m working on a novel, a slow day is four or five pages, a good day 10 and an ecstatic one 20. With fiction, more often than not, it’s Larkin’s “going down the long slide to happiness.” The real work comes with the re-writing – the slashing and burning, the brutal interrogation of every word, the pruning, clipping and sculpting, unconscionable mixed metaphors hacked off with an ax (a process which, if this were fiction, would wipe out everything in this sentence after the dash).

All through the white spectral days of January, February and March I managed a page a day. A Page A Day! I spent more time trying to read my indecipherable notes than actually typing. I was deeply depressed. After finishing my continent output I often crept, weeping, to my bed where I watched downbeat indie movies from Latvia on Netflix. I had bad sex. I sank so low I ate soy ice cream.

Then, one day, there on the page, Visconti died. I had reached the end of his biography. I packed it off to my usual reader: She liked it. I was released.

The rest of the writing was Larkin all the way. Criticism I know how to do, having worked as a film and arts critics since I was in diapers – criticism’s only half fact, the rest being personal opinion. With just the analyses of “Senso” and “Death in Venice” to go, I decided to write about the latter first, but in the writing, “Death in Venice” took over – I was overwhelmed by its beauty, intelligence and the subtlety of Visconti’s adaptation, which was an ingenious re-writing and re-envisioning of Mann’s novella. He had written an ironic tragedy – an aging man who gives all to forbidden love and dies for his efforts. The film has been viewed in much the same way ever since its release, as an object lesson for pedophiles. An extremely reductive response to a film as richly layered with ambiguity as “Death in Venice.” Visconti’s movie is about redemption, a clenched fist of a man transfigured by beauty and desire.

“Senso” will have to wait – maybe I can spin it off as an essay. In looking back I see that it was fear of failure, of not being able to do it, that motivated, depressed and distracted my throughout the writing of Death in Venice: A Queer Film Classic. And that’s good, because for me without fear there’s no creation.

In addition to Death In Venice: A Queer Film Classic, Will Aitken has published three novels: Realia, A Visit Home and Terre Haute. He’s also a travel journalist and teaches in the CinVidCom department at Dawson College.

The launch for Will Aitken’s Death In Venice: A Queer Film Classic is on Thursday, 26 January 6pm to 9pm at the Royal Phoenix Bar, 5788 St Laurent, Métro Rosemont.

Quand on aime on a toujours vingt ans

Mélanie Grondin — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 05:01:30 +0000

Tout le monde recherche et le bonheur et l’amour. Peu importe l’action des gens qui nous entourent, au fond, ils cherchent tous, comme nous, à être heureux. Thème universel que cela; thème qui fait toujours un bon roman. C’est cette quête qui propulse le dernier roman d’Yves Beauchemin : La serveuse du Café Cherrier.

Après avoir été chassée de la maison familiale parce que sa mère, femme égocentrique et ultrareligieuse, croyait qu’elle était prostituée, Mélanie Gervais quitte Trois-Rivières pour Montréal. D’une beauté presque incroyable, elle devient serveuse au Café Cherrier et attire le regard de tous les personnages masculins que Beauchemin intègre à son roman. Le roman s’ouvre sur la rencontre entre Mélanie et Pierrot Bernard, un écrivain quinquagénaire ressemblant au père Noël de Coca Cola, qui, avec beaucoup d’efforts, finit par devenir l’amant de Mélanie. Surviennent : un sinistre éditeur beaucoup plus intéressé par la beauté de Mélanie que par le roman de Pierrot; la mère de Mélanie qui décide, elle aussi, de déménager à Montréal; et un drame qui changera le cours de la vie de Mélanie. Ainsi se termine la première partie du long roman de Beauchemin, lequel, il faut le dire, est tellement accrocheur qu’il se lit très rapidement.

La serveuse du Café Cherrier est un roman ou les bons sont bons à en être naïfs et les méchants sont tellement méchants qu’on les imagine presque avec une cape noire et un rire lugubre. Mais le lecteur peut pardonner ces extrêmes stéréotypés tellement les retournements sont intrigants. En effet, la prose de Beauchemin — malgré son affection marquée pour les italiques (je n’en ai toujours pas compris l’usage ici : « Et il se mit à rire, tout fier de son trait d’esprit. ») — est entraînante, attirant le lecteur dès la première page et le tirant, tel un chien suivant un morceau de viande juteux, tout au long des aventures de Mélanie.

Mélanie (l’ai-je dit?) est belle au point d’en être agaçante, tant pour nous que pour elle, mais malheureusement la propension de Beauchemin à répéter les traits qui caractérisent son personnage principal ne s’applique pas toujours à ses autres personnages, particulièrement Louis Perez. Autant l’Haïtienne Gerbederose Café et l’ex-itinérant Tonio Blanchet deviennent réels et vivants dès leur arrivée dans le roman, autant Louis Perez, un personnage pourtant important dans la vie de Mélanie, demeure flou. L’héritage haïtien de Gerbederose est omniprésent, mais l’héritage hispanophone de Louis, dont les parents semblent être des immigrants de première génération, est à peine mentionné. On le devine plus qu’on ne le sait et son personnage en perd de la vivacité.

