Volume 17 Issue 10 - July/August 2012

Wanderlust, the second newmusical to receive its worldpremiere this summer inOntario. A collaboration betweentwo Vancouver artists,Marek Norman, a composerand musician, and MorrisPanych, one of Canada’s mostcelebrated playwrights anddirectors, the show openson July 11 at the StratfordShakespeare Festival where itruns through September.Based on the poetry ofRobert Service (the “Bard of the Yukon”) whose poems, along withadditional text by Panych, constitute Norman’s lyrics, Wanderlust focuseson Service’s creativity, which might seem ironic in that he spentmuch of his life working in a bank. But, as Panych points out, evenas a ledger-keeper, Service had “a boundless imagination” that allowedhim to write most of his Klondike poems long before he travellednorth. “A shaper of images and stories, of places he’d never evenseen, things he had never done,” Service piques Panych’s own creativity,leading him to explore the man’s life and work in what ultimatelybecomes a tribute to his passion for poetry. “The story I have written isnothing close to the truth, of course,” Panych adds wryly.If this project offers a more pertinent irony, it rests with the factthat Service’s best-known poems such as The Shooting of DanMcGrew and The Cremation of Sam McGee still are dismissed byliterary scholars as doggerel. Despite such disapprobation, Songs ofa Sourdough, the collection in which the poems were published in1907, has sold more than three million copies, making it the mostcommercially successful book of poetry of the 20th century. HowMarek Norman uses the poems in his sonwgs is just one reasonto check out this innovative musical. Another is to see the poetrybrought to life by such accomplished actor/singers as Dan Chameroy(Dan McGrew), Randy Hughson (Sam McGee), and Lucy Peacock (Mrs.Munsch). That Tom Rooney plays Robert Service also bodes well forthe show. An accomplished actor, singer and comedian, most recentlyseen on Toronto stages in Queen of Puddings’ Becket:Feck It!last February, Rooney may have found the perfect role for his winsomechicanery.Robert Service emigratedto Canada from England atthe age of 21, finally reachingthe Yukon in 1904. After hispoetry achieved wide publication,he became so successful(and wealthy) that he settledin Paris where he went on towrite novels and an autobiography,besides more poetry.Often called the “CanadianKipling,” he cared little aboutWanderlust.critical approval. “Verse, notpoetry, is what I was after,” heexplained late in life, “something the man in the street would take noticeof and the sweet old lady would paste in her album; something theschoolboy would spout and the fellow in the pub would quote.” Withno desire to become a household name, he nonetheless became one.While Fred Eaglesmith has yet to achieve such fame, he still might,and for much the same reasons. Already, he has accumulated a substantialfollowing for his unique singing voice and song-writing talentsthat combine to create a sound best described as alternative countryand-western,crossed with folk and bluegrass. Performing with a bandknown variously as the Flying Squirrels or the Flathead Noodlers (dependingon the style of music it plays), Eaglesmith tours his TravellingShow across Canada, the US and Europe. Last month, the BlytheFestival premiered Dear Johnny Deere, a new musical based on hissongs, and, if you hurry, you can catch it before it closes on July 7 .Directed by Eric Coates, artistic director of the festival, Dear JohnnyDeere is written by Winnipeg playwright Ken Cameron who explainsthat, like many other “Fred-heads,” he fell so hard for Fred’smusic that it now features prominently “in the soundtrack to my life.”Inasmuch as Eaglesmith’s songs frequently concern failing farmsand small businesses, and are peopled with characters forced to dealwith loss of love, livelihood, or both, they were an obvious choicefor Cameron when he decided to write a musical about Johnny andCaroline, a couple struggling to keep their farm and marriage together,even as the bills pile up. Cameron explains that “[When] I set aboutcataloguing each of the more than 140 songs Fred has recorded, I wasdrawn to the quirky down-on their-luck characters and his accessibleimagery.” All he had to do was create a play-list, and he had a score.Fashioning a narrative around Eaglesmith’s lyrics, Cameron discoveredthat the composer’s songs “are like short stories, each witha twist ending in the final verse.” It was inevitable that he would arriveat a tractor to help resolve John and Caroline’s plight, given thatEaglesmith regularly writes about machines or vehicles such as trains,trucks, cars, and engines. The play-list for Dear Johnny Deere, besidesincluding titles like White Trash, Bench Seat Baby and Yellow BarleyStraw, features Freight Train and Old John Deere — which suggestsnot only its rural emphasis but, as well, the prominence of a tractor inits plot, a perfect ingredient for a festival like Blythe that foregroundsCanadian plays which speak to a rural community.It’s one thing to use Eaglesmith’s songs to score a musical; it’s quiteanother matter to imitate the sound made by Fred Eaglesmith and theFlying Squirrels. Yet Blythe’s musical director, David Archibald, attemptsjust that by giving J.D. Nicholson the role of Johnny, and thetask of singing like Fred. He’s made a good choice, for Jack, a foundingmember of the 1991 JUNO-Award-winning band, the Leslie Spit Treeo,is a seasoned singer/songwriter, currently a member of the popularToronto-based the Cameron Family Singers. Archibald, a composerand singer himself, joins Nicholson, along with Matthew Campbelland other seasoned singers, to give Dear Johnny Deere a musical stylethat has won Eaglesmith’s blessing.So, take your pick. This summer, pack a hamper and head eastor west for big-time theatre in small-town Ontario. Cool originals,guaranteed.Based in Toronto, Robert Wallace writes abouttheatre and performance. He can be contacted atmusictheatre@thewholenote.com.ANDREW ECCLES26 thewholenote.com July 1 – September 7, 2012