Up To Low

In this Points of View, around the presentation of Crow’s Theatre and Talk is Free Theatre’s production of The Wedding Party, NAC English Theatre Artistic Director Jillian Keiley hosts a discussion with special guests, Lisa Levia, Catering Sales Manager for NAC Food & Beverage and Kraig-Paul Proulx, Wedding & Special Events Designer & Coordinator, about the challenges, changes and beautiful moments go into planning weddings and receptions. The Wedding Party ran in the NAC Theatre January 30 – February 9.

In this Points of View, around the holiday presentation of the Segal Centre For Performing Arts from Montreal’s The Hockey Sweater: A Musical, NAC English Theatre Artistic Director Jillian Keiley hosts a discussion with special guests, Author Roch Carrier on the history and creation of the story, leading to the musical, and a surprise visit from CSA Astronaut Robert Thirsk, who chats about reading the story in space. The Hockey Sweater: A Musical ran in the NAC Theatre December 5 - 23.

Mabel Hubbard Bell was a strong, self-assured woman – bright, passionate, and a complete original. Despite a near-fatal case of childhood scarlet fever that cost her the ability to hear, she learned to talk and lip-read in multiple languages. At 19, she married a young inventor named Alexander Graham Bell and became the most significant influence in his life. Silence is Mabel’s story, offering the unique perspective of a woman whose remarkable life was overshadowed by her famous husband. Deftly directed by former NAC English Theatre Artistic Director Peter Hinton, Silence recounts how Mabel communicated with the man who invented the most powerful communication tool ever conceived.

Based on the novel by Ottawa’s beloved Brian Doyle, Up to Low is the magical and mystical tale of a young boy’s journey to manhood. Twelve-year-old Tommy is on the road with his father and volatile family friend Frank, heading back to the cabin they haven’t visited since Tommy’s mother died. But Tommy also remembers Bridget, whose eyes are the deep green of the Gatineau Hills. Filled with deserted farms, smoky taverns and midnight rows upriver, Up to Low captures 1950s Ottawa Valley in a way that is both familiar and brand new. By Brian Doyle Adapted for the stage and directed by Janet Irwin

Centred around the cataclysmic 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami Carried Away on the Crest of a Wave illustrates how world events link us all together. From two brothers in Malaysia trying to save their house from sinking, a Canadian radio-show host angered by disaster-relief efforts, a grieving Japanese father, to a lonely woman in Utah baking a pie, the play explores humanity in times of disaster. Winner of the 2015 Governor General’s Literary Award for Drama and directed by Siminovitch Prize laureate Kim Collier, carried away on the crest of a wave shows that despite our differences, we are all connected through serendipity, loss and love. The stellar cast includes John Ng from CBC TV’s Kim’s Convenience, Zaib Shaikh, star of CBC TV’s Little Mosque on the Prairie, Adrienne Wong, a frequent director at the GCTC, Kayvon Khoshkam from NAC's productions of Twelfth Night and The December Man (L’homme de décembre) and Jenny Young from the NAC’s productions of Innocence Lost: A Play about Steven Truscott and The Penelopiad.

Celebrated theatre-maker Robert Lepage returns to the NAC with an autobiographical journey through his childhood in a Quebec just beginning to awaken to its own promise. Unable to memorize a poem he must recite, Lepage uses the “memory palace” technique, assigning stanzas to the familiar rooms of his childhood home. But re-opening the doors to each room reveals more inside than just the poem he put there. With stagecraft that will take your breath away, 887 recreates the world of a young boy growing up in 1960s Quebec.

It’s mid-rehearsal, and two actors playing Lauren and Larry deliver their lines. All is well until the real Larry wanders onstage. When the real Lauren – who, it seems, is also the playwright – leaps up from the audience, chaos ensues. Throw in some rogue spectators, a corrupt senator, lion dancers, ghostly ancestors, and a few firecrackers, and you have King of the Yees, an unapologetic and hilarious take on Chinese culture and tradition in North America. From stage to backstage to audience and back on stage again, this play within a play bulldozes the fourth wall in an epic joyride through Chinatown. A Gateway Theatre (Richmond, BC) production

Evgeni Onegin is a charismatic and bored bad boy who makes ruinous choices at every turn, leaving devastation in his wake. Based on Alexander Pushkin’s serial poem about unrequited love in 19th century Russia, this sweeping and romantic story for the ages gets a hip and acclaimed new theatrical treatment. With inventive choreography and a sharp, 21st century sensibility, Onegin is as fresh today as it was nearly two centuries ago. From the creators of Do You Want What I Have Got? A Craigslist Cantata, including a raucous and uplifting score by creators Veda Hille and Amiel Gladstone, this is the very definition of passion. Lubov! Produced by The Musical Stage Company (Toronto, ON) in collaboration with NAC English Theatre.

Incendiary Canadian playwright Brad Fraser (Unidentified Human Remains and the True Nature of Love) makes his long-awaited return to the NAC with Kill Me Now, a gritty black comedy leavened with profound humanity. Widower Jake Sturdy cares for his severely disabled teenage son Joey until unexpected news leads to an astonishing role reversal. Devastatingly funny and defiantly unsentimental, Kill Me Now finds hard truths and irreverent laughter in every limb, joint and thought in the hopelessly fragile human body. “Funny and brutal and honest. But it is also moving, deeply emotional, and ultimately harrowing.” STAGE REVIEW (LONDON, UK)

The ghosts of the Donnellys return to tell their side of things. A raucous, wall-of-sound rock opera, Vigilante tells the explosive true tale of a ruthless Irish immigrant family and an entire town bent on revenge. Based on the unsolved 1880 massacre of Ontario’s notorious Donnelly family, Vigilante is a stomping, swaggering and compulsively watchable story about frontier justice. This outlaw offspring of Sweeney Todd and The Threepenny Opera walks the razor’s edge – aggressively inventive, visually stunning and absolutely electrifying. Vigilante marks the return of Edmonton’s astonishing Catalyst Theatre (Nevermore), following major tours to London and New York. “I saw this piece twice: once in Fort McMurray, and again in Edmonton after Catalyst had returned from the off-Broadway run of their original production Nevermore. I loved both iterations but the steampunk style and pulsing fury of the music was deep in my bones by the second viewing. Now to see it again will satisfy a craving that I’ve had ever since.” – Jillian Keiley, Artistic director, NAC English Theatre “History — Canadian history! — doesn’t just rock, it comes at you with an aggressive and explosive energy in the thrilling new rock ‘musical’ from Catalyst Theatre.” - THE EDMONTON JOURNAL