Yves Beauchemin en est à son treizième roman et il sait, sans l’ombre d’un doute, satisfaire le lecteur. La serveuse du Café Cherrier n’est pas un roman où l’on découvre une nouvelle facette de l’humanité (tant la notre que celle d’autrui), ni un roman où l’on se perd dans un monde inconnu. Par contre, il s’agit d’un bon roman que le lecteur aime lire, une bonne histoire dont certains personnages sont inoubliables.

Mélanie Grondin est rédactrice en chef du Montreal Review of Books.

12 hommes, 12 livres

Joseph Elfassi — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 17:30:54 +0000

J’ai demandé à 12 hommes de me recommander des livres importants pour eux. Mon but final est de réévaluer mon rapport avec eux et avec les hommes en général. Un soir de janvier, je rencontre Youssef, ami, photographe, penseur, voyageur, pour parler du dernier livre de Dany Laferrière, que l’auteur qualifie d’autobiographie de ses pensées. On parle.

On revient souvent vers la dualité de l’être. Les images saisissantes sont récurrentes dans le livre : un livre est une carte de trésor, dont l’auteur possède la moitié de la carte, et le lecteur, la deuxième partie. Le temps est une rivière, que nous sommes. Ce tigre de Borges, qui le déchire alors qu’il est lui-même ce tigre. Et cette image qui frappe Youssef, de l’interdépendance du voyageur et du sédentaire. Entre celui qui prend le train et celui qui attend à la gare pour entendre son histoire. Comme quoi les deux ont sauvagement besoin de l’autre pour exister.

Mais qui es-tu, Youssef, entre les deux ? « Moi je suis le voyageur. » C’est une réponse légitime. Youssef a quand même foulé le sol de plusieurs pays dans différents continents. Petite pause. « Mais je suis aussi le gars qui attend au quai un peu. » Comme quoi, on raconte des histoires et on se fait raconter des histoires.

Dany Laferrière parle de cet homme qui a décidé d’être incognito pour éviter d’être repéré par le dictateur. Si longtemps qu’il est resté incognito longtemps après que le dictateur soit parti. Cela me fait penser à ce qu’il dit des chefs-d’oeuvre, qu’ils sont dangereux parce qu’il leur arrive parfois de dépasser leurs buts. Comme cet incognito trop longtemps caché qu’il n’identifiait plus ce qu’il évitait. Il a dépassé son but. Est-ce que Youssef les dépasse, ses buts ? En a-t-il ?

« Mon père me pose cette question, mais je ne sais pas vraiment quoi répondre ». S’il n’a pas de but précis, Youssef est quand même un hyperactif : photographe, édimestre, vidéaste, intervenant…mais n’a-t-il pas de buts précis ? « En fait, je n’ai jamais de but qui va plus loin qu’un an. » Il pense. Lentement, il arrive vers sa réflexion. « Mon seul but, à long terme, serait l’immortalité, dans le fond. »

Non pas l’immortalité physique de quelqu’un qui ne meurt jamais, mais de quelqu’un qui continue d’exister aux yeux des autres, à travers ses romans, ses pensées, quelqu’un qui a sa place dans ces cimetières de Laferrière, les bibliothèques. Youssef souhaite donc écrire éventuellement une œuvre qui pourrait rester dans l’imaginaire des gens. « Si ma vie s’arrêtait là, est-ce qu’il y aurait une seule phrase que j’ai dite que quelqu’un lirait dans cent ans et trouverait qu’elle est bien formulée ? ». Youssef me rappelle que nous sommes tous les deux un peu obsédés par cette notoriété artistique, qui, une fois la mort arrivée, ne vaut plus rien réellement. Il faut un certain niveau d’acceptation.

Quand Laferrière parle d’un auteur qui renaît à chaque lecture, conclut Youssef, il doit un peu penser à lui-même, non ? Et s’il parle de lui-même comme étant découvert dans le futur, dans son propre livre, c’est qu’il a un peu accepté l’idée de se propre mort ?

Mais qu’est-ce que la mort, je me demande, pour un homme qui considère qu’il est la rivière du temps dont la source remonte à l’enfance ? Pour cet homme qui lit des poèmes avant de se coucher, et qui croit que l’on construit l’univers en dormant ?

Dany Laferrière nous démontre, dans L’art presque perdu de ne rien faire, sa façon originale et presque spirituelle d’aborder ces questions éternelles du temps, de la mort, du sommeil et de l’art. Dany Laferrière n’est pas avec nous lorsqu’on discute de lui à La Petite Cuillère, mais ces pauses entre les phrases d’Hemingway, dont il parle, qui sont chargées du « poids des rêves de ces lectures », composent la conversation entre Youssef et moi. Tour à tour nous lisons ses phrases, et permettons à ces silences, ce poids de rêve, d’exister entre nous. Si l’auteur n’est pas là, physiquement, avec nous, deux copies de son livre reposent sur la table du café tandis qu’on fait vivre, ou renaître, ses pensées.

