Hate Graffiti In The Village: Toronto ’s Queer Community Confronts a New Wave of Violence
This past Monday, I was sitting at my local coffee shop when a friend, a longtime queer activist, showed me a photo on their phone that stopped me cold. Overnight, someone had spray-painted “Kill Fags” across his apartment building, with a Nazi symbol scrawled beneath it...
Raymond Helkio - Jul 16
Anne of Green Gables: the power of imagination invigorates a classic
As the audience settles in, Maev Beaty, in full Victorian drag, fusses about the stage. She has a stagehand, Josue Laboucane, adjust the lights, and she positions and re-positions a small-scale model of Green Gables. She then welcomes us to a meeting of the Anne of Green Gables book club. It is a mildly meta introduction but Beaty's presence instantly allays any fears anyone had...
Drew Rowsome - Jul 14
As You Like It: a trip to the lovely, earthy Forest of Arden
It takes a lot of convoluted plot to get to the central scene of As You Like It. It is as if Shakespeare didn't quite trust that a crossdressing rom-com romp would have enough weight to attract critical approval. Director Chris Abraham and designer Julie Fox are of the same mind and this production opens with the stage crowded with the ensemble hefting and piling sandbags into towering piles...
Drew Rowsome- Jul 13
Almost Ever After: songs about love
Unfortunately an unfortunate combination of personal and professional commitments severely limited my ability to attend the Fringe this year. However I could not miss a new musical by Andrew Seok (The Man with the Golden Heart, Unravelled). And I'm not the only one, unfortunately for many, the entire run has sold out. Almost Ever After is a combination of a musical and a staged reading...
Drew Rowsome - Jul 11
Oh! I Miss the War: two dangerous predatory homosexuals want
Oh! I Miss the War: two dangerous predatory homosexualsOh! I Miss the War encapsulates approximately 80 years of gay history in the form of two parallel monologues. In the '60s we meet, in a local watering hole, a tailor who runs a small shop that specializes in tight fitting trousers in order to emphasize "the goods...
Drew Rowsome - Jul 10
Macbeth wows Bellini
Staging Macbeth in modern dress is not a new idea. It dates back to 1923. But using the text and re-imagining it in terms of the Quebecois biker wars of the 1990s is inspired. Director Robert Lepage is legendary for challenging “the standards of scenic writing, particularly through the use of new technologies,” as the program states...
Paul Bellini- Jul 7
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels: give them what they want
ent Free is a new comedy film from director Fernando Andres. It’s about two losers who are trying to live rent free in Austin, Texas by constantly crashing on friends’ couches. They are charmless, but also pitiful, so they very often get to stay somewhere out of mercy. ...
Drew Rowsome - July 7
The Tragedy of Macbeth: using the grandiose to illuminate the intimate
Shakespeare is infinitely interpretable. The setting, the themes given emphasis, and even the delivery of the text can illuminate whatever the director finds most intriguing or crucial in the play. For this Macbeth, Robert Lepage layers the plot and words over 1990s bikers to explore fate, gender and voyeurism through Shakespeare's familiar depiction ...
Drew Rowsome - July 6
It's Fringe time!
The Toronto Fringe Festival is exhilarating, packed with incredible art and adventures, but also completely overwhelming. Every year there are so many shows I want to see and, being human, so many that I am crushed to have missed. This year is no exception As we will be unable to give each show the attention they deserve, we've ...
Drew Rowsome - Jun 22
Leaving Home: a classic as a vivid slice of life
Leaving Home dates from 1971 when Canadians were beginning to discover that they could have a unique theatrical voice. That plays about specifically Canadian topics and characters could become universal. A scholar could tell us where Leaving Home fits into that evolution, but a quick google shows just how important and influential it was in creating a national theatrical...
Drew Rowsome - Jun 19
Maxxie LaWow: Drag Super-Shero lip syncs to save the world
Simon is a shy barista who works, with his best friend Jae, at The Pink Unicorn coffee shop. He has a crush on a regular, the hunky Calvin whose standard order is a "glitter latte with glitter foam and an extra shot of glitter." On his 21st birthday Simon (Grant Hodges) plans to finally drink legally at Tuckertown's gay bar extraordinaire, The Skirt and Girdle, run by the formidably maternal Mama Mumu...
Drew Rowsome - Jun 17
After the Rain: ladies and gentlemen, Evans Stone
Evans Stone is a soft rock band who are "Canada famous." Or, as is repeatedly stated, "poor." But they are driven to do what they do, tour and struggle to record, in pursuit of writing that perfect song. And for the sheer joy in performing. And when they are performing the joy is infectious, turning the revamped Tarragon theatre into a raucous concert, a party, a magical space where...
Drew Rowsome - Jun 13
Buster Canfield's Apocalyptic Miracle Show: And tentacles!
There can be little doubt that our current times feel perched on the edge of an apocalypse. Perhaps just not the dire horrific apocalypse that Buster Canfield warns us of. Owing more than a little to the writings of HP Lovecraft, Canfield prophesies terror beyond imagining in a torrent of doom-laden, vividly preached words. Punctuated with "And tentacles!" The Old Ones are awakening, ready to bring....
Drew Rowsome - Jun 5
Iconique: Singing Out's Noah Witenoff on the power of collective queer voices
Every Pride, when a gay anthem, no matter how familiar or overplayed, booms over the loudspeakers, there is a rush of joy, goosebumps, and the irresistible need to sing along. Amplify that anthem by 130 enthusiastic voices in dynamic four part harmony, set it in the acoustically and visually splendid environs of Koerner Hall, and Singing Out's Iconique is set to sing its way into one's quivering...
Drew Rowsome - June 4
Tallulah at The Bankhead Review at Tallulah's
Jul
10
Bellini's 8 1/2 Paul Bellini
Memoirs: Letters From a Pandemic, The Loves of My Life,...
Jul
10
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
The Butcher's Daughter: The Hitherto Untold Story of Mrs Lovett
Jul
10
We Recommend Drew Rowsome
Red Like Fruit: articulating what "no-one" wants to hear
Jul
10
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and Annie: Bellini does Stratford
Jul
10
Bellini's 8 1/2 Paul Bellini
Trans Joy Jamboree: Mandy Goodhandy and Bren D'Souza ...
Jun
20
416 SCENE Drew Rowsome
Crashing Rent Free
Jun
20
BELLINI'S 8 1/2 Paul Bellini
Comfort Food: not comfort food but rewarding
Jun
20
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
VIZA: the Queen of Mean
Jun
20
416 SCENE Drew Rowsome
Beautiful Evening, Beautiful Day: it is never clear who the villains are
Jun
15
MOVING PICTURES Drew Rowsome
The Toronto Theatre Critics Awards 2025
Jun
05
416 SCENE Drew Rowsome
Genrefuck: Never Walk Alone and Reina and some trigger warnings
Jun
05
416 SCENE Drew Rowsome
Wicked Nix: the foulest of the faeriend the queen
Jun
05
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
MacBeth: A Tale Told by an Idiot returns in all its weird and wonderful glory
Jun
05
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
A Strange Loop: musical exuberance amidst
self-doubt
May
20
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
Job: a dynamic evolving feed/feud of information and conspiracy theories
May
20
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
Poz: gay resilience
May
20
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
Feast: to live is to want more
May
20
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
asque of the Red Death: "if the world was ending, you'd come over, right?"
May
20
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
The Virgo Queen joins Shea Co
May
20
MGT STAGE Drew Rowsome
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