Lunch concerts at Four Seasons Centre - Dance Works

The Four Seasons Centre for Performing Arts at Queen St and University Ave holds free lunch time concerts in its Richard Bradshaw amphitheatre.  This is a unique space where the performance takes place on an open floorspace on the 3rd floor of the building. Stadium seating consisting of rows of wooden benches look down at the performance floor, with a breathtaking view of University Avenue to the left.  Overflow seating includes rows of chairs as well as standing room only viewing on the 4th floor.

From noon to 1pm on given afternoons, a performance from one of five possible concert series is presented - piano virtuosos, dance, jazz, chamber music or world music.  The concerts are getting more popular and fill up earlier and earlier.  For the first concert that I watched, we arrived around 11:45 and secured a bench seat, but now if you arrive after 11:30 it is standing room only  and by 11:45 they are turning people away.  So far this year, I've watched a duet of piano and cello as part of the chamber music series, a Caribbean bongo drum performance as part of the World music series, and most recently a dance performance.

I usually am not that fond of dance, but the modern dance performances by the duo of Robert Glumbek and Yvonne Ng really appealed to me.  Partly its because the big tall Caucasian male and petite Asian female dancers remind me of Rich and myself.  But mostly it is the style and coreography of their dances, full of acrobatic moves,  that I found unique and fascinating.

The first was an excerpt from a dance called "A Tale Begun" and is performed with Yvonne strapped to Robert's back as if he was carrying a small mischievous child.  Throughout the dance, he flings her in all directions as they twist and twirl, entwine and unentwine themselves, with motions sometimes graceful, sometimes frenetic, sometimes robotic, and all very innovative.

The second was an excerpt from a new dance called "Level on my Level".  This time they are not attached but the dance is still full of whimsy and acrobatics as she jumps into his arms, rolls on him, and walks over him while he is lying on the floor (Rich is thinking that I shouldn't get any ideas from this!).  I enjoyed this so much that I'm actually going to buy tickets to their full show, playing at Harbourfront Centre in late April.

Danceworks
Enwave Theatre, 231 Queen's Quay W, Harbourfront Centre
April 28-30, 8pm
www.danceworks.ca

Reel Talk World Cinema - The Tenants & Mary Pickford Exhibit at TIFF

Our friend gave us tickets to watch another film in the Reel Talk World Cinema series at TIFF, which presents a surprise foreign film once a month and then has a film critic lead a discussion about it afterwards. We previously watched the movie Tirza from the Netherlands.

This time it was a tension-filled Brazilian film called The Tenants (Don't Like it, Leave), depicting San Paolo Brazil as a violent, politically amoral city where bombings are a regular occurrence, the government is not to be trusted and crime is rampant while the police look the other way.  Valter, the head of a middle-class family living in a relatively peaceful neighbourhood, tries to deal a trio of hoodlums who move into the house next door.  They have loud drunken parties all night, terrorize the old man who also lives in the house, and are possibly involved in an assortment of crimes including drugs, robbery and murder.  Had this been a typical Hollywood movie like Gran Torino, the father would become the vigilante hero and confront the thugs in a big shootout.  Instead we get a nuanced character study that reflects the passivity and helplessness of a society that has no choice but to accept its bleak existence.

If the purpose of the World Cinema film series is to expose us to other cultures and societies, then I'm quickly amassing a list of locations that I never want to visit (including the Ozarks after watching Winter's Bone on DVD!).  Based on the two movies we've seen in this series, as well the comment forms from other viewers, most of the selected films have been extremely dark and depressing.  As one patron wrote, "Are there no happy foreign movies to show on a Sunday morning"?  These films are probably picked with the same thought process that drives the Academy Awards to mostly pick "serious" movies as best picture.  My personal theory is that we watch these types of movies to better appreciate our own lives.  Just the other day when I was feeling a little down, I perked up after thinking, "well, at least I don't live in San Paolo Brazil!".