Joseph Elfassi is a Montréal based photographer, filmmaker and writer. He writes for the litterary blog www.baiselivres.com and hosts videos for the popular comedic website www.petitpetitgamin.com. You can see more of his work on his personal website www.elfassi.ca

This is a cross-post from baiselivres.com

More Slapstick, Fewer Words

Anna Fuerstenberg — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 05:00:32 +0000

Veronica Classen designed a fabulous set at the Bain St. Michel and the device of having poetry and text messages projected on the high tech grey walls was delightful. She also dressed a cast which was supposedly sweating in the office of a tiny poetry magazine bereft of air conditioner, in seriously dark and heavy clothes … and in a Montreal heat wave only one character wore actual sandals.

The actors in Ars Poetica are a who’s who of Montreal theatre, and Noel Burton was actually terrific as the scoundrel publisher of the magazine. He delivered his overwrought lines with terrific aplomb and almost convinced us that he might have had a fling with the ingénue, delightful Elena Dunkelman. But he was just a tad long in the tooth to be playing the part, even though we were delighted that he did.

He was utterly convincing when sparring with Howard Rosenstein who gave a terrific performance as the father-lawyer persona. Rosenstein shot out lawyer jokes which fared less well. “What’s the point of being a lawyer if you can’t take other people’s property?” Not a bad line but a bit of a machete cutting daisies in this play.

Danielle Desormeaux played the part of Diane Langlois, a cliché writ large who was neither funny nor believable. This is an actress with outstanding skills and her comic timing saved some of the really awful moments in the play. We have all had our share of run- ins with heartless arts bureaucrats but some of the writing was just over the top. It was hard to believe that someone would lose their job at the Canada Council for endorsing a small poetry magazine which couldn’t come up with a strategic business plan. Paula Jean Hixon was terrific as the true believing editor of Ars Poetica and her performance was nuanced and moving.

Ultimately the comic zingers – such as: “Greenfield Park is the deep south … practically Atlanta” – were not enough to live up to the play’s promise of delivering an actual farce. The definition of a farce is that every entrance and exit must be hilarious. The play was about a poetry magazine and there was a great deal of actual poetry both spoken and projected. Perhaps that is just too wordy a topic to sustain the lightness and buffoonery necessary for farce. The wordiness slowed down the action and the blocking was actually uninteresting. A beautiful set which had everyone in tiny quarters only becomes part of the comedy when there is a lot of movement in the tiny space, think state room and the Marx brothers.

Neurosurgery is easy; comedy is hard. This is not a bad first theatrical effort by Arthur Holden at getting the laughs out, but it did not get the audience on this freezing night to generate even one loud guffaw.

Ars Poetica, by Arthur Holden, runs Tuesday to Feb. 12 at Le Bain St. Michel, 5300 St. Dominique St. Tickets cost $10 to $20. Sunday matinee on Jan. 22 is pay-what-you-can.

Never Say Die

Alex Woolcott — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 04:39:49 +0000

It’s a swing and a miss for Ars Poetica, the second play by Arthur Holden and the latest offering from Montreal’s Infinitheatre. Infinite can always be commended for exclusively producing new work by local writers. But this time around they’ve emerged with a weak and meandering comedy in desperate need of another draft.

It’s a day in the life for Ars Poetica, a struggling literary magazine that has the audacity to print English poetry in Montreal. Plucky intern Naomi Rose (Elana Dunkelman) has made it a Take-Your-Dad-To-Work-Day, a decision that injects her stern father (Howard Rosenstien) into the chaotic world of a smarmy publisher (Noel Burton), his loyal editor (Paula Jean Hixson) and a crazy Canada Council official (Danielle Desormeaux).

The play wobbles from the start, with the plot (Ars Poetica needs Daddy’s money to survive) not kicking in until – wait for it – ten minutes into the second act. Until then, we are left with some genuinely funny dialogue, a few clever moments and little else.

Aside from the pesky plot problem, Ars Poetica’s greatest challenge is deciding what sort of comedy it wants to be. It most resembles the gentler comedies of summer stock, though there are hints of satire when it pokes at the government officials who decide the fate of Canadian art. Then there are the touches of madcap farce, such as when Burton ducks in and out of windows as he tries to hide from Desormeaux. In healthy doses, this could create a stylish night; for now, the measurements are wholly uneven.

Holden’s a talented writer and knows his way around a piece of a dialogue. His play has received a lot of dramaturgical work in the last fifteen months, beginning with a reading at 2010’s Pipeline Series (Infinite’s annual festival of staged readings) and ending with a long list of dramaturgs, all of whom are included in the Thank You Section of the program.

But whether it’s a case of too many cooks in the kitchen or plain bad luck, Ars Poetica never quite manages to get off the ground. The play has a surprisingly lack of tension, some far-fetched plot points and manages the amazing feat of never quite having a central character – unless you count the magazine itself.

Designer Veronica Classen should be noted for giving the actors a stylish playground, but the true heroes of the night are the cast, who never stop fighting to bring a bit of humanity to characters that move from farce to pathos in the blink of an eye. Elana Dunkleman has delightful pluck – I’ve used that word already, but it’s really the only one that fits – and Howard Rosenstein enjoys some fine moments as the lawyer who’s having a really bad day. Together with Paula Jean Hixson, he even survives some deft acting acrobatics when the script calls for their two characters, who have barely spoken, to suddenly show some romantic spark.

