Theatre 2009

While the article title might suggest a punk band from the 70s, in reality Clean Sheets is the annual offering of original queer-themed plays by Canadian playwrights produced by local arts group, Screaming Weenie Productions. Now preparing for their second year, the call has gone out for submissions for their 2010 showcase.

One of the most talked about shows at the 2009 Vancouver International Fringe Festival, Biographies of the Dead and Dying, returns to the Havana Theatre begining December 16th, 2009 with all performances pay-what-you-can.

In other’s hands, A Beautiful View may not have been as successful, but with playwright Daniel MacIvor at the helm of his own play, coupled with the terrific performances from Colleen Wheeler and Diane Brown, this Ruby Slippers Theatre production is indeed a thing of beauty.

It's A Wonderful Life returns once again to the Arts Club's Granville Island Stage and even after three years, the show has not lost any of its lustre and continues to be worthy of its yearly visit.

Both inventive (when was the last time you saw a couple cosmonauts in a Shakespeare play?) and accessible, Studio 58 serves up a touching, sometimes funny but always entertaining production of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale.

Yes, it was a little dirty but there is certainly nothing rotten about the wonderfully wacky production of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels on stage at the Vancouver Playhouse through December 27^th.

Award winning gay Canadian playwright Daniel MacIvor is in town directing a production of his A Beautiful View.  We caught up with Daniel between rehearsals to talk about his plays, his career, being out and his new gaysploitation-teen-revenge-thriller screenplay.

Award-winning gay Canadian playwright, Daniel MacIvor, will direct the Western Canadian premiere of his A Beautiful View in both Vancouver and Burnaby this December.

Magic may or may not remain in Uncle Digory’s house, but it definitely does on the stage of Pacific Theatre in their adaptation of C.S. Lewis’ beloved children’s book, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.  But this is not the magic of special effects, lavish costumes or elaborate sets, but the magic of great theatre.  And indeed theatre doesn’t get much better than this with a perfect mix of story, technical expertise and actors who transport us easily to a different time and place.

Aaron Webster.  Ritchie Dowrey. Steve Gian.  Jordan Smith.  These are just a few of the names that came to mind last night as I watched the Theatre at UBC production of The Laramie Project, playing at the Frederic Wood Theatre at UBC through Novemer 28th, and I was simultaneously grateful and saddened that even after eleven years this play still remains relevant.