Category Archives: All Years

Enchanted April (Mar 24 – Apr 2, 2022)

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** IMPORTANT NOTICE:

Tickets for this production are available through the box office only. Please call 416-299-5557.

A Comedy Drama by Matthew Barber from the novel by Elizabeth von Arnim.

When two frustrated London housewives decide to rent a villa in Italy for a holiday away from their bleak marriages, they recruit two very different English women to share the cost and the experience. There among the wisteria blossoms and Mediterranean sunshine, all four bloom again – rediscovering themselves in ways that they – and we – could have never expected.

2003 Tony Award Nominee—Best Play.
“ENCHANTED APRIL is as good as they come: a lush, thoroughly refreshing theatrical holiday. Escape has seldom seemed so sweet. A magical triumph.” —LA Times.

The Gentleman Clothier (Jan 30 – Feb 8, 2020)

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Experienced gentleman’s tailor Norman Davenport has barely opened the doors of his new clothing store when Sophie, an exuberant young woman, barges in looking for work, followed by Patrick, a single father who claims to be handy. Norman hires then both to help tie up the last few threads before his Grand Opening. And whether Norman realizes it or not, he needs help getting into the twenty-first century. Disappointed that he feels he is being forced to cater to the latest fashion trends, he makes a wish that changes his life forever.

“a tailor made play that will not only fit you like a glove, it will transport you to a bespoke world that will keep you in stitches.” – Theatre Orangeville

A Gift to Remember (Nov 28 – Dec 7, 2019)

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A comedy by Joseph Robinette, Based on the book Can This Be Christmas? by Debbie Macomber.

On Christmas Eve, during a snowstorm, a group of strangers all hoping to arrive at their destinations in time for Christmas find themselves stranded, due to a snowstorm, in a small train depot.  Understandably disappointed and dispirited they try to make the best of things with little success at first.  Eventually, however, they begin to bond despite their circumstances.  They even find themselves beginning to accept their fate by finding ways to celebrate the true spirit of Christmas.  As the former strangers become collective friends, they realize the memory of this night will be a gift to remember.

Awards: The Charlotte B. Chorpenning Playwright Award

Spider’s Web (Oct 3 – Oct 12, 2019)

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Clarissa, the second wife of Henry Hailsham Brown, is adept at spinning tales of adventure for their bored diplomatic circle. When a murder takes place in her drawing room she finds the drama much harder to cope with, especially as she suspects the murderer might be her young stepdaughter Pippa. Worse still, the victim is the man who broke up Henry’s first marriage! Clarissa’s fast talking places her in some hair raising experiences, as she comes to learn that the facts are much more terrifying than fiction…

“Suspense, anyone? The old fashioned kind? Who’s for good, clean fun? One is Agatha Christle’s 1954 puzzler, The Spider’s Web.” – Howard Thompson, The New York Times

To Kill A Mockingbird (May 16 – May 25, 2019)

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Our season closes with To Kill a Mockingbird, a dramatization of Harper Lee’s 1960 Pulitzer Prize-winning masterwork of honour and injustice in the Deep South and the heroism of one man in the face of blind and violent hatred. One of the best-loved novels of all time, To Kill a Mockingbird has been translated into more than forty languages, sold more than forty million copies worldwide, and served as the basis for an enormously popular motion picture.

It’s 1935, and racial tensions are high in Maycomb, Alabama. Nonetheless, young Jean Louise Finch – or Scout, as she is fondly called – manages to live a rather carefree, priviliged existence, insulated from issues of race. All that changes when Scout watches her father, Atticus Finch, defend an innocent man, Tom Robinson, against a potential death sentence, which looms threateningly against him because of racial prejudice. Scout learns that “growing up” often means doing what is right, even when it comes at great cost. To Kill A Mockingbird is now considered an American masterpiece.

Blue Stockings (March 21 – March 30, 2019)

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A moving, comical and eye-opening story of four young women fighting for education and self-determination against the larger backdrop of women’s suffrage. Cambridge 1896, and Girton College, home to the country’s first female students, is an object of annoyance and derision to the rest of the university. The year’s intake of new women face economic difficult, the distractions of men, radical politics, and the jaw-dropping prejudice that blights every aspect of academy life. Meanwhile, there looms the prospect of a controversial vote to decide: should these ‘blue stockings’ be allowed to graduate? While skilfully invoking its Victorian setting, the play’s themes of gender equality and the power of education are just as important today.

 

“Cracking… leaves you astonished at the prejudices these educational pioneers had to overcome.”  ~ Michael Billington, Guardian

 

“Touching and entertaining… Swale tells the story with both wit and a hint of righteous indignation.”  ~ Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph

Someone Waiting (January 24 – February 2, 2019)

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The third play of the season is Emlyn Williams’ Someone Waiting, first seen in London and on Broadway in 1955. Martin’s best friend Paul has been wrongfully hanged for murdering a woman in his adoptive father’s flat. When Martin fails his law exam, Fenn, a private tutor, arrives and soon confides to Martin that he is Paul’s father who has come to administer justice himself to whoever it was who really did the killing. Before this evening is over, you will find that you have been misled several times. Playwright, novelist and actor Emlyn Williams understood theatre intimately and knew what worked for audiences. When he died in 1987, he had written or co-written 20 screenplays in addition to his 20 plays.  Someone Waiting will keep you on the edge of your seat as the plot twists and twists again.

 

 “… a drama of murder and revenge which stretches suspense from the first moment of the first act to the final line… If you can guess beforehand what will happen at play’s end you are smarter than I am… As an addict of the psychological thriller, I had a fine time.”  ~ New York News

Miracle on 34th Street (November 22 – December 1, 2018)

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Based on the 1947 Oscar-winning film, this heartwarming classic story of Kris Kringle, an old man from a retirement home who gets a job working as Santa Claus for Macy’s, the famous New York department store. Kris unleashes good will to the Macy’s customers by referring them to other department stores, where they can find exactly the toy their child wants for Christmas. Seen as deluded and dangerous by Macy’s, a plot ensues to have Kris sent to Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital, that results in  a court hearing. At stake is one little girl’s belief in Santa Claus. In a dramatic decision, the court confirms Kris as the true Santa, allowing countless children to experience the joy of childhood fantasy.

 “This is a tale that we want to believe in… that creates a world we seem to desperately desire.”  ~ Santa Cruz Sentinel