Not surprisingly, a little poetry also gets spouted throughout the show. Dunkelman’s wide-eyed neophyte has a head full of quotes which she turns to for the same reason we all turn to writers: to say the things that we can’t quite seem to say ourselves. It’s at these moments that we most catch a glimpse of what Ars Poetica could be: a show that says all those things we can never quite articulate about the never-say-die attitude of English culture in Montreal. It’s a worthwhile message. The messenger just needs to be a bit more finely-tuned.

Ars Poetica plays through to February 12 at Infinitheatre, Bain St Michel, 5300 rue St Dominique. 514-987-1774 www.infinitheatre.com

Le chemin d’un chef d’orchestre

Isaline Cartier — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 11:52:31 +0000

Issu d’une famille où tout le monde était un peu musicien, il « est tombé dedans quand il était petit », mais c’est l’intervention des recruteurs de l’école du Plateau, qui faisaient la tournée des écoles pour dénicher des talents, qui déclenchera son parcours musical. Dans cette école primaire où la part académique était condensée en une demi-journée et le reste consacré à l’éveil musical, l’amour de la musique se mêle à une fascination pour la vie de groupe. Il se forge dans cet incubateur le sentiment que, plus qu’un art ou une réalisation personnelle, la musique est un « trip de gang ».

Il poursuit en percussion à la polyvalente Joseph-François Perrault, toujours entouré de ses amis. Ses professeurs voient en lui la matière brute d’un chef d’orchestre. « Quand le prof devait s’absenter de la classe, il me demandait de venir diriger à sa place. C’est devenu évident que c’était toujours à moi, qu’il demandait! (rire) Il voyait quelque chose que moi je ne voyais pas encore »

De la batterie qui donne le rythme au chef qui bat la mesure, il n’y a qu’un pas? Oui? « Non! » Car entre l’affinage des capacités musicales par le diplôme en direction d’orchestre et la vocation de chef d’orchestre, il y a un fossé énorme.

Après le Conservatoire, Jean-Marie Zeitouni part en Autriche avec le désir d’aller au bout de ce qu’il pouvait faire : apprendre l’allemand et l’italien, parce que la musique est très liée aux langues. Apprendre des milliers de pièces qu’il ne connaissait pas. Puis aussi entendre des musiciens de très haut niveau. À Vienne, une capitale de la musique classique, passent chaque semaine les plus grands orchestres du monde. « Tu es constamment exposé à des gens qui performent et qui jouent leur spécialité parce qu’ils sont en tournée. » C’est aussi possible là-bas d’assister aux répétitions de l’Orchestre Philarmonique de Vienne, où il trouve une tradition incroyable de compréhension de la musique, de qualité d’exécution. « C’est là que tu apprends les interactions du chef avec un groupe, que tu comprends les réactions du groupe, et, surtout, que tu entends le résultat! » Comparativement au Conservatoire, il n’y a pas de fonction pédagogique : le chef travaille avec des spécialistes.

Or, la direction d’orchestre est un métier qui ne peut s’apprendre qu’en le faisant. Au contraire d’un musicien qui pratique avant d’arriver en répétition, la contribution du chef d’orchestre ne peut pas être travaillée quand il est seul chez lui. « Même si tu comprends les pièces, que tu aies la capacité d’intellectualiser la musique, c’est dur de saisir ce que tu auras à faire avant de le faire : ça va émerger de la dynamique de la rencontre. Tu ne peux pas te préparer pour ça… »

Le programme de chef en résidence du Conseil des Arts a été créé à cette fin, et Jean-Marie Zeitouni a été le premier chef au Canada à en bénéficier. À la fin de cette première année avec les Violons du Roy est arrivé l’ingrédient final :

« Quand t’es membre du groupe, tu fais partie de l’entité. Mais quand tu deviens le chef, il y a une distance, c’est toi qui prends la responsabilité. C’est bien : t’as plus d’influence, mais en même temps il faut que tu renonces à l’identité d’être un membre du groupe. C’est ça que je trouvais difficile dans le fait d’accepter d’être le chef : je devais renoncer à être un de la gang. » C’est à ce prix seulement qu’on peut embrasser le métier de chef d’orchestre et saisir la baguette comme un Excalibur? « (rire) Oui »

C’était il y a dix ans, et depuis, beaucoup d’eau a coulé sous les ponts du Danube. De leur côté, les musiciens d’I Musici de Montréal ont en moyenne le double de l’âge qu’ils avaient quand l’ensemble a été fondé. Cette nouvelle union est donc celle de professionnels accomplis. Jean-Marie Zeitouni est prêt à amener l’ensemble ailleurs et les musiciens sont très enthousiastes. Ce sera un beau trip de gang.

I Musici de Montréal présente Coucher de soleil italien, sous la direction de Jean-Marie Zeitouni, à la salle Tudor du magasin Ogilvy, le vendredi 20 janvier à 11 h et à 17 h 45 et le samedi 21 janvier à 14 h : trois représentations en tout. http://imusici.com

Uncommon Creation

Kati Belanger — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 23:57:47 +0000

The promise of variety and the fresh energy of emerging choreographers sold out last year’s edition of Common Space at the Bouge d’ici dance festival. In its fourth year, the Common Space showcase seeks to shine the spotlight on a large group of up-and-coming choreographers here in Montreal, while providing them with resources to develop their work.

