Gladstone

Macbeth: Now with fire-dancing witches!

Ian Farthing is directing Bear and Company’s production of Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at The Gladstone Theatre, with Paul Rainville in the lead role of George. The play opens April 7th. Brian Carroll interviewed Farthing and Rainville about this production and some of their other work. Apt613: Can you give me a […]

American playwright A.R. Gurney’s Love Letters is an epistolary play.  Epistolary plays – plays based on the exchange of letters – reside in a small niche in the world of theatre.  You may be familiar with plays such as 84 Charing Cross Road and Les liaisons dangereuses.   Using only dramatically read letters, Love Letters traces the complicated […]

2 hours with one 15 minute intermission/ Comedy | Parental Guidance Alan Ayckbourn’s trilogy, The Norman Conquests, is a set of plays that takes place in parallel, involving the same six characters, during the same weekend, in three different parts of an English country home (garden, living and dining room). Round and Round the Garden […]

There’s a not-to-be-missed theatrical treat at The Gladstone! Living Together is the second of a theatrical triple-header called The Norman Conquests.  You can read my review of the first play, Table Manners here.  I’ve learned since then that Alan Ayckbourn wrote this brilliant trio of plays in a mere 10 days.  One patron on opening night […]

Table Manners is the first of a theatrical triple-header at The Gladstone and, I believe, a first for Ottawa. As a result of a flippant remark to a reporter in 1973, Alan Ayckbourn found himself committed to writing a trilogy of plays.  The result was his brilliant classic, The Norman Conquests. Ayckbourn’s three plays share […]

Kinky? Serious? Dramatic? Comic? Suspenseful? Warped? Disturbing? Playful? Political? Role-bending? All of the above? Venus in Fur is a sex comedy turned on its birch-switched bottom. Don’t come expecting a frothy farce like Noises Off. Yes, there’s a scantily clad attractive woman. Yes, there’s a pedantic tight-assed frumpily dressed man. Yes, there’s a play within […]

Vanity Project Productions brought us Hedwig and the Angry Inch (twice) at The Gladstone last year.  Alvina Ruprecht called it “the theatre event of the season”.  From April 1 to 4, they’re presenting another theatrical treat:  a dynamite production of Richard O’Brien’s The Rocky Horror Show. I pity those without a ticket – this is […]

Bankrupt is a very enjoyable – and slightly smutty – comedy by Ottawa playwright Stéphanie Turple.  Her 2011 French play, Banqueroute, was translated into English and workshopped in 2013, and has now been brought to The Gladstone by Plosive Productions.  It’s a dandy bedroom farce/musical mashup with some great comic moments.  Judging from the laughter during the […]

130 minutes (including one intermission) / Drama | Parental Guidance The striking first impression of this production is how good the casting is. Robin Guy, Shawna Pasini and Cindy Beaton are immediately believable as sisters Agnes, Theresa and Louise. The MacKeigan sisters (hard-drinking actress Agnes, teetotaling nun Theresa and television-addicted, unemployed Louise) are gathered in […]

Set in a northern UK town Jim Cartwright’s Two features Michelle LeBlanc and Richard Gelinas in not only the roles of husband and wife publicans, but also as the dozen or so characters that pop in for a drink over the course of an evening down the pub. This inventive two-hander opens with the landlord […]

An evening bookended by gifts. But first, a word of advice, O gentle reader, before you enter the theatre: The Gladstone bar is featuring eggnog, with or without Sailor Jerry rum. Order yours before the show for intermission. It’s very popular. The Radio Show has become a Christmas tradition at The Gladstone. As befits a […]

I knew we were in for a fun evening when the audience laughed within the first minute of The School for Wives. They kept laughing throughout the rest of the play. Understandable when you consider the quality of the script, the direction, and the acting. Moliere wrote The School for Wives the year he married […]

Every four years, the US presidential election captures the attention of the world.  And why shouldn’t it?  From a practical perspective, it is of immense interest to every person on the planet: who will be placed in charge of the largest nuclear arsenal and greatest concentration of purchasing power in the world?  Even then, a […]

A lot of people are talking about 100 mile diets. Eating more local food seems like a natural way to support the local economy and reduce the amount of transportation it takes to get food onto our table. The Red Apron, a local staple in the budding foodie haven of Gladstone Avenue, is finding ways […]