While at the Bell Lightbox, we also visited the Mary Pickford exhibit.  Nicknamed "America's Sweetheart", this early 1900s Canadian silent film star spent her childhood in a home which is now the current site of the Toronto Sick Children's Hospital.  The extensive collection included posters from her numerous movies, as well as photos and memorbilia from her personal life.  She was one of the first celebrities to widely license her image, with her face imprinted on everything from jigsaw puzzles, broaches, spoons, makeup, pillows, cigarette cases and cards.

A film clip of "My Best Girl" illustrated why Mary Pickford was so successful in her silent films.  Her big expressive eyes, face and actions conveyed everything you needed to know about the story without the need for words.

I was impressed by how influential and business-savvy she was for a young woman in the 1920s.  Mary Pickford helped to form United Artists, the first artist-run film studio, after not being happy with the movie deals that she was offered.  She cofounded the Academy Awards of Motion Pictures, sold liberty bonds to raise money for the war and contributed hugely to charities.  Her scandalous affair and marriage to Douglas Fairbank made them the "Brad and Angelina" of their times.

This exhibit gave a very thorough retrospective of Mary Pickford's career and personal life and is well worth seeing.   It is on display on the 4th floor, in the Canadian Film Gallery and is free of charge (closed on Mondays)

Complaints Choir at the AGO

The Toronto Complaints Choir gave a performance in the Art Gallery of Ontario's Walkers Court as part of a week of appearances at various Toronto locations.  Inspired by an idea that originated in Europe (doesn't it seem all good ideas originate in Europe?), the organizers solicited complaint suggestions from the public, found a composer to create a rousing song called "Toronto Complains!", and invited all interested parties to join the choir.  Meant to be a fun and cathartic way to vent common frustrations, the lyrics of the song strings together many rhyming non-sequiturs.  Seven choruses of complaints ranged from traffic, TTC, litter bugs, winter, Rob Ford, dog poo, escalator blockers, kids, work and so on.

"Where are the attractive single men?
Bugs are invading my house again
We are people, not sardines
Not everything is about you teens!
Complaining ...

Accompanied by a guitar and bongo drums and led by the spiky haired conductor and composer, the group exhuberantly sang a very catchy tune, while the audience who were handed out the lyrics tried to sing along.  It only lasted about 5 minutes in total, but what fun!

Getting into the spirit of things, I'd like to add my own complaint - the article in the weekend Globe and Mail advertising the AGO performance indicated it would be at 6pm so I showed up at 5:45 only to find out the real start time was 6:45.  I'm "Complaining ...!"

To kill time waiting for the singing to start, I checked out a few of the gallery's exhibits.  One room consisted of the cartoon drawings and accompanying text of the children's book "The Animals' Conference" by Erich Kästner. This was a fable about animals trying to convince human politicians to bring peace to the world for all the children.  It was quite enchanting to walk all the way around the room reading each panel of the story and viewing the delightful illustrations.

I also stumbled upon the Marvin Gelber Print and Drawing Centre, tucked away in the back of the ground floor and only open for limited hours.  The lonely curator seemed delighted whenever anyone wandered by.  She proudly explained how there were over 60,000 works on paper filed away in metal drawers in their vault room and that each piece of art could only be shown for a very short period of time before having to be rotated so as not be overexposed to light.

Currently on display there was the exhibit called  "Love Bites: Amorous Works on Paper".  It was a series of works on paper of various forms (prints, drawings, watercolours, photographs) all dealing with the concept of love in some way, abet not always the traditional hearts and valentines types of images, which made it very interesting to see.

Nixon in China at Cineplex

In general I don't enjoy opera since it usually lacks the features of musical theatre which I love - memorable songs with hummable melodies, lyrics that advance the plot, and the occasional dance number to accompany the singing. I also don't like the sound of extremely high-pitched soprano voices, another strike against the typical opera.

