It's celebration time for Theatre Northwest.
TNW is not quite finished its current season, but artistic director Jack Grinhaus couldn't keep the excitement to himself as he thought ahead to the slate of plays he has in store for the 2018-19 season. It's the professional theatre company's 25th year of operation, so celebration is the theme for their silver anniversary.
"We are looking backwards but also looking ahead in all our plays," said Grinhaus. "It's a great time to bring up those feelings of where we've been, where we've come from, but also hint at where we are going."
The first title on next year's agenda is Fish Eyes, written and starring Anita Majumdar. That forward-looking spirit of innovation is built into this offering. Majumdar wrote a trilogy of freestanding but related plays and this night will give local audiences two of them, both looking in on a new Canadian's culture shocks moving from India to a rural northern community.
"It's all about new experiences, and we can all relate to that," Grinhaus said.
"It's funny, it's heartwarming, but it's not part of a strict emotional determination. It's very rare in theatre anymore to have one emotional track the audience is supposed to get from the stage. This is an example of that smarter kind of writing where we get a more accurate portrayal of how we feel when we watch a story unfold. We think and respond in more than one way. She nails it."
If you feel some familiarity with the actor-playwright's name, you'd be on the right path. She is the star of the hit television movie Murder Unveiled (she won the Best Female Actor award at the 2005 Asian Festival of First Films for that role), and was also in such movies as Diverted and Midnight's Children. She was also in an episode of Republic of Doyle.
Grinhaus said this story has a peppy dose of Bollywood dancing and character shifting by its writer and star.
The second play looks back at TNW's past, but also the history of rock 'n' roll. In all the 24 years of the company's life so far, no play has earned better box office results than The Buddy Holly Story shown in 2013. If that's what Prince George wants, Grinhaus was determined to twist in any which way to satisfy that desire.
"Oh my god, I can't believe it, it was a lot of hard work, but we got the rights to a really difficult play to obtain. We get to produce the play Million Dollar Quartet," he said.
This fictional musical jukebox show is based on the very real meeting one day in the studios of Sun Records when rock 'n' roll super-producer Sam Phillips brought together four young stars of the very new radio industry.
The four stars were named Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley. This actually happened. So what would the room sound like if you got to be a fly on that wall back in 1956?
"We don't know what was said, or what music they played, but we sure know the songs these four superstars gave us, and the poster is not a fake image, that is the one and only photograph known to have been taken at that incredibly rare meeting," said Grinhaus. "It's going to be a rock 'n' roll smash. It has almost 30 songs sprinkled in - Hound Dog, Ring of Fire, Blue Suede Shoes - and those songs went on to form the basis of everything we still listen to today, from country to punk to metal to rockabilly, even the movies we watch have some trace influence from these guys."
He is not disclosing just yet whom the actors will be, but did allow that all of them are popular musicians in their own right and the majority have direct connections to Prince George.
"Number three, next year, literally goes back to the beginning," Grinhaus said. "We're going to present The Occupation of Heather Rose which was the very first play Theatre Northwest ever did in Prince George. This is the play that started it all. It was written to be as heartwarming as it is heartbreaking, and it is still as relevant today as when it was written by Wendy Lil 35 years ago and first produced in this city 25 years ago."
As extra homage to the local audience, this one-woman production will star an actor the local community declared a loud and clear affinity for. Julia Mackey, the star of the most successful local play of all time, Jake's Gift, will embody Heather Rose. The director of Jake's Gift, Dirk Van Stralen, will also be Mackey's director for this show. Both live and work in Wells-Barkerville.
"They are the perfect dynamic duo for Theatre Northwest," Grinhaus said.
The fourth mainstage production next season will be the new play Meet My Sister written by Bonnie Green, in co-production with Western Canada Theatre in Kamloops. It'll the second season in a row that TNW and WCT have collaborated on a play (this year, The Best Brothers is a shared show). It'll be the third year in a row that TNW will present the audience with a world premiere.
"This is a hysterical comedy about two sisters, one living in northern Ontario and one living in the B.C. interior, who have to try to get their mother out of her house. She's barricaded herself inside, but the house has been sold and she's supposed to move into a senior's home, but she refuses to go," Grinhaus described. "Bonnie is a producer and administrator with the Stratford Festival, but she's also an amazing writer, and this play is just hysterical. It also has a great twist ending. With our aging population, and we can include ourselves in that, this is perfect for our times."
TNW always provides a four-play mainstage season, but they also like to offer audiences a couple of productions outside of the regular schedule and outside their regular style. Next year the main one of those will be a show called Jack & The Bean, created and presented by Presentation House Theatre based in North Vancouver. But don't let the Lower Mainland address fool you. The writer of this "enthralling new spin on the much loved children's classic Jack & The Beanstalk" is Linda Carson who was one of the earliest actors TNW ever employed. She acted in The Melville Boys in 1997, Western Edition in 2000 and Brighten Beach Memoirs in 2012.
The director for Jack & The Bean is Kim Selody who was involved in a production of The Hobbitt done in Prince George in 2002, conducted a TNW actors' workshop in 2012 and he was on the creative team with Carson that brought an adaptation of Where The Wild Things Are to TNW's stage in 2016.
Carson and Selody were both raised in Prince George and now stand in national esteem within the Canadian theatre community.
Next season offers a choice of subscription options. You can commit to the preview performance for each play, a Saturday matinee for each play, pick a midweek night, buy the full unrestricted subscription, or get a Flex Pass for maximum mixing and matching. It's easily possible to watch all four mainstage shows for less than $50 or no more than $121 if you splurge.
These various season's passes are available now at the theatre's office, online at the Theatre Northwest website, or downtown at Books & Company.
