Review — Kingston Theatre Alliance

Face cast in an almost permanent frown, Harriet Leary stumbles into her recently deceased mother’s lake house with the urgency of a to-do list that has nothing scratched off. She moves about the house with a general air of uptight worry. Not long after her follows the topsy turvy Juliet ‘Jules’ Leary, bustling through the house with an uproarious energy and apparent emotional indifference, quickly searching for a drink. Lastly […]

This past winter came early, hit hard, and—quite frankly—overstayed its welcome. It clung to Kingston’s limestone buildings with both hands before the sun managed to thaw the city. As the tulips gradually emerged and newborn goslings paddled around the inner harbor, Princess Street restaurants traded in their snow shovels and sidewalk salt for parasols and patios. Kingston welcomed this much-anticipated seasonal change the best way it knows how: with music.  […]

This year at Thousand Islands Playhouse, the Springer Theatre’s first show of the season is Sugar Road, written by Kristen Da Silva and directed by Sheila McCarthy. Like the formulaic Hallmark movies that are beloved around the holiday season, Sugar Road follows a structure that will be as familiar to most audiences as the back of their own hands: two sentimental protagonists, two comedic side characters, enough miscommunication to push […]

How do you review a dream? When you blearily blink back into wakefulness, is it better to critically engage with your slumbering mind through a psychoanalytical Freudian lens, or that of an English major attempting to establish a story structure? Perhaps a bit of both, with a healthy amount of neither.  James Joyce’s 1939 novel Finnegans Wake reads like a dream, radical and baffling to the point where nearly a […]

With Women of the Fur Trade, Thousand Islands Playhouse opens its 2026 season with a fine-tuned balance of biting satire and roaring comedy. Directed by Keith Barker alongside Apprentice Director Stephanie Fung and written by Frances Koncan, the play focuses on three women who sit trapped together in a frontier fort: Marie-Angelique (Danelle Charette), a Métis idealist who fangirls over Louis Riel; Cecilia (Alison Beckwith), a British settler concerned for […]

Stepping into the Domino Theatre on April 23rd, 2026, one had to be prepared for two theatrical occasions: Opening Night of A Comedy of Errors, and the 462nd birthday of William Shakespeare. As an English Literature student with a passion for live theatre, I am always eager to see how accessible a new adaptation of the Bard’s work is for modern audiences. I could not be more thrilled to see […]

Content Warning: ‘Carrie’ deals with child abuse, violence, murder, and bullying. Although this review does not discuss these topics in depth, they are general themes in the performance.

When walking into the lobby of the Baby Grand Theatre, one is rarely expecting to face philosophical questions about nature versus nurture. Yet, anyone attending opening night of House on Fire Theatre’s Blood Relations found themselves faced with that age-old question. Audiences were encouraged to mark on a line the degree to which they believe murderers are born, created, or some combination of the space in between—a perfect set up […]

“Careful, it’s sharp!” comes the warning from one of Deathtrap’s five characters, and while it’s meant to caution against the cutting steel of a weapon, the descriptor could just as easily apply to the play itself.  Deathtrap, a 1978 play written by Ira Levin, is Queen’s Theatre Troupe (QTT)’s latest production. Co-directed by Myra Chiu and Alfonsina, the dark comedy contains multiple twists and turns that are just as likely […]

The play revolves around the experiences of Janey Quinn, played by Elizabeth Morris, and Fiona Conlon, played by Hayley Hudson, who are two Deaf actors working as extras on a film taking place in Potato-Famine-era Ireland, but shot in Frontenac County. The third and final actress on stage is Lauren Lafayette Brooks, who plays multiple characters: Aisling, the film’s frustrated First Assistant Director (AD); Nicola, the movie’s star; and Sean, Janey’s unhoused and drug-addicted cousin. With this small cast of characters, the three actors lead the audience through the hurdles Deaf actors are forced to navigate to pursue their dreams. 

“All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” – George Orwell One of the first classic novels I read in grade school, Orwell’s Animal Farm is one that stuck with me well beyond my eighth grade classroom. An allegory for the Russian Revolution and Stalin’s rise to power and subsequent dictatorship, the novel also carries a wider warning of the ways in which governance can be […]

A pair of rival, vicious Hollywood stars who must be kept apart at all costs somehow ending up in the same suite? What could possibly go wrong… Suite Surrender, written by Michael McKeever, is a hilarious comedy directed by Lorna Jodoin currently playing at Domino Theatre. Two feuding Hollywood starlets, Claudia McFadden (Julia Moore) and Athena Sinclair (Vanessa Costa) are invited to perform at a war benefit at the Palm […]