A few productions that I've reviewed in previous years are back up on stage at the moment:
- Glynis Leyshon's production of Kevin Loring's Where the Blood Mixes is at Factory Theatre in Toronto. Here's my two and a half star review from when it premiered at the Luminato Festival in 2008.
- Soulpepper's production of Glengarry Glen Ross is back at the Young Centre. Here's my 3.5 star review from last year.
- And in Montreal, Billy Twinkle: Requiem for a Golden Boy, puppeteer Ronnie Burkett's latest show, continues its international tour at the Cinquieme Salle at Place des Arts. I reviewed it in Edmonton at the Citadel in October 2008 and gave it 2.5 stars.
Should critics return to review productions when they are remounted with the same cast and artistic team? We tend not to do so at the Globe for practical reasons, though I do well know that productions evolve over time.
In the case of Billy Twinkle, for instance, a couple months after I reviewed it in Edmonton, our man in Vancouver - Michael Harris - reviewed it for the Globe BC section and gave it 3.5 stars. (Sorry, no link.)
Did Billy Twinkle get stronger over two months? Or do Harris and I look for different things in a night at the theatre? Probably yes and yes, but who could say for sure? Ultimately, a review is only ever a snapsnot of a single performance from a single viewpoint - and while some shows may only hit their stride a week into the run or in the second city of the tour, others will lose their energy or shape as they go on. The only way you could talk about a production entirely authoritatively is if you saw every performance of its run and that, I'm afraid, is not in the cards.
As a snapshot of Billy Twinkle circa April 2010, here's what critic Pat Donnelly has to say about the show's current run in the Montreal Gazette.
In other Burkett news, the Siminovitch prize-winning puppeteer recently gave an interview to La Presse's Alexandre Vigneault about the headache the Conservative government's cutting of touring programs gave him two years ago.
Burkett was left without money to take Billy Twinkle to theatres in England and Australia that had already paid for the show's development. It was an embarrassing situation, but things eventually worked out - he rejigged his budget and the Australian and English theatres helped make it happen.
But Burkett is obviously still annoyed at the destruction of the PromArt and Trade Routes programs, as it continues to impact his future as an artist who depends on touring to fund his productions. "We'll work out a way to make things work," he told La Presse, "and, like most Canadians, we'll wait for Stephen Harper to resign, to be beaten in an election or to die." (That's my French to English translation of his quote to La Presse, which was probably already translated from English into French, so if it sounds a little Babelfishy, that's why.)