STAGE
FALL ARTS PREVIEW
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More of the season’s must-see dance and theatre shows are listed online now at thecoast.ca.
The cast and crew of Fat Juliet during rehearsals. DANIEL WITTNEBEL
Fat Juliet takes her story back Stevey Hunter’s play riffing on Shakespeare “won’t change the world,” but it just might change yours. BY MORGAN MULLIN
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t might seem trite to say Eastern Front Theatre’s Fat Juliet is a Romeo and Juliet adaptation unlike any you’ve ever seen—yes, even counting the dreamy Leonardo DiCaprioClaire Danes redux from 1996. But what if I was to tell you that this spin on Shakespeare’s
star-crossed story, debuting at Alderney Landing from Oct 22-31, is also more fun and relatable than any you’ve ever heard of? “The very first moments of the play, we see Juliet in a bathing suit, considering herself in a mirror—perhaps not so favourably. And then,
a little bit conspiratorially, she announces to the audience: ‘No one can love you if you’re fat, you know. My mother told me that.’” Kat McCormack, the show’s director, leans over the table at rehearsal for emphasis and says, “That, to me, is a little bit of the thesis: Do we actually have these thoughts about ourselves, or is this something that someone has put in my own mind?” The story—written and starring playwright Stevey Hunter—reframes the story from Juliet’s perspective, smuggling themes of self-love and body positivity into the historical play. “I never saw myself as Juliet, until I actually was like, ‘Oh, unless she was fat, because when I was 16, I was fat’—and I've never seen that. Why haven’t I seen that? Why don't we see fat people falling in love? Because fat people fall in love all the time,” says Hunter, seated near McCormack. “So then it just turned into: OK, well let’s see this timeless love story, but this time it’s from the perspective of what it would have been like for me, as a fat 16 year old.” That means the entire stage at Alderney Landing is being constructed to look like a Billie Eilish tour, with a 20-foot-high four-poster bed and big sleepover vibes. Body-positive illustrations by Coast contributor Mollie Cronin of Art Brat Comics round out the scene. “The Shakespeare language kind of comes out like regular conversation,” Nathan Simmons, the actor who plays Tybalt, adds, while Lou Campbell (playing Angel) nods next to him. Another departure? “It's going to totally smash everybody’s idea of who Romeo is and totally dethrone Leonardo DiCaprio,” says Peter Sarty, who’ll be playing the heartthrob. “He’s a bit of a fuckboy!” “I know this play won't change the world,” adds Hunter. “But it might change someone’s world.” a
HEIST’s Frequencies
SEE
Frequencies Livestreamed from The Bus Stop Theatre’s stage to be watched virtually, Nov 5-6, tickets are $15, tune in to https://nac-cna.ca/en/event/29336
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The Coast
t’s true that a thing cannot be defined by what it is not, but that didn’t stop Halifax’s indie theatre scene from stripping its art to the core foundations during COVID-19. Without a traditional audience or stage, theatre-makers like Aaron Collier and his Frequencies collaborators Stewart Legere and Francesca Ekwuyasi put forth abstract new visions of what theatre can be. Now, the National Arts Centre is helping Collier and Co. restage their pandemic hit from The Bus Stop’s newly renovated theatre as a livestream spectacular, calling the show “one of the most exciting inventions to have emerged from livestreamed theatre.” The play will be viewable from your phone screen, yes, but still worth the watch. Collier’s company, HEIST Live Art, has made a name for itself by blending technology and theatre since its breakout 2016 Halifax Fringe Festival play The Princess Show, which went on to win Best of The Fest (and is currently up for the 2021 Nova Scotia Masterworks Award). “We had already invested a significant amount of our time and energy into figuring out how to make sort of 3D digital worlds and these fantasy drag performances in the digital domain,” Collier told The Coast last summer. “So at that point we thought...maybe there’s something in this. Now, here we are, trying to discover if there’s something in this.” It looks like there is. —MM
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Scene Heard
What’s going on behind the scenes in Halifax’s theatre and dance community.
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he world of live performance is returning to the stage at last—and it feels like a big exhale. Halifax’s indie theatre scene was a cultural liferaft during COVID, since it had already been exploring innovations to the form that made digital theatre not only possible but actually worth watching. One of the brightest examples? Zuppa Theatre, which added app-based shows to its repertoire years ago. (If you’re wondering what that means, these shows explore a story through a narrated walking tour.) Zuppa is keeping with this innovation this fall with its newest app-based show, 50Things. Co-artistic director Ben Stone explains it as “a scavenger hunt to 50 art pieces around Nova Scotia,” including short films, paintings, spots by local musicians and special guests. A work that’s in support of the Ecology Action Centre, you can download 50Things from EAC’s website. But if you’re elated at the thought of an IRL show, you’re in good company. The Bus Stop Theatre, which had a soft reopening for the Halifax Fringe Festival last month, is throwing a reopening fundraiser party October 23. Since buying its building last summer, the Gottingen Street theatre has been undergoing massive renovations to create a second performance space in the basement and make the space fully accessible. “Prior to these renovations, The Bus Stop was known kind of by default as one of the most accessible venues in the city, but that's only because everywhere else is so inaccessible,” Sebastien Labelle, executive director of TBS told us in September. Making the most of the improved space? Kitbag Theatre and Page 1 Theatre, two newto-the-scene production companies arriving in Halifax from New Brunswick and PEI. Both companies will be performing shows on The Bus Stop stage this fall. Meanwhile, Eastern Front Theatre is celebrating a return to roots as it packs its bags for Dartmouth’s Alderney Landing Theatre. It’ll debut a new work there this month, directed by EFT artistic director Kat McCormack. And let’s pour one out for the doomed work-life balance of Neptune’s Jeremy Webb: the theatre’s artistic director will also direct all the shows it stages this season—including the upcoming must-see ghost play Woman In Black. It’s also going to be a busy fall for the multidisciplinary artist Liliona Quarmyne, who not only curates this weekend’s Nocturne Festival (which you can read more about on page 8) but also kicking off a new season at Kinetic Studios, where she is artistic director. The dance stalwart’s upcoming November Open Studio Series (Nov 12-13) will be a blended IRL and online performance, featuring works by Olivia MacLean, Vanessa Furlong and April Hubbard, among others. Also in the world of dance, The Woods, Halifax’s first professional hip hop dance company, celebrates a decade of keeping the beat this year—and we’re still trying to copy the company’s choreography from its last performance. —MM
