Results tagged “richardgreenblatt”

The last time Birdland Theatre's production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot came through town, it won five Doras and the reputation of being "the best show nobody saw." With only five performances at The Distillery District's enticingly named Fermenting Cellar, there wasn't much of a chance to. This time around, they doubled the number of performances, but sadly, this still doesn't mean a very long run, and if you didn't make the trip to Mill Street and Parliament last night, you missed your last chance at catching this fabulous show.

The Gladstone Variations is taking the Fringe by storm. And with good reason. The 90-minute piece is by Convergence Theatre, who were the team behind last year's fantastic Autoshow, which was actually a collection of 7 ten-minute plays by different playwrights performed in and around the parking lot at Royal St. George's. The Gladstone Variations is actually more ambitious and, amazingly, even more successful. The piece is made up of four short plays by different writers and, as the title would suggest, takes place entirely in and around the historic Gladstone Hotel. The 60 audience members are broken into groups of 15 and each is made to follow the actors of one of the plays around the hotel while they perform their show. Each group sees two of the four plays in one performance, constituting one "variation." And that's the brilliant marketing strategy of the show: to be able to see the entire thing, you have to go to it twice.

After a whirlwhind, SummerWorks-filled weekend (we saw nine shows in three days for Eye - whew!), Torontoist needed a couple of days to recover from the theatre marathon. But it was all worth the risk of brain implosion, for there are some really stellar pieces playing this at this year's festival, and you still have a whole weekend left to catch them. Here are our top three:

Toronto's theatre community is all abuzz and aflutter about this item that appeared The Globe and Mail's "Feed the Goat" gossip column today:

Don't hold your breath, but we should know within the next fortnight whether Toronto will be chosen as the launch site for the largest theatrical project ever conceived. My sources in London tell me the show's producers are seriously considering Toronto for the world premiere, either in late 2005 or early 2006. Details of the show itself are under very tight wraps, but I'm reliably informed that it's based on a very hot creative literary property (which is not Harry Potter); that it's not a stage musical in the traditional sense, although music is a big part of it; and that the set uses three interlocking revolving stages and 18 elevators. Needless to say, the estimated $100-million (U.S.) investment would be an enormous boost to Toronto's sluggish economy and its reputation. As of now, it's a 50-50 proposition.

Given Toronto's recent big-time theatre woes -- early farewells to fare like The Producers, Hairspray and Urinetown -- this rumour seems a little spurious.... which is just the way Torontoist likes 'em.Our first guess was The Lord of the Rings: The Musical, but that show -- no joke! -- is already slated to open on London's West End in the fall of 2005. Our next was that it was Garth Drabinsky's big Toronto comeback with a musical stage production of his film The Gospel of John, a hot literary property if there was ever one; alas, we think this washed-up impressario is not up to such impressive impressario-ing at the moment.Our biggest hope is that the project is a megamusical production of Richard Greenblatt's musical-in-development about satirical pianist-in-a-bowtie Tom Lehrer, which he previewed to great hooting and hollering at last night's Cold Reading Series Christmas Cabaret. A blog can dream, can't he or she?If you Torontoist readers hear anything, be sure to let your favourite Toronto blog know now. (Only if your favourite Toronto blog is Torontoist, of course.)

Tonight, the Cold Reading Series holds a Christmas Cabaret fundraiser featuring performances by actor/musician Richard Greenblatt (on one piano with two hands), stand-up comic Marcia Johnson and blues bassist Gary Folka -- as well as some stellar cold readings. Tickets are $10 and the proceeds go to pay the entrance fee to the Fringe or Summerworks Festival for a deserving Cold Reading Series writer.