Fall Preview (2016)

In some ways, this is simply an extension and elaboration of this list here.

From this list, I did make it to We the Family, which was quite interesting and dark (darker than most of the Walker plays I've seen).  It also featured an unbelievably annoying Jewish grandmother.  Her schtick is explained by her having developed a brain tumor.  Still, I was always glad when she was not on stage, since I didn't like that character at all.  The play started out as an exploration of a hybrid wedding (in this case Jewish-Chinese) but then went in some very different directions.  I'd recommend it overall, and it plays for one more week.  I also need to type up some thoughts on the conversation that George F. Walker had with the UT theatre community, but that will have to wait.

I am supposed to see Antigone tonight, and that plays this weekend and next.

However, this post also recommends that you pick up Now if in the Toronto area.  It is the issue with the Fall Stage Preview on the cover.  While the headline stage articles are somewhat interesting, the main feature is a 4 page listing of events (p 70-73), which is hard to replicate on-line.

I was generally aware of the plays that interested me, such as Lady Windermere's Fan and Wonder of the World.  I had just become aware that there is a student production of The Physicists, and I think I'll probably go to that in two weeks.  Tickets are only $7, which is hard to beat.

The only one that was completely new was a production of Alan Bennett's Talking Heads, which will be playing in that small living room in the Campbell House Museum, where I saw Mamet's Boston Marriage.  I think I'll go to this, assuming I can squeeze it in in November.  Actually, I just took a look at the program, and they are going to alternate between 6 of Bennett's monologues, which makes this a more substantial investment of time and money.  I hope at some point they put together a package deal for people who want to see both shows.

Anyway, there are many other interesting plays.  I tend to shy away from the really dark ones, like Edmond at the Storefront Theatre or The Ties that Bind, though some people will be interested in those.  I'll probably largely skip the plays I've already seen, like Avenue Q, though I mentioned already that I probably will see The Physicists, despite seeing it earlier in the summer at Stratford.  I am leaning towards the Watershed Festival's production of King Lear in late Nov.-early Dec., but I also just have to pace myself.  I think this is going to be a very busy fall, and I may well be burned out on theatre (and work) by that point.