When Rich wanted to see the opera Nixon in China performed by the Canadian Opera Company, I was less enthused. Rich is not much of an opera lover himself but being a history buff, the topic of this show intrigued him.  A good compromise came up when we learned that Cineplex theatres were broadcasting the the opera live from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York.  For a mere $25 per ticket (significantly cheaper than the lowest priced opera seat), we could watch the action on a large screen in the high definition, surround sound enabled theatre that had reserved stadium style seating so there were none of the usual issues of sightlines for short people like me.  Although it lacked the excitement and intensity of watching a live performance, it had its own advantages.  We got to see shots of the orchestra being conducted for the first time by John Adams, the composer of the opera.   Between acts, they cut to shots behind the scenes and held interviews with members of the cast and crew to provide additional insights into the show.

We also got to see the elaborate staging of the Met's production, as opposed to the smaller road show held at Toronto's Four Seasons Opera House.  For the arrival of the Nixons in China, the entire front end of an airliner descended onto the stage (reminiscent of the helicopter from Miss Saigon) and the doors opened to reveal the President, First Lady and Henry Kissinger.

Watching Nixon in China served to reinforce my original opinion about opera.  I found the score and orchestration to be jarring.  Although the opera was in English, the style of singing made it difficult for me to understand what was being sung, so I read the subtitles to catch the gist of the storyline.  Unfortunately the lyrics seemed totally random to both Rich and I, and did not reflect the synopsis which we were given to read prior to the show.  We assumed that Mao's dialogues were intentionally ambiguous, reflecting the historically documented style of his speech at the time. His statements ("History is a dirty sow") were described as philosophical and allegorical in nature.  However even when the other characters sang, we still couldn't figure out what they were trying to convey.  Perhaps it was too poetic for us and we were just not sophisticated enough opera connoisseurs.

I found it amusing that the deep vibrato style of operatic singing made every line seem to have such importance, even when discussing something as banal as the weather.  Rich thought they sounded like rappers in the way they repeated a line over and over again.  At one point, Kissinger sang at least 5 times "There, you've got me, I'm lost" and I thought, that's exactly how I feel watching this.  Whenever Chairman Mao spoke, his words were echoed by three identically dressed female party members wearing thick rimmed glasses - the Chinese version of a "Greek chorus".

For me, the most entertaining part of the opera was watching the revolutionary ballet which Mao's wife arranged to be performed for the Nixons.  The dancers superbly mixed typical ballet moves with Red Army stances and gestures.  However even this got confusing when for some reason the Nixons and then Mao's wife ended up in the middle of the performance.

Actually, the most entertaining part happened before the opera even started.  A woman placed her coat in the seat next to us and then left temporarily.  Shortly after a man appeared and muttered that someone was in his seat.  I told him that a lady had left her coat and was coming back, to which he declared that she was in the wrong seat.  When the woman who returned ended up to be his wife, he exclaimed " I didn't realize the lady was you!".  It made me think of the old joke, "That's no lady, that's my wife!"

So we've concluded that although Nixon in China is probably a wonderful opera, as the unanimous rave reviews seem to prove, it's just not our cup of tea.  Back to musical theatre for us.  However we definitely would watch another live broadcast of a show at the Cineplex again.  That was a good experience.

Sonic Boom and Yorkville IceFest

We took a walk from Yonge & St. Clair en route to Sonic Boom, the eclectic music and movie store across from Honest Eds, which is currently displaying a collection of vintage 1970s "Exploitation" movie posters - more on that later.

For us, a walk down Yonge St usually involves stopping in at our favourite shops and galleries.

Muse Gallery (1230 Yonge St) always has interesting paintings and sculptures on display. Of the current exhibits, I like the smaller bronze diaramas by Won Lee that depict various scenes that tell a story, as well as the wood-inlayed sculptures by Susan Valyi that seem to be part bird, part man.