It has been a long process for the artists about to present their work Wednesday through Saturday at Mainline Theatre. The choreographers were chosen from a record number of applications back in November, and they represent a cross-section of Montreal talent, many educated in the major dance programs of the city. They are francophone and anglophone, and have diverse backgrounds, from theatre to butoh. They applied to Common Space with an already-realised work in the hope of expanding and retooling that creation into something even better.

For Concordia Dance alumnus Maxine Segalowitz, Bouge d’ici represents a spring board into the vast Montreal dance community. “People know about this festival. Where I am right now as an artist, this is a great entry point,” says Segalowitz.

The added draw was that the festival facilitates the choreographic process by providing each artist with a mentor.

“These are established people in the dance community that the artists have maybe never had an opportunity to work with,” says Bouge d’ici planning committee member and artist liaison Holly Greco. “It can be intimidating to ask a stranger, especially a successful one, into your rehearsals to look at your work. We do that for the artists – we provide them with that outside eye.”

Segalowitz had the eye of mentor Emily Gualtieri of PARTS&LABOUR_DANSE, who is a past participant of the festival. “It changed my life!” enthuses Segalowitz.

Bouge d’ici’s Common Space: L’Espace Commun at Mainline Theatre (3997 St-Laurent Blvd.), Jan. 18-20 at 8 pm, and Jan. 21 at 4 pm

Tickets can be purchased at Mainline Theatre

Photo by Cindy Lopez

Letter from Chicago

Marianne Ackerman — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:23:46 +0000

The age of national culture is over. Forget about tired nation-states, their ineffective governments and surly citizens. Great art is to be found in cities with strong flavours. At the top of my list is Chicago, just over an hour from Toronto by air, where a vibrant theatre scene is offering the best play I’ve seen in years.

The Chicago Shakespeare Theatre is located on Navy Pier, a Disneyesque promontory sticking out into Lake Michigan. Drawing eight million visitors a year to a children’s museum, a glittering midway, several bars and a slew of boat cruises, Navy Pier is the last place you’d expect to find a jewel of a classical theatre, but the six-storey playhouse with two performance spaces is world unto itself. The 500-seat main space is an ingenious blend of London’s Globe, with several stories of seats built in a steep U around the performance space, and a combination proscenium and thrust stage reminiscent of Canada’s Stratford Festival thearre. Theses are references only; the CST playhouse is an original. A surprisingly intimate space, even cosy, it is surrounded on three sides with glass reception areas offering a spectacular view of the waterfront.

During a brief visit to Chicago in early January, I saw Timothy Findlay’s play Elisabeth Rex, starring two Canadian Stratford stalwarts, Diane D’Aquila and Stephen Sutcliffe, directed by the CST’s founder and artistic director, Barbara Gaines. A magnificent play written by a great, late Canadian, it was staged with feeling and finesse, a breathtaking mixture of pathos and comedy. After opening in late November to rave reviews, it was selling out in the last weeks, meaning a Broadway transfer could well be the next stop. Such moves are common on the Chicago theatre scene, which boasts an excellent transfer record.

Set during the end of Elizabeth I’s reign, the play imagines the Queen descending into a draughty barn where Shakespeare and a few of his leading actors are spending the night. Elizabeth has condemned her former lover, the Early of Essex, to death for fomenting an uprising, and turns to the theatre crowd for distraction. Ned Lowenscraft, a gay actor who has spent a lifetime playing women’s roles, is days away from succumbing to venereal disease. Their night is a long argument about the true nature of womanhood and manliness, the issue resolved after an emotionally wrenching battle of wits. Between them, Shakespeare, in skullcap and bathrobe, is reading Plutarch and taking notes for his next play, Anthony and Cleopatra, which he is basing on the Queen’s tormented love life. Rich, imaginative and intense, the play is a masterpiece, and very well served by the theatre’s formidable production.

The Chicago Shakespeare Company is celebrating its quarter century anniversary this year, and much ground covered since Gaines launched the venture upstairs at the Red Lion Pub 25 years ago. I had a chat with creative producer Rick Boynton, one of four who make up the artistic staff of the company. A former actor and casting agent, Boynton acts as liaison between the artists and an accounting department with an annual budget of $13 million, half of which comes from box office. He also nurtures new projects, such as the Sondheim musical Follies, launched last fall to great acclaim.

How does a company with Shakespeare in the name dare programme a true blue American musical? “Our mandate is to do Shakespeare, his contemporaries and other plays inspired by his brilliance,” Boynton explained. The definition clearly works. Currently he’s developing a hip-hop adaptation called Othello the Remix for the Globe-to-Globe festival coming up in London, the only North American theatre invited to present work at an event featuring dozens of foreign-language productions of the bard’s plays.

Later this season, the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre is presenting a 3-actor rift on The Tempest, using masks along with 651 pounds of driftwood, 38 feet of chain, a gramophone and an ax, followed by A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Timon of Athens.

