Review — Kingston Theatre Alliance

It’s family drama and first crushes, with a side of baseball. Directed by Penny Nash and staged by Domino Theatre, Neil Simon’s Brighton Beach Memoirs (1982) is a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age comedy. It centres around the Jerome family through the perspective of the youngest son, fifteen year-old Eugene Morris Jerome (William Mitchell). Living in Brooklyn, the Jewish-Polish immigrant family experience personal hardships and conflict under the threat of impending war. Meanwhile, […]

On the day of her mother’s wake, Amelia finds herself at a loss for what to wear. It doesn’t help that her dead mum keeps appearing in her childhood bedroom, all smiles and chatter.  Written by Chloe Whitehorn and directed by Will Britton, Dressing Amelia unpacks mother-daughter baggage through quippy digs, impassioned speeches, and the ever-tantalizing promise that dirty laundry will be aired. A little bit soap opera, a little […]

The night Menopause The Musical 2: Cruising Through ‘The Change’ came to Kingston, my mother was in town, so naturally I invited her along as a guest expert.  She’d seen the original Menopause The Musical on tour several years ago and hadn’t enjoyed it much, offering such sizzling critiques as “I think there’s a certain type of ‘hilarious’ humour that I don’t like,” and “I hate the Beach Boys.” Ever […]

It’s tough being a drama critic at the best of times. For Brooklyn-based theatre journalist Mortimer Brewster (Danny Lalonde), the drama is seeping into his home life at a worrying pace.  Mortimer has just promised to marry his long-term girlfriend, Elaine (Wendy Stephen), when a chance peek into his aunts’ window seat reveals that life in the Brewster household is not all as it seems. Aunt Abby (Charlene Wehlau) and […]

A group of young artists puts on a musical about young artists in a festival for young artists. Blue Canoe Productions and the 2024 Juvenis Festival present Rent, directed by Dylan Chenier.  Jonathan Larson’s Rent, loosely based on Giacomo Puccini’s La Bohème, tells the story of young artists as they traverse through gentrification, love, and the HIV and AIDS epidemic present in the 80s and 90s. With New York City […]

“I’ve seen tears in men’s eyes… It was a very emotional time when a man came in and went up to the counter.”  -Relief worker in Barry Broadfoot’s Ten Lost Years: 1929-1939. Ten Lost Years is a play based on the 1973 book of the same name by Barry Broadfoot playing at Domino Theatre this spring. Written by Cedric Smith, George Luscombe, and Jack Winter, and directed by Martha Bailey, […]

Nine is a famous Broadway musical brought to life by the students of St. Lawrence College’s Music Theatre – Performance program. It played at the Thousand Islands Playhouse this past weekend and was directed by Alexandra Herzog. With music and lyrics by Maury Yeston and book by Arthur Kopit, the story based on the 1963 film 8½  follows Italian Film Director Guido Contini (Felipe De Brito) as he tries to […]

Since my first dreary days as an ArtSci frosh, getting stuck in a crowd of Queen’s students has been a surefire way to bring out my inner Wednesday Addams. As I stood in the Rotunda Theatre’s packed lobby on Thursday evening, noisy whirls of preview-night chatter ricocheting in my ears, I felt a distinct urge to crawl deeper into my own skin. When I realized my arms were crossed and […]

You’ve heard of iPhone, iPod, iPad, but what about iWorld?  Kingston Meistersingers’ production of We Will Rock You!, directed by Rachael McDonald, is a jukebox musical with songs by Queen and book by Ben Elton. Bringing a collection of rock hits to Domino Theatre’s stage, the show flashes forward hundreds of years into the future: the world is run by Globalsoft, a music corporation that has destroyed and banned all […]

Audiences are wondering if all the world’s a billboard as the latest trend in corporate sponsorship emerges in Kingston’s theatre scene. Previously known as Domino Theatre, the new Domino’s Pizza Theatre will soon follow the lead of Slush Puppie Place (formerly Leon’s Centre) in accepting commercial dough.  Rising costs of venue upkeep and drastic cuts to arts funding have been cited as motivators for more local organizations to turn to […]

Set forth on a journey through the Forest of Arden where love and laughter intersect to create a fascinatingly funny story. As You Like It is written by the brilliant William Shakespeare and Domino Theatre’s production of the show, directed by Peter Aston, is now playing. Personally, I am not a big Shakespeare theatre-goer. I read a few of the plays in high school and saw some live performances, but […]

“The biggest mistake any of us could make would be to underestimate Satan.” –Paradise Lost Paradise Lost is an interesting and unique retelling of the story of Adam and Eve, and the first battle between good and evil. By Playwright Erin Shields and directed by Evalyn Parry, the play is loosely based on John Milton’s poem of the same name. Paradise Lost flips everything we were taught about the story […]