Our next stop is usually L'Atelier (1224 Yonge St), the home decor shop that contains multiple rooms of furnishings and nicknacks that range from elegant to quirky. As we browse, we usually play the game of "if we had infinite money and space in our home, what would we like to own". Rich has always yearned after a cabinet with beautiful marquetry, inlaying different shades of wood to result in a Venice-like scene. Lately we've been admiring a pair of bright red chairs, and if we had room for huge whimsical items, I would be bringing home the full sized wicker man. I had also had my eye on these cast iron sculptures of a man on a rope, scaling a wall. However next time I looked for them, they were gone, as the inventory changes frequently. This makes it fun to return to L'Atelier repeatedly to see what's new.

Continuing south on our walk, we stumbled upon the IceFest ice sculpture festival going on in Yorkville. Many intricate sculptures lined the sidewalks along the "Mink Mile" on Bloor St. and throughout Cumberland St. For some reason there were multiple clown sculptures, perhaps this year's theme for the festival. Several ice sculptures were still being created and it was interesting to watch the artists use both chainsaw-like power tools to cut through the ice and more delicate chisels to carve the details. On one block of ice that was further from completion, we could see the charcoal outline of the intended sculpture.

Several other stores caught our attention. The Lululemon store (153 Cumberland St) had "live mannequins" in the storefront window, demonstrating exercise and yoga moves while a DJ blared music. I was more taken with the facade of the store. The tiny colourful mosaic tiles reminded me of stainglass patterns by the architect Frank Lloyd Wright.

Holt Renfrew (50 Bloor St W.) always has interesting display windows. Currently they feature quotes from various Canadian personalities declaring what items they "Can't Live Without". This included the predictable makeup, shoes, designer clothing and accessories, plus one person who couldn't live without lemons??? The merchandise in the windows are colourful and vibrant and the text makes you stop to read. Too bad they couldn't find more famous celebrities to give them quotes.

After our long walk, we finally reached our destination of Sonic Boom (512 Bloor St. W.). The collection of about 20 or more 1970s exploitation B-movie posters depicted the typical advertising for such flicks - big breasted scantily clad women often depicted in perilous situations, big guns, fast cars (sounds like an episode of Charlie's Angels?). The cheesy taglines that promote these movies are so outrageously over the top that they make you laugh rather than take offense - "Their guns are hot and their bodies are hotter.." These type of movies seem to have gone out of vogue by the end of the '80s, although recently Quentin Tarantino directed a pair of movies that he called the "Grindhouse" series (Death Proof and Planet Terror) which played homage to this genre.

Sonic Boom is a great store for audiophiles looking for that hard to find album. It buys and sells a wide variety of recent and older music, dealing in CDs and vinyl, DVDs and VHS. Its walls are lined with jacket covers of old LPs (long playing vinyl record albums) that take you on a blast from the past. There are some interesting groupings such as Teenage Head hung next to Scott Baio - I didn't even know that Chachi could sing?? The store is filled with funky decorations hanging from the walls and ceiling, including a drum set, giant insect, a huge cassette tape, and cardboard cutouts ranging from singer Erykah Badu to Batman to Super Mario. Free live concerts are regularly held in the lower level.

Billy Elliot the Musical

The Toronto version of Billy Elliot the Musical was marketed as the highlight of the Mirvish 2010/11 subscription season and it does not disappoint. Four talented boys aged 12-14 share the demanding role of Billy and each needs to be a triple threat in acting, singing and dancing.

Our Billy was Marcus Pei, an American of part Chinese descent who also starred in the Chicago version of the show. It is notable that 3 of the 4 Billy's are visible minorities. It is the show's policy to have "colourblind casting", accepting any child who can fulfil the demands of the role. It was a bit jarring at first to see a Chinese looking Billy amongst his all-white family and friends, speaking with a thick cockney accent. But this is soon forgotten, especially once he "learns to dance". The role of Billy requires skills in ballet, tap, and perhaps the most challenging of all for these young protegies, trying to dance poorly at the beginning of the show.

