Toronto Theater Reviews

Review: TORONTO FRINGE FESTIVAL: DAY 8
by Ilana Lucas - July 13, 2024

Reviews of Madame Winifred's Circus of Wonders, Rooted: A Musical Poem, Girls' Night Cabin Fever, How Lucky Are We, The First Jew in Canada: A Trans Tale, and Are You Lovin' It?...

Review: TORONTO FRINGE FESTIVAL: DAY 7
by Ilana Lucas - July 12, 2024

Reviews of Gulp, Bus Stop, and Rosamund...

Review: TORONTO FRINGE FESTIVAL: DAY 6
by Ilana Lucas - July 11, 2024

Reviews of Monks, Stiff and Sons, Tape, Moe: A Rap Opera, and Crosstown...

Review: TORONTO FRINGE FESTIVAL: DAY 5
by Ilana Lucas - July 10, 2024

Reviews of Rat Academy, Poz, The Bluffs, and 1 Santosh Santosh 2 Go...

Review: TORONTO FRINGE FESTIVAL: DAY 4
by Ilana Lucas - July 09, 2024

Reviews of Gringas, Far-Flung Peoples, and Paternal Guidance...

Review: TORONTO FRINGE FESTIVAL: DAY 3
by Ilana Lucas - July 07, 2024

Reviews of Colonial Circus, Elephant Song, Daniel In Love (For One Night Only), and Cabaret of Murder at the Toronto Fringe Festival...

Review: TORONTO FRINGE FESTIVAL: DAY 2
by Ilana Lucas - July 06, 2024

Reviews of SEE YOU TOMORROW and ARTIFICIALLY INTELLIGENT at the Toronto Fringe...

Review: TORONTO FRINGE FESTIVAL: DAY 1
by Ilana Lucas - July 06, 2024

Reviews of Chloe and Meraki, Doctor Dolittle, Crime After Crime (After Crime) and Unfurnished...

Review: DEATHTRAP at Red Sandcastle Theatre
by Louis Train - July 08, 2024

I reckon it’s a stroke of producing genius to launch a run of DEATHTRAP, Ira Levin’s classic meta-thriller, on the same day that the Toronto Fringe Festival kicks off. Fringe plays tend to be edgy, experimental, personal, and always of their moment; DEATHTRAP, a sturdy two-acter about a playwright w...

Review: THE LAST TIMBIT at Elgin Theatre
by Ilana Lucas - June 29, 2024

THE LAST TIMBIT isn’t here for a long time; after all, doughnuts go stale quickly. It’s here to be an Experience, and an Experience it is....

Review: TINA - THE TINA TURNER MUSICAL at CAA Ed Mirvish Theatre
by Samantha Wu - June 26, 2024

When considering the most influential performers in the history of rock, Tina Turner's talent and legacy is counted among titans. Her voice, her signature growl, is unmistakable. Her determination to succeed and survive despite years of abuse at the hands of her husband set her apart from the rest. ...

Review: A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE at Soulpepper
by Ilana Lucas - June 24, 2024

Tennessee Williams’ sprawling classic about what happens when the unstoppable force, fading, fluttering Southern belle Blanche DuBois (Amy Rutherford), meets the immovable object of her brother-in-law, pragmatic, animalistic Stanley Kowalski (Mac Fyfe) proves a night of searing theatre, with Weyni M...

Review: ALL MESSED UP & NOWHERE TO GO at Second City
by Ilana Lucas - June 20, 2024

The frequently witty and always entertaining offering from the comedy troupe will make you happy that you put on pants and left the house....

Review: AGE IS A FEELING at Soulpepper
by Ilana Lucas - June 20, 2024

McGee snaps spellbinding shots of existence, exquisitely distilling an emotion, moment, or rumination until it’s almost unbearable. As she goes on through the decades, you can hear a pin drop; that is, when audience members aren’t laughing or sobbing with recognition....

Review: WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION at Shaw Festival
by Michael Rabice - June 17, 2024

Time travel back to the age of film noir when black and white movie dramas were played to the hilt with overarching mannerisms, full of prototypical characters and not too subtle close ups full of tension inducing musical scores. The Shaw Festival is producing one from that ilk with the classic Agat...

Review: R.A.V.E. at Outside The March
by Ilana Lucas - June 16, 2024

Like its main character, R.A.V.E. is weighed down by some overly ambitious intersectional goals; however, as a party and as an emotional experience, it earns a R.A.V.E. review.A.V.E. at Outside The March?...

Review: HEDDA GABLER at Coal Mine Theatre
by Ilana Lucas - May 19, 2024

Director Moya O’Connell’s take on Henrik Ibsen’s play, in a new version by Liisa Repo-Martel, emphasizes the power of triangles, relationship groupings that seem stable but which are easily unbalanced by such an act of bisection. With a dynamite cast, an accessible adaptation, and the claustrophobic...

Review: HADESTOWN at Ed Mirvish Theatre
by Samantha Wu - May 21, 2024

Back by popular demand for a limited time is the multiple Tony and Grammy Awards winning new musical Hadestown - music, lyrics, and book by Anaïs Mitchell, directed by Rachel Chavkin - for a limited run at the CAA Ed Mirvish Theatre until May 26. This modern, politically relevant tale combines two c...

Review: SWAN LAKES AND MINUS 16 at Harbourfront Centre
by Ilana Lucas - May 05, 2024

What did our critic think of SWAN LAKES AND MINUS 16 at Harbourfront Centre?...

Review: SHANIQUA IN ABSTRACTION at Streetcar Crowsnest
by Ilana Lucas - April 15, 2024

Directed by Sabryn Rock, behind Theatre Passe Muraille’s hit Our Place, watson’s show is an 85-minute series of sketches about the joys and frustrations of being a Black woman right here, right now....

Review: SPRING DOUBLE BILL at Toronto Dance Theatre
by Ilana Lucas - April 14, 2024

Toronto Dance Theatre’s Spring Double Bill, highlighting East Asian choreographers of different dance backgrounds, is as welcome as a spring bloom. The two trios run the gamut from serious to irreverent, but both highlight dance as a way to connect, whether between the present and past self, or betw...

Review: EL TERREMOTO at Tarragon Theatre
by Ilana Lucas - April 08, 2024

When the ground beneath your feet starts, to move it's an unmooring, dangerous feeling. That’s the sensation that shakes at the core of Christine Quintana’s complex and refreshing new play, EL TERREMOTO (The Earthquake), which may shake you from your seat—even without the help of the intense rumble ...

Review: UNCLEARING at Harbourfront Centre
by Ilana Lucas - April 08, 2024

As the name suggests, UNCLEARING can be somewhat opaque in its messaging to the audience, but it doesn’t stop it from being a stimulating evening....

Review: HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK at Elgin Theatre
by Ilana Lucas - April 08, 2024

Produced by Côté Danse, Ex Machina and Dvoretsky Productions, THE TRAGEDY OF HAMLET is on at the Elgin theatre for five short days, and it’s a respectable addition to Ham Mountain, a visually inventive production that never lets its stage magic overshadow the dancers behind and in front of the curta...

Review: LES MISERABLES at the Princess of Wales Theatre
by Samantha Wu - March 30, 2024

The world's most beloved musical, Les Misérables - directed by Laurence Connor and James Powell based on the Victor Hugo novel, makes a highly anticipated return to the Princess of Wales Theatre for a limited engagement. This new reimagined staging is heralded as a reawakening of the classic for the...