Written by Martin McDonagh and directed by Mitchell Cushman, Studio Theatre’s The Cripple of Inishmaan is intricate and ambitious in both its design and dialogue. A looming backdrop of rocky cliffs is beset by the sea, confining the main action of the play to a compact set in center stage. Scene transitions are made with live fiddle and the Bodhran drum, giving the feeling of being transported to Ireland.

The play … Read More

Featuring three new one-act plays by budding Alberta playwrights, From Cradle to Stage is presented by the Walterdale Playhouse.  The three plays have different themes, but work together for an enjoyable evening of one-acts. 

The first is a staged reading of Rober Zimmer’s Poetry Unbound, a heady verbal exchange between characters who represent abstract nouns such as Theory, Poetry, Academia, and Taxpayers.  Zimmer posits motivations and conflicts between the characters, shedding light on the failings of … Read More

Edges is a presented by Powerhouse Performance Company, directed by Gregory P. Caswell and Sarah Horsman.  It features four performers who sing a variety of musical theatre numbers with live piano.  The performance has an off-Broadway feel, and the small intimate setting at the Trans Alta Arts Barn further lends to this experience.

The themes of the songs range from sisters who can’t get along to understanding sincerity in the age of social media.  While some of the songs are a little too earnest and feel motivational, the show has … Read More

Backwater is a Windrow performance, created and directed by Amber Borotsik and Jesse Gervais. As the name suggests, this performance deals with themes such as northern Alberta’s isolation, urban sprawl/stagnation, and echo chamber like political rhetoric. This presentation is a crosspollination of dance, theatre, and sound art that is a striking sensory experience for the audience. At times, the action is slowed … Read More

The Threepenny Opera is written by Bertolt Brecht with music by Kurt Weill and adapted for English audiences by Marc Blitzstein. The Walterdale’s production is directed by Curtis Knecht with music direction by Sally Hunt.

The “opera” is set in London just before the coronation of Queen Victoria. The main characters are beggars, murderers, sex workers, petty thieves, and generally morally bankrupted individuals. The … Read More

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Surreal SoReal theatre company has lived up to its name in this truly original theatre piece. Written by Jon Lachlan Stewart and directed by Bradley Moss, Dog is a provocative descent into surreal madness and an engrossing experiential encounter that leaves the viewer haunted. The play takes place in the ruptured space that bridges adumbrated recollection, hate-filled … Read More

Written by Trina Davies and co-directed by Kristi Hansen and Vanessa Sabourin Shatter recreates the 1917 Halifax Explosion from the point of view of four residents. Life in Halifax is initially hopeful because of the economic boom that the war has provided. The play centers on a mother and her daughter Anna and how their life is changed the day all the windows shattered. The close family friend, Elsie, a German, is a vehicle for … Read More

Written by Daniel MacIvor, Communion's construction and dialogue is wonderfully philosophical, emotional, and challenging. MacIvor asks questions without forcing answers on the audience. He asks us to think about how our beliefs about the world operate across social spaces that aren’t necessarily defined by any shared beliefs; a client and her therapist, a mother and a daughter. MacIvor ponders how we reckon with our failures, and what it means to make sense of our pasts within fraught relationships. This play leads the audience one worry and one question at a time to face the existential realization that it is up to us how we render our experiences meaningful.

Communion is a meditation on the role of psychotherapy in … Read More

The obscurely titled Meat Puppet is the story of four characters who find themselves tangled in a web of lies, ambition, and (social) media. Online, “meat puppet” refers to a person deliberately sent in to change or disrupt the goings on in online forums and chats.

The play is loosely based on an episode of Dateline NBC’s To Catch a Predator after which Louis Conradt committed suicide when the organization Perverted Justice found evidence that he was having sexually explicit chats with someone who identified themselves as a thirteen year-old boy.

In exploring the themes that come to the surface from To Catch a Predator, Meat Puppet asks whether we have gone too far with reality TV, voyeurism, greed, and cynicism.

It was the … Read More