The story of Billy Elliot is set in England in the 1980s in midst of the miners' strike during which Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher broke the unions. The show starts off with historic footage from that time, quickly establishing the backstory and mood of the miners. The first song "The Stars Look Down" make reference to a 1940s movie of the same name about the same topic. Apparently, the discord between miners and mine owners has been ongoing through the decades.

Billy is an eleven year old boy, being raised in a male dominated family after his mother dies. He stumbles into an all-girl dance class after ditching the boxing lessons that he hates and discovers that he enjoys dancing and is actually good at it. The two disjoint worlds of the miners strike and violent clashes with the police versus the innocence and joy of the children in their dance class come together in the rousing song "Solidarity".

Billy shows his dancing prowess in three main dance numbers. In the "Anger Dance", he frenetically acts out his frustration when his father refuses to allow him to audition for the Royal Ballet School. In "Dream Dance", Billy imagines himself performing a pas de deux with an older dancer, possibly a grownup version of himself. At one point, Billy is hooked to a harness and soars across the stage. Witnessing this beautiful ballet, his father finally understands Billy's passion and potential for dancing and sees the chance for him to escape from the grueling mining life. When Billy finally gets to audition for the Royal Ballet School, he dances to a song called "Electricity" where he tries to explain how he feels when he dances.

There are humorous moments including "Express Yourself", where Billy's gay friend Michael encourages him to be true to himself, resulting in the two of them dancing in women's clothing, and finally dancing with giant dresses. The sarcastic song "Merry Christmas Margaret Thatcher" disparaging the prime minister for her hard tactics towards the striking miners is accompanied by children wearing Thatcher masks and a giant Margaret Thatcher puppet.

One of the final scenes of the show depicts the miners returning to their jobs after the strike falls apart, while Billy leaves for Ballet school - one of the few to escape the fate of his home town. In a bittersweet moment, Billy says goodbye and as he walks away, only the eery glow of head lamps can be seen as the miners descend into the ground.

On the way out of the theatre, we noticed that the concession stand had an interesting item - a pair of pair of bright red short shorts similar to ones worn by Billy, but with the words "DANCER" written across the bottom. I can just imagine the look on a boy's face when he sees the souvenir that grandma brought back from the show!

Stroll down Queen St. West

One of our favourite past-times is to stroll leisuring up and down an interesting street or neighbourhood, browsing in the store windows, checking out small art galleries, and getting the occasional snack or drink. We traverse our own neighbourhood of Yonge Street from St. Clair to Bloor probably several times a month, and also enjoy Yorkville, Leslieville, Eglinton West, just to name a few.

Last week we returned to one of our favourite haunts which is Queen St West between Bathurst and Dufferin. This stretch has so far avoided becoming gentrified and infiltrated by the chains like Starbucks and The Gap that now reside east of Bathurst. For now, you can still find fun and quirkly little boutiques and restaurants with cool names like "Pho Pa" and "Done Right Inn".

On this trip, we went explicitly to see the Toronto photography exhibit at the Stephen Bulgar Gallery (1026 Queen St. W.) which featured both historic and current views of our beloved city. Some photos of note included slice of life shots including one of a crowd at the former Woodbine Race Track. The point of view is fascinating since you don't see the race, but can tell the story by the expressions and intensity of the spectators.

Another group of photos that caught my eye were by a photographer named Volker Seding who shot a series of pictures of Toronto buildings that were the unusual size of 31x20 inches. The result was a set of long and narrow images that highlighted the beauty of the buildings from a very interesting perspective which is not usually seen. I passed by this Cameron House building and wondered where he took the picture from to get that particular angle. I was also amazed to hear that he accomplished the size of the photo not through digital cropping but rather by using special film and camera techniques.

