VideoCabaret Double Bill / Dear Robert, written by Jim Garrard, directed by Aviva Armour-Ostroff, AND, Special Delivery, performed by JD “Jack” Nicholsen and Laska Sawade, Deanne Taylor Theatre, VideoCabaret, closes Oct. 27. Tickets here.
If you want to have an absolutely delightful theatre outing, you must take yourself to VideoCabaret at 10 Busy St. to catch a very clever double bill put together by interim artistic director Layne Coleman.
The first part, Dear Robert, is a play by Jim Garrard featuring a young woman called Amanda (Rebecca Gibian) who writes a series of letters of a rather startling and amusing nature. Special Delivery, the second half, is performed by musicians JD “Jack” Nicholsen and Laska Sawade, and every song they sing is about a letter.
Now, how clever is that?
Some Theatre History
Some context first, because this production is in some way a blast from the past.
Coleman and Garrard both go back to the heady days of the 1970s and 80s, when contemporary Canadian theatre was bursting out in all its glory.
Playwright/director Garrard is the founding artistic director of Theatre Passe Muraille, while actor/playwright/director Coleman followed him into that job a few years down the line. They are both Canadian theatre royalty.
Now that Coleman has taken over the reins at VideoCabaret, he seems to be reaching back to former greatness. British actor/playwright Alan Williams, who spent many years enriching Canadian theatre before returning to England, just completed a run of his three part autobiography, Once in A Lifetime Sometime Never. Now, Coleman has given us a play by Garrard, whose voice has been silent in Toronto for many a moon.
Incidentally, in communicating with Garrard, I have discovered that he now lives in Kingston, where he was artistic director for two summer festivals. Although he’s “retired”, he is also an occasional actor and director at Theatre Kingston, and is working on a novel.
Dear Robert
Which brings us to Dear Robert, which contains that unmistakeable touch of ironic humour that pervades Garrard’s work. I don’t want to give anything away, but suffice it to say, the letters that Amanda writes are remarkably similar, although they are going to different people.
Garrard explained to me in our emailing back and forth that he never expected to ever see the play produced. He wrote it as part of a 24-hour play writing event organized by Theatre Kingston’s AD, Rosemary Doyle. His assignment was to include the word “augment” and as many Kingston references as possible. He calls Dear Robert a playlet.
Well thank heavens Coleman has staged it because it is a charmer, and made even more charming by actor Gibian. To direct Dear Robert, Coleman brought in veteran Aviva Armour-Ostroff, and the women have created an Amanda who is absolutely believable in every way. Each body movement, each one of her facial expressions, each pause, is crafted with exquisite care. It’s a brilliant performance.
Gibian is a very special talent, and I wish we could see more of her, but she splits her time between Toronto and Montreal, where she also runs a theatre company.
Special Delivery
Actor/musician Nicholsen is the mastermind behind curating the letter songs. There are some well-known tunes like the Elvis Presley hit, Return to Sender, and Marty Robbins’, No Letter Today, but there are also some surprises, like a letter song from World War One.
The amiable Nicholson plays the guitar and is joined in duets by country singer Sawade, who has that delectable catch or halt in her strong voice that makes her singing so appealing. The harmony between the two voices is equally enticing.
It is a relaxed musical performance, with some interesting banter between the songs that invites the audience in. Not only that, once you realize that the session is going to be about letter songs, you wait in anticipation for what the next one will be.
Having Special Delivery (and what a clever title is that) follow Dear Robert is an inspired choice on Coleman’s part. In his program notes, he calls the evening a theatrical presentation about the dying art of writing letters, and even though letter writing might be dying, this performance glows with excellent good health.
Final Thoughts
I had such a good time at this VideoCab production, that I just want everyone to go and see the show.
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