Ilana Lucas

What did our critic think of THE NEIGHBOURS at Tarragon Theatre?

Bad Dog Theatre’s new improv show at Factory Theatre revolves around a storyteller who shares three short stories from their lives about what it means to be a person in Toronto. After each tale, the team of improvisers serves up a set of improv based on—or, at least, tangentially related—to objects, ideas, and themes from the piece we’ve just heard.

Master puppeteer Ronnie Burkett brings the beautiful handcrafted marionettes of the Daisy Theatre to Canadian Stage’s Berkeley St. location for a run of LITTLE WILLY, an anarchic riff off Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet in the same vein as 2022’s Little Dickens.

I grew up with Robert Munsch stories. If you grew up in Canada, it’s likely you did, too—or you’ve read them to your children, or grandchildren.

Many of us have, at some point in our lives, operated on the basic assumptions that our chosen communities, particularly those aligned by basic ideology, had our best interests at heart and would look out for each other.

Erin Shields’ beautiful YOU, ALWAYS, directed by Andrea Donaldson at Canadian Stage’s Berkeley Street Theatre, is a kaleidoscopic, fragmented look at all moments of a sibling relationship, from childhood to maturity and everything in between.

BroadwayWorld spoke to Roy about the play’s history, her fascination with writing complex women, and the possibility of a future instalment to make Chaya’s story a trilogy.

The fish leads a more exciting life when it jumps out of the water to visit mischief on the birds. That’s what Emily (Nicole Joy-Fraser), a 288-year-old spirit, tells Brooke (Lisa Nasson), a young Mi’kmaq woman who Emily feels is treading water instead of emerging from it.

BroadwayWorld spoke to actor Aidan deSalaiz, who plays Bobby in the immersive production, about the show’s contemporary relevance, its fascinating and revealing contradictions, and the joys of connectivity in an increasingly isolating world.

In a world where AI increasingly tries to consume and simulate real human experiences, theatre sometimes feels like one of the last gasps of being in a room together. When we watch a show with others, respiration synchronizes, empathy increases, and information retention improves. It’s one of my favourite feelings.

Within a week, Toronto audiences had the opportunity to see two musicals which parody that scourge of November to January television, the Hallmark Christmas Movie.

“Since we surveyed, mapped, explored, and planted a flag,” writes Robert Lepage in his director’s note to THE FAR SIDE OF THE MOON, “our interest in the moon seems to have greatly diminished.” Lepage, however, believes that, while it may no longer be as much of an enigma, the moon will never lose its poetic appeal.

What did our critic think of SPOTLIGHT AT THE SECOND CITY at Second City? For its October Spotlight series, the featured acts were $20 Sandwich and Sarah Bennett.

What did our critic think of TICK...TICK...BOOM! at Alumnae Theatre?

Tim Burton, praise Hecate in his name. That’s the refrain you’ll be encouraged to intone many times at THE BURTON EXPERIENCE, the second edition of a pop-up held at Novotel’s downtown location at 45 Esplanade.

Are the kids all right? It’s hard to say, but it’s easy to leave the show with hope for the future, and an appreciation of intergenerational artistic collaboration.

Ting’s performance art piece-cum-concert is part life confessional, part experimental violin recital, and part meditative state.

With compelling performances by Toronto theatre stalwarts, this tight, heartbreaking production might inspire you to call your grandparents and tell them that they matter.

What did our critic think of BLACKBIRD at United Hope Church? Of course, there’s a lot to gasp about in Talk Is Free Theatre’s production of BLACKBIRD, an incredibly intimate staging of Scottish playwright David Harrower’s 2005 drama about a tense confrontation, years after the fact, between a man who had a sexual relationship with a middle schooler and the now grown woman who tracks him down. So it’s a good thing to have such unfettered access to that respiration.

Coal Mine’s dedication to text and its intimate quarters mean that you don’t need to shell out for Broadway to get closer to Godot.