Also on display were photographs by French artist Gilbert Garcin whose black and white images feature himself, dressed in a nondescript trench coat, in whimsically staged and sometimes ridiculous looking situations. Occasionally he is joined by an equally anonymous woman (possibly his wife?). The surrealistic look and feel of the photographs remind me of French movies such as Amelie or Micmacs which have a similar tone. I was surprised to read that Garcin only took up photography after retiring at the age of 65.

Works of art in other galleries caught my eye as we continued our walk. There were the stylized celebrity paintings at the Sunny Choi Gallery (1046 Queen St. W.), highlighted by a sweetly innocent rendering of Marilyn Monroe in the window. It was refreshing to see Marilyn depicted in this way. Too bad the gallery was closed (unexplicably for a Saturday afternoon), but peeking inside you could also see images of Blondie, Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor and other iconic beauties.

In another gallery was a quirky painting that juxtapositioned serene Group of Seven-esque mountain scenery with one of the most archtypical symbols of commercialism and consumerism - the Golden Arches of McDonalds. The shock factor of this interesting combination is both humourous and thought provoking.

We had lunch in the Nadege Patisserie (780 Queen St. W.) which Rich had read about in Toroto Life Magazine, and somehow spotted with his eagle eye from the streetcar as we went whizzing by. The display of sandwiches and pastries were visually stunning, especially the multi-coloured macarons and artistically decorated mini cakes. We each had a hearty and flavourful bowl of chicken cauliflower chowder and shared a tomato and buffalo mozzerella sandwich followed by a chocolate almond croissant and a couple of macarons - one had orange flavoured meringue with chocolate filling, and the second was cappuccino.

There is a store called The Knit Cafe (1050 Queen St. W.) that I've often wished was in my neighbourhood. In addition to selling yarn and other knitting supplies, it offers lessons and acts as a social gathering place with events like "Stitch and Bitch" and "High Tea". What a lovely idea to gather with fellow knitters to work on our projects, have cookies and tea, share patterns and ideas. For Nuit Blanche one year, The Knit Cafe displayed knitted representations of Toronto landmarks such as the CN Tower, Honest Eds and the Gladstone Hotel.

Kol Kid(674 Queen St. W.) is a toy store which has the most amazing "designer" doll house on display in its window. It even has a name - Emerson House and is described as a 2-storied, 6 room open floor plan home with floor-to-ceiling windows, two fireplaces, sliding glass doors, solar panels, recessed LED lights. The rooms were filled with designer furnishings including a flat screen TV and Barcelona loungers.

There is a great bookstore named Type Books (883 Queen St W.) that features very interesting books on their tables. One was "Historical Tweets: The Completely Unabridged and Ridiculously Brief History of the World", with Twitter messages like "Having a hard time explaining to my wife why the maid's breasts are suddenly solid gold" from @TheTouch (King Midas).

Another was a deliciously cute little book called "Ten Little Zombies - A Love Story" that is not quite for young children. It spoofs the traditional Ten Little Indians poem, instead having ten zombies chase a boy named Kevin and his girlfriend. Cleverly they foil and kill the zombies one by one in various unique ways, depicted by graphic cartoon drawings - "Four little zombies chasing after me .. Fired up the Chainsaw, Now there are three." The surprise ending shows the power of love, and that there are worse things than becoming a zombie.

On our next visit, we need to check out one of our favourite boutiques, The Magic Pony which sells quirky and creative nicknacks and artworks. It was unfortunately closed for renovations this time. We've also been wanting to have "High Tea" at The Red Teabox but are never there at the right time. There is so much to do and see at Queen West that we've resolved to devote an entire day to it next time.

Mirvish New 2011-2012 Season Announcement

Every year in February, David Mirvish previews his new subscription season with an event held at the Princess of Wales theatre, inviting all recipients of his EStage online newsletter. Each new show is presented through a videoclip, and sometimes a live performance from the show.

