Category: Blyth Festival
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Justin Shaw in his one-man show, Off-Island Odyssey, at the Blyth Festival. Photo by Keith Tomasek By Galen Simmons What’s the difference between home and away? It sounds like a simple question, but after seeing Justin Shaw’s Off-Island Odyssey at the Blyth Festival earlier this month and speaking with him about the show, I’m not…
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Members of the cast of The Last Mayor of Rusty River (and Captain Whiskers) at the Blyth Festival. Photo by Alex Franklin By Galen Simmons It’s not often the high-stakes drama of small-town politics is put under the bright lights at centre stage, but that’s exactly what The Last Mayor of Rusty River delivers at…
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Justin Shaw in his one-man show, Off-Island Odyssey, at the Blyth Festival. Photo by Keith Tomaseck By Galen Simmons There was something both familiar and comforting about listening to Justin Shaw share his life experiences and bizarre Canadian encounters after leaving his childhood home on Prince Edward Island to find his way in the…
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Kirstyn Russelle, Shaina Silver-Baird, Alyssa LeClair and Madison Hayes-Crook in Curveball: The Fast-Pitch Ladies from the Factory Floor. Blyth Festival 2026. Photo by Alex Franklin By Galen Simmons In recent years, the story of Stratford’s Kroehler Furniture Factory’s women’s softball team and their championship-winning 1953 season – the same year that saw the opening of…
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Blyth Festival review: Dry Streak brings all that small-town Saskatchewan charm with some fun twists
Robin Craig and Brontae Hunter in Dry Streak. Blyth Festival 2026. Photo by Lyon Smith By Galen Simmons If you’ve ever been curious about what it’s like living in small-town Saskatchewan, playwright Leeann Minogue and director Kate Lynch’s production of Dry Streak this season at the Blyth Festival might be the play for you. Having…
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By Galen Simmons I had never heard of the Fleck strike of 1978 in Centralia before walking into the Blyth Memorial Community Hall on opening night of playwright Kristen De Silva and director Mary Francis Moore’s Sisters of ’78 on June 12. But by the time I walked out, I was hoarse from cheering for…
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By Galen Simmons To me, the mark of a good play – or any piece of art for that matter – is that it leaves me with a new way of looking at the world around me, or that it shifts my perspective to one I may have never considered otherwise. Director Severn Thompson’s production…
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By Galen Simmons James Dallas Smith as Hugh, Madeline Kennedy as Anya and Richard Comeau as Bobby in the Blyth Festival’s 2025 production of Sir John A: Acts of a Gentrified Ojibway Rebellion. Photo by Lyon Smith. What happens when historic oppression is framed through a modern lens? In playwright Drew Hayden Taylor’s sesquicentennial play,…