Just to be clear, much of this is speculation, as most cultural sites are hoping to reopen by mid-April, though that seems very unlikely from my perspective. A few of the really small theatres (and the Paradise second-run movie house) are keeping crowds below 250 and encouraging the audience to spread out, but I think it is only another week or two before they get the directive to close down completely (and again, probably until mid-May, though who knows at this point). They are actually talking about making all kids in the UK more or less repeat a year of school, since there is no way for them to sit their exit exams, so who really knows what the new normal will be in another few weeks. (Again, the only small comfort is that for most people under 60 the virus is not much more damaging than a bad case of the flu.)
As I mentioned before, I think the long-term economic impacts of the shutdown could well outweigh the impacts of the virus itself (even if we are talking 1.5% mortality rate as against 30-40% of the economy completely shuttered). So it is a tough call to be made between completely hunkering down and going out (responsibly) to keep some of these businesses afloat. Nonetheless, I will probably go into hermit-mode starting from today and will stop heading over to the gym and so forth, as well as taking the TTC (probably reading Camus's The Plague on the train this afternoon was unnecessarily provocative).
Looking over my calendar, these events are almost certainly going to be cancelled. I'll add a T if I had already bought tickets to the event.
March 20 L'Argent by Bresson at TIFF
March 26-April 26 Chekhov's The Seagull at Soulpepper (more for my son than for me)
April 3 T Frank-Ax concert at Royal Conservatory (ironically this was as a replacement for a concert cancelled twice for health reasons)
April 5 T Staged reading of 'Tis a Pity She's a Whore by Shakespeare Bash'd
April 6-26 The Antipodes by Annie Baker at Assembly Theatre (this is so far under the radar, they may well try to put it on despite the advisories -- I'll be tempted but I probably won't go)
April 10 T Always Still the Dawn by Fournier at Canadian Stage
April 12 T One at Factory Theatre
April 17-May 2 In the Next Room by Sarah Ruhl at Alumnae Theatre
April 18 T Rhinoceros at George Brown Theatre
April 26 T Angela Hewitt playing Bach at Royal Conservatory
April 26 T Hamilton (actually my wife and son are going, not me)
mid-March-April All the Little Animals I Have Eaten @ Crow's Theatre
mid-March-April Blacktop Sky @ Crow's Theatre
April-June The Cold War at Video Cabaret
As of now, the two productions at Crow's Theatre are definitively cancelled (perhaps to be rescheduled). I'm pretty sure the rest of these will ultimately be cancelled but they are all holding out hope that the crisis will pass and events can take place (perhaps if attendees have a clean bill of health or whatever). I do hope that most of these are ultimately rescheduled, even if it has to be in the summer or fall.
The May events are much more challenging to predict, but I expect most of them will be postponed or cancelled.
May 8 Skye Wallace opening for Union Duke at the Horseshoe Tavern
May 15 Brahms Sextet #1
May 22 T Beethoven 5th Symphony at TSO
May 23 T The Ex-Boyfriend Yard Sale at Soulpepper
May 31 Shubert Octet performed by Amici at Mazzolini Hall
Through mid May Sarah Sze exhibit at MOCA (I still think they could have stayed open another couple of weeks, given the actual attendance at this museum. Ditto for the Textile Museum.)
Summer 2020
The jury is completely out this far out, though I still think it is unlikely there will be no impact or crowd restrictions.
Picasso: Painting the Blue Period June 27-Sept. 20 at AGO. I definitely hope they find a way to put this exhibit on, even if the tickets are extremely limited and they can only let 100 people into the gallery at a time.
Other events that have caught my eye (so far) include:
June 13 T Beethoven Septet at TSO
July 9-Aug 9 Sizwe Banzi is Dead at Soulpepper
July 10 T Squeeze w/ Hall & Oates at Budweiser Stage
July 23 Toad the Wet Sprocket and Barenaked Ladies at Budweiser Stage
July 24 Miro Quartet performing Schubert Quintet
July 24-25 Henry V (adapted by Driftwood Theatre) performed in Withrow Park
July 29 Danish String Quartet
July-mid Sept. The Comedy of Errors in High Park (even though I more or less swore I wasn't going back to those back-killing seats...)
Aug. 13-Sept 9 M Butterfly by David Henry Hwang at Soulpepper
August 30 Moliere's The Miser at Stratford
Sept. 5 Pet Shop Boys and New Order at Budweiser Stage
Sept. 26 The Rez Sisters and Hamlet 9-11 at Stratford
So a whole lot of uncertainty right now.
Anyway, stay healthy everyone! And probably you should stay home if possible for the next couple of weeks...
Update: That didn't take long. The show One at Factory is completely cancelled, and will not be rescheduled for next season (and very likely not the season beyond). I'm expecting to hear from Canadian Stage soon, and Soulpepper will likely be cancelling The Seagull.
Update 2: Indeed, Soulpepper is now a bit ahead of the crowd and is cancelling the entire run of The Seagull and hopes to reopen in mid-May. And my gym just shut down indefinitely, which was certainly the responsible thing to do, but still upsetting. These are depressing times for sure...
Update 3: Canadian Stage has essentially pulled the plug on the whole season, even Shakespeare in High Park, which is not until July! I suppose they didn't want to invest in all the rehearsal for something that might well be off limits even this summer (whereas smaller, more self-contained events might be back by the summer, though there are no guarantees). Interestingly, this Thurs. a UK theatre group will begin live-streaming Shakespeare's plays in order, with the first being Two Gentlemen of Verona, which is one of the very few comedies I apparently have never seen. While I probably can't actually watch it live, due to time zone differences, I will try to check it out at some point.
Update 4: I had half an eye on the live-stream at The Play Must Go Online (link right above), though of course I was mostly working. It looks like they have archived the entire production, though I suspect it will only last a week until the next play (The Taming of the Shrew), so go check it out. Royal Conservatory has indicated that the Ax-Frank and Angela Hewitt shows will almost certainly be rescheduled, which is good news, though no one knows when obviously. A few others have been outright cancelled. The TSO hasn't cancelled May concerts yet, but it's probably only a matter of time. Not much good news on the coronavirus front, though I would say new infections in Ontario are growing slowly (not doubling or tripling, like in Italy and now the UK), but it is still going to be a long time until there is any meaningful relief.
Update 5: Factory has cancelled MacIvor's House in addition to One, so the season comes to an inglorious end. Soulpepper hasn't cancelled its May performances yet, though it is only a matter of time. For the moment, the summer performances are still presumed to be going forward, except for Luminato, which has cancelled completely. The big news of the day is that the Olympics bowed to pressure and is pushing the Summer Olympics to 2021! That's a very big deal, but the right decision given all the uncertainty around this epidemic.
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