Category: Stratford Festival
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By Galen Simmons When my partner, Julia, and I sat down in the Avon Theatre on opening day of director Kat Sandler’s new adaptation of Anne of Green Gables – the classic Canadian story by Lucy Maud Montgomery told countless times before – I wasn’t sure what to expect. Unlike Julia, who first watched the…
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By Galen Simmons Sophistication and class versus lowbrow simplicity. There are many ways to trick someone out of their money, as long as you remember one rule: give them what they want. The cast and crew of director Tracey Flye’s 2025 Stratford Festival production of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels did just that, delivering a fast-paced, highly…
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By Galen Simmons What more could one ask for in a musical than a group of talented kids, a stellar cast to back them up and a very well-trained dog? (He’s a good boy! Yes, he is!) With all these elements and so much more, director-choreographer Donna Feore has everything she needs for yet another…
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By Galen Simmons Though many of the issues William Shakespeare wrote about in his time can be connected to issues we are facing as a society today, it can still be difficult to reimagine a Shakespearean classic and present it in a way a modern audience can relate to. Like many, I struggle to relate…
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By Galen Simmons Having now seen every play in the Stratford Festival’s 2024 season, I can confidently declare Salesman in China is my favourite. This world premiere and potentially sleeper hit by Leanna Brodie and Jovanni Sy – the latter of whom also directs – is based on the true story of Death of a…
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By Galen Simmons Over-the-top performances, ridiculously gaudy costumes and impressively impeccable comedic timing makes the Stratford Festivals’ production of London Assurance a downright fun performance to watch. Despite some opening-night jitters, the cast of this production should be commended for bouncing back from the slightest of missteps quickly and landing those all-important reaction, slapstick and…
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By Galen Simmons The stories we tell ourselves and those around us are influenced by our own experiences and the stories told to us as children and throughout our lives. In the Stratford Festival’s production of The Diviners, author Morag Gunn (Irene Poole) is under pressure from her publisher to write her next, great novel.…
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By Galen Simmons A single-room play lives or dies on its character development. Without strong characters with rich backgrounds and motivations the audience can understand and relate to, the story itself never moves beyond the four walls it is being told within. Inspired by the Stratford Festival’s 2018 production of playwright Eugene O’Neil’s Long Day’s…
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By Galen Simmons Playwright Edward Albee’s play, The Goat, or Who is Sylvia?,was written and first staged in 2002 in part to challenge what an audience and we as a society will tolerate. Albee accomplished this by centring his story on a world-renowned architect, Martin (Rick Roberts), who has fallen in love and engaged in…
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By Galen Simmons When it comes to staging an adaptation of J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan, there are a few things any production team must get right. Neverland and it denizens need to be mysterious and fantastical, the crocodile must be terrifying, the fight choreography needs to be on point, and the actors playing the children…