Getting to Chicago is painless and, if you plan ahead, relatively cheap thanks to Porter Airlines which flies directly from Toronto’s City Airport (located on the island, a hop from downtown.)

New York it isn’t. I won’t say its better, as such claims are meaningless. But Chicago is definitely the American city I will turn to first for a fresh-water breath of creative air. Don’t get me started on the food, music and architecture. See for yourself, asap.

www.chicagoshakes.com

Marianne Ackerman is the publisher of The Rover.

Hypothetically Speaking

Matthias Lalisse — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 05:01:23 +0000

Alan Sokal, the physicist who famously “debunked” a Cultural Studies journal by tricking its editors into publishing a finely crafted parody, threw down the following glove to his wishy-washy colleagues in the humanities: “Anyone who believes that the laws of physics are mere social conventions is invited to try transgressing those conventions from the windows of my apartment. (I live on the twenty-first floor.)”

Sokal’s no-nonsense approach to postmodernist theory is on one side of the Great Divide between the sciences and the humanities. On the other, many continue to beat the postmodernist drum (though none seem to have braved Sokal’s gravity test). In her first volume of poetry, Hypotheticals, Leigh Kotsilidis is one of those drummers.

A graphic artist by training and trade, Kotsilidis is a visual poet. Her poems are descriptive rather than introspective, building complex images that must be unpacked on two levels: What are we seeing, and How are we seeing it? Each line dramatizes the positions of both perceiving subjects and perceived objects. In some cases, the object returns with a faint objection: “You are falsifying me!”

In this collection, a forest declaims Man’s “growing cabinet / of atrocities,” lamenting the way that “He counts our apples as he would / the dead: each one a head.” Here, Kotsilidis gives explicit voice to the implicit suffering of Nature. Elsewhere, knowledge’s falsification of its objects is only obliquely apparent. The speaker of “Sound Check” performs a morcellement scientifique—a clinical decomposition—that almost obscures his patient’s own intentions.

While you visualize her

underlying anatomy’s symmetry,

confirm her trachea

is midline. Put thumbs together

at her spine: Breathe.

…

Don’t let her fool you with coy

notes, lewd bassoons, buoyant

plumes, booze, croak.

Relentlessly objective, the sexless physician turns a blind eye to his patient’s enticements, her gibes and her fun. He methodically ignores the signals of her coital ambitions.

Because many of its poems elicit Nature’s response to the pretensions of Man – to invoke a classic dichotomy - Hypotheticals will be read by some as an eco-critical project. For others, it will reek of postmodernist dogmatism, irrationalist skepticism of science, and an unfortunate preoccupation with the problem of language. The book makes no secret of its agenda. The back jacket reads: “While science has provided a useful metaphor to explain the world, it has just as often proved to be as fallible as the flawed humans who lean on it.” Aggressive with this thesis, Hypotheticals throws around combative rhetoricals such as: “which truth will the brain feign?”

But at her strongest, Kotsidilis is not just tossing around polemics, or defining Man as the being that deceives himself in believing he is not deceived. Her best poems wield images to reshape perception itself. With sly metaphors, they scheme to make language realize its own limits, seizing neglected aspects of once-familiar objects. Of the ocean floor pierced by an oil rig’s vampiric drills, she writes that it is “a man, his mouth a clam / shucked of sound.” Objects of nature transfigure into signs of human significance: a backhoe’s orange arm slipping its shovel into the topsoil makes “You think of her dress – / your hand in the hem.” These images, with their instantaneous clarity, bypass the scientific method. With poetry, Kotsilidis wants to decompose the world and remake it from scratch.

The poems in Hypotheticals are deft rather than dogmatic, and the book manages to surprise with pieces whose relation to the theme are not immediately clear. It particularly avoids the naïve anthropomorphism of pathetic fallacy. Here, Nature is not the echo of Man’s aches and yearnings, but a force that batters Man with its more fundamental truth. Because of its abstract subject matter, Hypotheticals may be destined for a small cadre of enthusiastic speculators. But at the edge of the universe, these few keen voyeurs will eagerly clamp open their eyelids as Leigh peels knowledge’s dress over its head.

When he’s is not selling books, Matthias Lalisse is writing about them. He currently lives in Montreal.

Bliss This

Natalie G. — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 22:28:35 +0000

Pinned on the theme of a celebrity obsession, Bliss starts out lightly and amusingly enough before incrementally submerging the viewer into a darker, more confusing world where reality is a concept much like beach sand in a clenched fist.

Bliss is the English translation of Quebecois writer Olivier Choinière’s play Félicité. It is described as a surreal piece that “explores North American obsession with celebrity.” One surely gets the feel of this obsession in Bliss, taken to the fanatic extreme by Caro, who seems to have lost grips with reality as a cashier at Walmart.

Broadly speaking, the play interweaves the three stories of super star Celine taking a break from show business for a bed rest pregnancy; Isabelle, a sick and abused little girl; and Caro, an employee at Walmart. All are told through the actions of three of the four cast members on stage, who morph into different characters at different times. The other character, Caro, is at times directing – or perhaps dictating – the action as it unfolds through these three stories. What we are not sure of is whether Caro is assisting them to be true to events as told in the media or whether she is imagining these events.

