Volume 24 Issue 7 - April 2019

Beat by Beat | Music Theatre
Theatre Where
Music Has an Actual
Role to Play
JENNIFER PARR
The boundaries of music theatre in Toronto continue to be
stretched in all directions from Opera Atelier’s The Angel Speaks,
the brilliant “modern meets Baroque” extrapolation by composer
Edwin Huizinga, choreographer Tyler Gledhill, and director Marshall
Pynkoski, from Purcell’s The Blessed Expostulation of the Virgin
Mary, to the changing nature of what we know as the traditional stage
musical into the most effective
platform for exploring and
dealing with some of society’s
darker and more difficult issues
in such shows as Parade, Next to
Normal, and Dear Evan Hansen.
While the latter two have not
yet opened as I write, Toronto
Musical Concerts just presented
a two-day run of a semi-staged
concert reading of Jason Robert
Brown’s Parade. Based on real
events – false accusation, mistrial,
and eventual lynching of Jewish
factory manager Leo Frank in 1913
Georgia – this is dark material.
Despite this, or perhaps because
of it, the theatre was packed for a
strong rendition of this powerful
work anchored by outstanding,
magnetic performances from
Eric Craig and Ma-Anne Dionisio
as Leo and Lucille Frank. The
content is so relevant to the evils
faced by contemporary society,
and the audience attention was so
rapt, that I wouldn’t be surprised
to hear of a full production
happening somewhere soon.
Another direction of the current
redefining of music theatre
being explored by an increasing number of companies is the move
from purely text-based shows to plays where music is not only an
important but an integral element of powerful theatrical storytelling.
This is resulting in some fascinating and unique hybrids.
Toronto’s Factory Theatre is hosting, in the latter part of its season,
two productions from other Canadian companies that are experimenting
in this way: Bears and Angélique. When I asked Factory’s
artistic director, Nina Lee Aquino, about the choosing of these
two multidisciplinary shows, particularly if their incorporation of
music as an integral element of storytelling was instrumental in her
choice, she said:
“Not directly on purpose, but ... how the Canadian experience is
presented on our stages is just as important as the what and the why.
All the productions in our past seasons have had amazing, different,
and unique containers of telling the Canadian story. It is necessary
to be able to look at something in different ways, from different
lenses and perspectives. It reminds us (and our audiences) to keep
witnessing and listening to stories in prismatic ways. That’s one of the
more meaningful ways to learn from one another and become better
human beings to each other.”
Bears (an Alberta Aboriginal Performing Arts and Punctuate!
Theatre co-production) which just finished its run on March 17, is
unique in that it began with playwright Matthew Mackenzie exploring
his newly discovered Indigenous heritage and wanting there to be
a movement vocabulary along with his words to create the specific
world and language of the play. From the beginning he worked with
choreographer Monica Dottor as his co-creator to invent the show’s
physical language, then brought on board composer and sound
designer Noor Dean Musani to develop a musical vocabulary to meld
the two together. The result is an amazingly effective myth-turnedmusic
theatre experience. With humour as an important element,
the words, music and movement align to immerse us in a mythic yet
completely modern wake-up call to recognize our ties to the earth and
the need to save it from the inroads of industry and climate change.
Next in the season, Factory partners with Obsidian Theatre to
present the Toronto premiere of Lorena Gale’s award-winning musical
play Angélique in a new production from Montreal’s Black Theatre
Workshop and Tableau D’Hôte Theatre that incorporates a live musical
score throughout. Like Parade,
Angélique is based on real events
and another case of false accusations
and miscarriage of justice.
The location this time, though,
is Montreal in 1734, where an
enslaved Black woman, Marie
Joseph Angélique, was accused
and convicted of setting fire to the
city although there was very little
evidence against her.
I asked director Mike Payette
why he feels this play written
in 1998 is an important one to
share with audiences now. He
responded passionately about its
contemporary relevance:
“Angélique is an urgent play
that speaks to the immediate
and historical systemic nature
of oppression and racism within
our country, but more importantly,
as this is not a history lesson
on slavery, it is about the life of
a woman who is forced into an
environment of abuse and servitude,
unrelenting in her condemnation
of slavery, and ultimately
tortured and killed for something
Angélique
we will never know she did. This
is a play that looks at the visceral qualities of us as human beings; the
monsters that we have inside all of us and the questioning of whether
we act on these monstrous thoughts. Angélique says at one point: ‘And
though I am wretched, I am not wicked.’ I find this to be a compelling
distinction of the human experience. In the pursuit of dialogue
and understanding, Lorena Gale urges us to find the inherent and
universal qualities of both the oppressed and the privileged; all this
through a highly theatrical and contemporary experience.”
Music is central to the language of the play and particularly this
production. As the director explains:
“I wouldn’t call Angélique a musical theatre play, but it is indeed,
musical. The score, composed by award-winning Sixtrum Percussion
Ensemble, has myriad influences, from Afrocentric to European to
popular, seamlessly heightening tension and giving breath when we
need it most. The drum is central to this play, it is one of the last words
spoken, and it becomes the instrument that is universal because it
represents not only the rage of fire, but the swelling of a heart beat.
The score is unique to this production. From my understanding,
26 | April 2019 thewholenote.com