PLAYBOT: Les Miserables – oh, the irony!
Wasn’t Les Miserables originally a story about the devastating effects of poverty and injustice in early 19th Century France that resulted in the French Revolution? And now it’s a huge spectacular musical whose tickets only the wealthy can afford?
Oh, the irony! That sound you hear is Victor Hugo rolling around in his grave – laughing. He liked irony, didn’t he?
Oh, sure, you time travelers, he might also like this so-called “musical” based on his novel, considered one of the longest and most political novels ever written. Who knows? The musical only lasts two-and-half hours. Also, in places where huge spectacular musicals like this are generally staged – in this case the Jubilee Auditorium July 3-8 in Edmonton by Broadway Across Canada (tickets actually very affordable from $44) – one doesn’t often see the terrible poverty that afflicted so many lower class Europeans in the early 19th Century. Not even over on the North Side.
“Les Miz,” which since its premiere in 1980 has become one of the most popular musicals ever produced, centres around the hapless hero Jean Valjean, who, after spending 19 years in jail for stealing a loaf of bread, tries to make a new life for himself on the outside. He is thwarted by the stickler police inspector Javert, a real douchebag by the sounds of it, and swept into the bloody Revolution. Didn’t see that coming. Cue Do You Hear the People Sing? Not easy to do without your head, eh?
Next to Normal
Sometimes an amateur theatre company can take chances like pro companies can’t. It’s not just that all the actors are unpaid volunteers doing it for love, so expenses are down; it’s that the expectations maybe aren’t quite as high – which some might think is an insult to point out, but then the amateur companies can often get away with whatever the heck they want to do, with the results more often than not a pleasant surprise for everyone.
The venerable Walterdale Theatre has selected a difficult work for its latest show – a “rock” musical about mental illness. Playing July 4-14, Next to Normal is about a mother who suffers from bipolar disorder, and how her struggles affect her family. With book and lyrics by Brian Yorkey, and music by Tom Kitt, it won three Tony Awards and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2010. Very ambitious choice for Walterdale, for sure – a company that lacks neither courage nor a deep talent pool. Remember the Othello incident.
Freewill Shakespeare Festival
Hamlet, I am your father!
No, that’s not true! That’s impossible!
Search your feelings. You know it to be true, forsooth!
NO! To sleep, perchance to dream! I’d give my right arm just for this day to be over! Goodnight, sweet Prince … ARRGHH!
That’s how it goes, right? A little foggy on our Shakespeare – which is why the Freewill Shakespeare Festival underway at Hawrewlak Park until July 15 is such a swell event to bone up on the guy considered the Western world’s finest playwright. Don’t argue.
If Hamlet (playing on even dates) is a little heavy for you, try Comedy of Errors (odd nights and matinees), which is a classic farce from the real olden school. In that one, we’re not sure whose father is whose!
READ: Review of Comedy of Errors
Forever Plaid
Imagine a hell where one is doomed to croon corny doo-wop numbers for all eternity, trapped at the very moment when that sort of stuff was being shoved aside to make way for the Beatles and other real rock ‘n’ roll.
But maybe one man’s hell is four men’s heaven, and hell is actually other people, as Victor Hugo may have once said. A little foggy on our Shakespeare.
Anyway, there’s these four guys with big dreams who formed a singing group, but then they were killed in a collision with a bus filled with schoolgirls on their way to see the Beatles’ American debut on The Ed Sullivan Show. Talk about irony. Forever Plaid never got to enjoy the fame of their peers The Four Tops, The Four Aces and The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,
The production in full swing at the Mayfield Dinner Theatre seems to bring a full ironic understanding of all the hokey comedy bits, deliriously awful choreography and painful patter one sees – or rather, saw – at the height of Era of Male Vocal Quartets. At the same time, director Kate Ryan and her cast bring appreciation to these unforgettable pop ditties so firmly rooted in their time, celebrating a rock ‘n’ roll history that never was. Every night for all eternity – or when the show closes on July 29, whichever comes first.
Extempore’ – Improvised Shakespeare
To continue the Shakespeare kick, here’s a bump for another one of the new Grindstone Comedy Theatre’s many regular shows. Every Tuesday at 7 pm noted local thespian Vincent Forcier directs what must be seen to be believed, or not to be believed. To believe or to not be believed, that is the bee question, bzzzzz!
Is that what they’re doing here: Improvised Shakespeare?
You couldn’t be foggy on your Shakespeare to pull something like this off.
David Cross
Playbot doesn’t usually get a chance to plug good comedians. Here’s one who despite a pedigree as an actor in harmless corporate fluff – Alvin and the Chipmunks – is a writer and stand-up comic with remarkable insight and talent. Also star of Arrested Development, Cross is unafraid to speak truth to power, tackling politics, religion, and stupid human nature with equal venom, often through real life anecdotes.
At the Myer Horowitz Theatre Friday, July 6, Cross is on the “Oh Come On!” tour in support of his new Netflix comedy special Making America Great Again – which we assume is also ironic.
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