For those who find themselves in need of a quick travel fix, we’ve compiled a list of must-dos for a 48-hour weekend at Niagara-on-the-Lake.
Shaw Festival
Posted inArts & Entertainment
THEATER REVIEW: 2013 Shaw Festival
In the four plays I just saw at the Shaw Festival, accident and unpredictability are constant, as are contradiction and reluctant confession. Some are triumphs, others anything but, but the liquid nature of identity is everywhere. Even the reliability of time is up for grabs. That’s the case in Tom Stoppard’s “Arcadia” (Studio Theatre, through […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
THEATER: 2013 Shaw Festival
So far, I’ve seen only half the plays at this year’s Shaw Festival, so it wouldn’t be fair to draw final conclusions. But at this point the word for this season is — with exceptions — mediocre. Only director Jackie Maxwell’s production of George Bernard Shaw’s “Major Barbara” in the small Royal George Theatre transformed […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
THEATER PREVIEW: 2013 Shaw Festival
How long can you call yourself The Shaw Festival if you do hardly any Shaw? For most of the last 30 of its more than 50 seasons, the Festival in nearby Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, has mounted a dozen plays, more or less, between April and late October, including three or four by George Bernard Shaw, and […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Return to Shaw Fest
Our critic takes on “The Magic Fire,” “The Heiress,” “The Crucible,” and “Love Among the Russians”
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Inside Shaw Fest 2006
The 2006 Shaw Festival, featuring Arms and the Man, High Society, Too True to Be Good, The Crucible, The Magic Fire, Rosmersholm, Love Among the Russians, The Heiress, The Invisible Man, and Design for Living, continues through November 19 at several theaters in Niagara-on-the-Lake in Ontario, Canada. For schedules and ticket information visit www.shawfest.com, or […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Onstage 8.24.05
Happily resolving controversies Shaw Festival’s last 2005 additions are a lovable American modern classic and a downright weird new Canadian play, both of which bring controversial material to a happy ending. Starting with the tawdry material of either a sociological study or a sex fantasy, William Inge’s Bus Stop(1955) treats its troubled characters with such […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Onstage – 7.20.05
Despite quibbles, I’m feeling like a flack for Shaw Festival’s brilliant season. With eight productions open now, they’ve not got a weak offering. If R.C. Sherriff’s Journey’s End isn’t a masterpiece, it’s one of the great war plays. Its understated honesty is gripping and heartbreaking, with no heroic grandstanding, no anti-war preaching, just a frighteningly […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Onstage
I’m getting uncomfortable seeing lively revivals of Shaw plays that the audience loves but I’m pretty sure George Bernard Shaw would really dislike. In the Shaw Festival’s gaudy production of the charming comedy You Never Can Tell, director Morris Panych has turned what Shaw regarded as a comedy of manners into vaudeville. It’s wild looking, […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Two finds and a superplay, please
The Shaw Festival has achieved international fame with its superb revivals of relatively unknown plays of significant worth. The latest two are fascinating period pieces. Githa Sowerby’sRutherford and Son played in London and on Broadway in 1912, then virtually disappeared. In the last decade it was revived because of renewed interest in plays about […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
A visit to Eugene O’Neill’s ideal childhood
Another two delightful openings show the Shaw Festival on a roll with five winners out of five thus far. The musical may be imperfect, but it’s a treasure. And the festival’s first production by Eugene O’Neill is a pleasure indeed. Alisa Palmer’s direction of the musical Pal Joey is perhaps a tad too wholesome, […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Shaw starts sparkling
Shaw Festival’s 2004 season got off to an early and rollicking start with three effervescent comedies. Two more plays conclude the opening “week” at the end of May. Seven more productions will follow and play into December. These first three set the bar high. First, Artistic Director Jackie Maxwell directs G. B. Shaw’s classic […]