The actors were more than competent in their parts. Instead of getting stuck on obvious or jarring re-enactments, they handle their transitions modestly and subtly, creating a true melting between the stories. Special mention must be made of the apt casting of Caro, whose soothing, velvety voice speaks grotesque words in a strangely hypnotising, lyrical, even beautiful manner. I found myself with goose bumps a few times as the words are so rich and the actors use them artfully to illicit the images described.

The set is simple and good stage direction manages to transform the same clinical space into the various spaces in which the narrative unfolds.

In truth, it is not easy reviewing a piece like Bliss because what it was for one person is not what it will be for another. One is presented with is a piece that requires attention and mental joining of the dots. Or perhaps those dots cannot really be joined together. It is surreal, Dali-esque theatre.

Bliss is on at Centaur Theatre’s Wildside Theatre Festival until January 14, 2012.

Natalie G. is a 28 year-old fresh inhabitant of Montreal, having moved here from South Africa in December 2011. She has both an honours degree in Dramatic Arts and a law degree from the University of the Witwatersrand (in SA) and thoroughly enjoys Montreal’s artistic and culture rich atmosphere.

Eyes Wide Open

Natalie G. — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 19:17:59 +0000

In this one-woman “tragi-comedy,” Kirsten Rasmussen, as one-part Sara Tonin and five-parts bunny, takes you on the fast-paced, brilliantly executed journey of Sara and Benjamin Bunny into a young woman’s world behind the personality she presents at her workshops.

The setting is a motivational/self-help workshop and you, as the audience, are in attendance. You meet Sara Tonin, an obviously successful, driven and fulfilled woman who travels the country teaching people how to live the successful, driven and fulfilled life that she does, using her method of “skinning the bunny.” Without divulging too much (will leave that to her), she also tells us about a scared little bunny called Benjamin and we get a glimpse into his world of fear and rejection.

While Sara tours Canada giving these workshops, she finds herself in her hometown, or as close as that can be, and as such, she is confronted with familial duties and haunting memories. Will she be able to deal with them as her “successful” persona would? Will Benjamin Bunny be able to shed his fears and be more like his father?

The audience is included in the play and you will probably find yourself wondering whether you’re at the theatre or part of a motivational workshop, as Rasmussen brilliantly breaks the fourth wall.

Rasmussen is clearly an extremely talented woman. She embodies – nay morphs into – each of the characters so flawlessly, it’s almost distracting. Her timing and wit – on script and off – is impeccable.

The stage is extremely bare and instead of set and props there is genius use of lighting and sound. Every element of this piece is fresh and well thought-out and outstandingly executed.

Blink Blink Blink is a thoroughly enjoyable must-see hour of theatre in which you will laugh either at funny moments or acknowledge the truth of the human condition that eventually emerges from the events that unfold. Even if none of the subject matter necessarily appeals, then just go to marvel at the skill and craft of the talented star of the show.

Blink Blink Blink is on at Centaur Theatre’s Wildside Theatre Festival until January 14, 2012.

Natalie G. is a 28 year-old fresh inhabitant of Montreal, having moved here from South Africa in December 2011. She has both an honours degree in Dramatic Arts and a law degree from the University of the Witwatersrand (in SA) and thoroughly enjoys Montreal’s artistic and culture rich atmosphere.

Dance in Their Pants

Kati Belanger — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 00:35:48 +0000

Montreal’s most approachable dance festival is back for its third edition. Bouge d’ici is the brainchild of choreographer and St-Ambroise Fringe Festival director Amy Blackmore. The festival aims to showcase emerging dance talent and reach out to new audiences by offering a wide range of performances and workshops.

Typical of this philosophy is the opening night, Friday, Jan. 13, which features a tap class with multi-disciplinary dancer Heather Keiller, and a special dance-themed edition of Confabulation, Montreal’s premiere all-true storytelling event, titled “Just Dance” (both dancers and non-dancers will tell their best stories about moving, in all contexts, from weddings to on-stage). Workshops take place nearly every day of the festival, which extends through the following week. These classes are geared to everyone, from emerging professionals to the curious beginner.

“How to Contemporary Dance” with dancer-choreographer Karen Fennell is a low-key intro to a dance form many have admired from afar, but been too afraid to try. At the other end of the spectrum is “The Language of Your Work” with multi-talented performance artist Mike Hughes (whose recent credits include Uncalled For and Cirque du Soleil). Seeking to help the dancer or actor discover a “resonant language,” it promises to be interesting and challenging.

Other workshops include “Photo and Video made Simple” with Paul Aflalo, “Theraband Conditioning” by Lydia Jenvy and “A Dancer’s Approach to Yoga” by Hannah Dorozio (these last two are free admission).

An exciting addition to the festival is a full evening of dance on film and video (Jan. 15 at 8 pm). The film night will feature several short works by artists Ivan Rubio, Maria Simone and Josh Usheroff among others.