There are usually 6-7 shows in the subscription year, which gives David a chance to flex his artistic muscles when it comes to picking them. While most of the shows that he picks should appeal to the general public, he will often throw in one or two unconventional productions that only a small targeted audience really appreciates. In the past he's included a Korean subtitled opera, an obscure Shakespeare play where the actors were dressed as 1920s mobsters so that it was impossible to tell the King from the Jester, an unknown musical where the actors spoke with such strong Jamaican accents and slangs that they were uncomprehensible.

Last year the shows were all mainstream consisting of 5 well-known musicals and a comedy. Perhaps due to the recession, with theatre being a discretionary expense, Mirvish felt he needed to appeal to a larger audience to keep up the subscription numbers. This year he is back with his usual eclectic selections - there are 3 dramas, a comedy and 3 musicals on the playbill.

The event was hosted by the stars of the play "Four Hands Two Pianos" which is not on next season's subscription, but is being marketed as an extra show to be offered at discount to subscribers. Ted Dykstra and Richard Greenblatt performed favourites like Chopsticks and Heart and Soul on duelling pianos before launching in on more ambitious songs to demonstrate their musical prowess. Then they went on to describe each of the upcoming shows, sometimes introducing producers, directors or actors from the show to further the promotion.

The first show is a drama called "The Railway Children" which will be shown in the new Roundhouse Theatre and includes a real train that is being transported all the way from London England. Next will be the Noel Coward comedy "Private Lives" starring Kim Cattrall of Sex in the City fame. Kim was on hand at the event to give a little star power to the presentation. The third show is the musical "Chess", with original music and lyrics written by the two male B's of ABBA, and deals with a highly political chess match between an American and a Russian. Another drama called "Blue Dragon" follows the life of a Canadian now living in Shanghai and will consist of dialogue in English, French and Mandarin with subtitles. I have a feeling I'll either love or hate this one... Each of these shows were introduced using promotional video clips.

The casts of the musicals "Mary Poppins" and "Hair" each performed a medley of numbers from their shows. Mary Poppins and Bert sang and danced to well-known songs like Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious and ChimChim Cheree amongst others. I spent most of their performance thinking how much I liked her dress.

The cast of Hair went pyschodelic to hits including the title song Hair and Aquarius, spinning their long locks in a frenzy. They ended the show by throwing flowers into the crowd in a show of 1960s flower power.

But the highlight of the event went to the presentation for the drama "War Horse". This acclaimed West End London drama featuring hand-spring puppets follows the adventures of a boy and his beloved horse who is sold to the army during WWI. The star of the show, a 6 foot tall puppet horse named Joey was brought out during our preview event and it was amazing to see how life-like he was, even though the puppeteers that manipulated him were clearly and purposely visible. The puppetry reminds you of the Lion King, but takes it to the next level in terms of movement, look and feel. While our usual subscription seats are at the back of the theatre, for this event I was sitting within the first 10 rows of the Orchestra and got a very good view of Joey. To fully appreciate the artistry, you need to be closer so we've decided that we need to upgrade our seats for this show. The video clip that shows the horses in battle at full gallop is too breathtaking to describe.

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels Musical at Hart House Theatre

There is so much opportunity to watch live theatre in Toronto, ranging from the big name shows put on by Mirvish and Dancap, to slightly smaller professional companies such as SoulPepper and Canadian Stage Company, to community theatres like Etobicoke Musical Productions and Curtain Call Players.

Recently we stumbled upon the Hart House Theatre, run by the University of Toronto. They were performing the musical Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, based on the 1988 comedy starring Michael Caine and Steve Martin as a pair of con men in the French Riviera who prey on wealthy women looking for excitement and adventure.

Lawrence is the more experienced, debonaire con artist who pretends to be an exiled foreign prince trying to raise money for a revolution to reclaim his throne. He has the cooperation of a French police inspector named Andre who takes a cut of each scam. Freddy is a small time con who has recently arrived in town and initially looks up to Lawrence as a mentor, but eventually enters into competition with him, with the loser vowing to leave town. Their target is an American heiress named Janet and the competition is to determine which one can first get her to give them $50,000. When they later discover that Janet is not actually an heiress, they change the bet to whether or not Freddy can get her to sleep with him.

The 2005 musical version follows the plot of the movie quite faithfully, but adds some extra scenes and songs for Andre and his developing relationship with Muriel, one of Lawrence's early marks. The appropriately titled first song is a slick jazzy number that quickly establishes Lawrence's style and sophistication, and why he is so successful at his scam, since he is just
"Giving Them What They Want". The women follow with a mock tragic, but actually extremely funny lament about their encounters with the "prince". In "What Was A Woman To Do", they describe him as "Magically long of lash; Tragically short of cash". The theatrical fourth wall is broken when one of the female "ushers" joins in on the song from the audience.

Freddy's first big number is a hilarious rap/rant called "Great Big Stuff" where he rapidly rhymes off all the things he could do if he made as much money as Lawrence. He ends the song with the plea "I just want someone to love me .... for my money!!!".

Freddy's scheme to scam the money from Janet is to pretend to be a pyschosomatically traumatized war veteran who needs therapy to be cured. At one point, Freddy and Janet decide that what he actually needs is love, and they sing the purposely corny and schmaltzy duet "Love is My Legs" which mocks the traditional big ballad love song found in typical romantic musicals.

In my opinion, dramatic musicals rely heavily on the music and orchestrations to set the mood, while a good comedy's success lies primarily in its lyrics. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels has witty lyrics that advance the plot and make you laugh out loud as you hear them.

Herein lies the problem with the Hart House Theatre. The acoustics were not the best so we strained to distinguish the words being sung. That many of the characters were speaking with various European accents exasperated the issue. In spite of this, the show was so much fun to watch and the leads were very strong actors with good singing voices.

It was great to see a relatively new musical playing in Toronto and again I feel blessed to live in a city that provides so many opportunities to see different shows. I recently found out that the movie Dirty Rotten Scoundrels is actually a remake of a 1964 David Niven/Marlon Brando/Shirley Jones movie called Bedtime Story. I found a store that rents this movie so I hope to check it out soon.

Trigger and Luma Dinner at Bell Lightbox

Went to a special members only screening of the Canadian movie Trigger at the Bell Lightbox. Molly Parker and the late Tracy Wright play the members of a rock band named Trigger, who broke up acrimoniously and now have reunited for the first time after ten years. Each has her demons, one with alcohol abuse and the other with drugs. The movie depicts their running conversation through the evening while they explore their past and current relationship with each other.

This movie seemed all the more poignant in light of the fact that Tracy Wright was dying of pancreatic cancer while making this film. Her heartfelt monologues about illness and death take on an extra meaning, and makes you wonder what she was feeling as she was delivering those lines. Her real life husband made a cameo in the movie, which was filmed in a rush (9 days over 5 weeks) and serves as a final tribute to this brave actress. Tracy Wright died several months before the movie was released.

Filmed in Toronto, the movie features some recognizable locations including the upscale restaurant Canoe, Allen Gardens Greenhouse (which was also used in Atom Egoyan's Chloe), a school in Etobicoke, and a park near the DVP. I always get a bit of nerdish pleasure in trying to spot the Toronto landmarks while watching a movie.

Following the movie, we dined at Luma and tried the Tim Burton themed Creature Comforts menu. One companion and I had the Alice in Wonderland Magic Mushroom Lasagna, while the other had the "Big Fish" meal, which was seared tuna on salad. No one was brave enough to try the Mrs Lovett's Meat Pie of the day, in case it contained the Sweeney Todd special ingredient! We ended with the Willy Wonka inspired dessert, consisting of a dark chocolate truffle cake, topped with peanut butter ice cream, caramelized bananas, candied nuts and a cocoa tuile cookie. It was as delicious as it was beautiful.