The festival culminates in a weekend of pure movement performance. Bouge d’ici has added an extra performance to “Common Space: L’espace Commun” this year, giving audiences yet another opportunity to fill Mainline Theatre (as was the case last year). Running from Jan. 18-21, “Common Space: L’espace Commun” is the nucleus of the festival: four performances (Jan. 18, 19 and 20 at 8 pm, and Jan. 21 at 4 pm) featuring the remounted, re-invented work of more than 10 emerging choreographers. Curated with an open submission process, the pieces represent a wide cross-section of new talent in Montreal. For planning committee member Vanessa Kneale, this is the most exciting part of the festival.

“Common Space brings together artists from all over the city – all the dance institutions, francophone and anglophone,” says Kneale. “The people you’ll see in this show are the up-and-coming artists in dance in Montreal.”

In many ways, Bouge d’ici was created to both feature and foster these artists, to nurture their development and give them an opportunity to perform their work. The festival pairs the young choreographers with mentors who have achieved a notable level of success in Montreal’s vibrant and competitive dance scene. Dancer/choreographers Andrew Turner, Sasha Kleinplatz, Dana Michel, Lara Kramer and festival founder Blackmore are but a few of the mentors who have worked with the choreographers over the last few months to help push the work they submitted to the festival to new heights.

The name of the game at Common Space is diversity, and audiences can expect everything from Butoh (a very controlled and often dramatic Japanese style of movement) to physical theatre. The diversity of perspectives and styles will continue Saturday night, Jan. 21, with the closing party, a cabaret of work by Bouge d’ici planning committee members Allison Elisabeth Burns and Vanessa Kneale, mentor and Wants&Needs founder Andrew Tay, workshop leader Karen Fennell and many other artists. DJ David Lafontaine will cap off the festival with a dance party populated by all of those who’ve lent their talents to Bouge d’ici, which will be a sight worth seeing in its own right.

The Bouge d’ici main events take place at Mainline Theatre (3997 St-Laurent Blvd.), Jan. 13-21

For workshop registration, scheduling, locations and all other info, please visit the Bouge d’ici Facebook page here.
For tickets, visit www.mainlinetheatre.ca, or call (514) 849-FEST

Photo by Cindy Lopez

Brilliant Stage Noir

Alex Woolcott — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 16:11:19 +0000

A criminally clever coup de théâtre, Claude Guilmain’s Requiem pour un trompettiste manages the amazing feat of being both an homage to film noir and a timely expose on corruption in politics. And all of it is couched in an intricate technical dance of music, dialogue and deft timing.

The first Don’t-Miss theatre of 2012, this production arrives in Montreal courtesy of Espace Libre and Theatre La Tangente, one of Toronto’s only French-language theatre companies.

How the plot of Requiem unfolds for you will be entirely your choice. Upon arriving at Espace Libre, spectators are directed towards one of two sides of the theatre, the Maître or the Hôtel. Each side comes equipped with its own set, cast of characters and taut little one act play. As the two sets are windowed and sit back-to-back, we are given occasional glimpse into the other world and soon realize that both stories involve the same characters – and that the events of one world are affecting the ones in the other.

The plays unfold to the same jazzy score (composed by Claude Naubert), which both adds to the atmosphere and provides the actors with a way to say on cue. The whole thing is delicately choreographed – even the blackouts happen at the same time – and some characters leave one play only to emerge moments later in the other.

Either way, you get the same story: in one room, the shifty mayor (Pier Paquette) works with his cronies (Bernard Meney and Vincent Leclerc) to escape scandal by pinning the blame on a hapless scapegoat (Marcello Arroyo). Across the street / theatre, the mayor’s nubile mistress (Marie Turgeon) plots to leave him with the help of an innocent bellboy (Victor Trelles Turgeon). It’s a noir-ish plot and one does has to accept certain tropes of the genre to buy the story – it takes only a scene, for instance, for Trelles-Turgeon to decide he’s in love with the girl (a moment which, admittedly, is helped by the fact that when they meet, she is scantily clad).

All of this is smartly directed by Louise Naubert, but what really makes Requiem shine is Claude Guilmain’s text: each one-act works both independently and in concert with its companion: if you walked out at intermission, you would still feel you’d received a full and complete story. None of this technical wonderment ever feels gratuitous: all of it is in service to the script, which Guilmain wrote as a response to the Walkerton tragedy, an Ontario scandal involving a small town, tainted water and government conspiracy.

Guilmain’s concern with moral and political corruption is echoed in the two plays and the style of the piece provides verisimilitude to the affair, heightening the tension and giving the whole thing the intimacy theatre strives so hard to attain.

There were technical foul-ups the night I was there, due to the decision to mic all the actors and provide the audience with headsets so they could tune into their particular play. This did create some problems as the actors, knowing they would be miked, had rehearsed a less-theatrical style of performance. Accustomed to speaking softly, it became tough to hear them when the mics cut-out. By the second act, the cast had abandoned the mics all-together. Ironically, this actually increased the verisimilitude, as the other play provided a distant soundtrack and the ever-present reminder of city life: that another world is always spinning right under your nose.

Requiem pour un trompettiste runs at Espace Libre until January 21.
For tickets, visit www.espacelibre.qc.ca or call 514.521.4191.