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Gabrielle Marceau
Gabrielle Marceau is a writer, critic, and editor living in Toronto. She has contributed essays, criticism, and (occasionally) poetry to Sight and Sound, Geist, Mubi Notebook, Cinemascope, Reverse Shot, and Arc Poetry, among others. She is the founding editor of In The Mood, a triannual online journal about film and pop culture.
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iPhoto caption: Olivier Normand in 'The Far Side of the Moon.' Photo by Li Wang.
REVIEW: Lepage’s ethereal The Far Side of the Moon is insomniac theatre
The Far Side of the Moon begins and ends with a large mirror on stage, and the show extracts enigmatic power from the tantalizing question of whether its protagonist is losing himself in his reflection, or moving toward self-discovery.
iPhoto caption: Shaakir Muhammad, Christopher Gerty, and Matthieu Pagès with artists of the National Ballet in 'Procession.' Photo by Karolina Kuras. Courtesy of the National Ballet of Canada.
REVIEW: National Ballet’s Procession tangles the lines of sorrow and sensuality
Procession, the National Ballet of Canada’s brooding and stylized world premiere ballet, rushes to the stage with startling vitality — and does so at a funeral.
iPhoto caption: The company of 'CHILD-ish.' Photo by Jae Yang.
REVIEW: Tarragon’s CHILD-ish takes a hopeful and hilarious look at life through kids’ eyes
It’s a giggly good time, if a pinch oversweet.
iPhoto caption: Vincent LeBlanc-Beaudoin, Drew Moore, and Peter James Haworth in 'Abraham Lincoln Goes to the Theatre.' Photo by Emelia Hellman.
REVIEW: At Ottawa’s GCTC, you won’t expect what happens when Abraham Lincoln Goes to the Theatre
Sarah Kitz’s production leans into the play’s real strength: its exploration of narrative. The characters attempt to narrativize the play’s events before, after, and even while they take place. But their failure to impose narrative logic onto complex realities only results in escalating cycles of violence.
iPhoto caption: 'Kokuho' still courtesy of TIFF.
REVIEW: During this year’s TIFF, two films depicted theatre as a vessel for transcendence
Of the several performing arts-adjacent selections I took in, most affecting were two dramas: Lee Sang-il’s Kokuho and Chloé Zhao’s Hamnet. In both period pieces, theatre creation serves as an emotional outlet for an artist navigating devastating loss.
iPhoto caption: Jordan Pettle, Janelle Cooper, and Monique Mojica in CHILD-ish. Photo by Jae Yang.
Tarragon’s upcoming show gives audiences a verbatim taste of children’s wisdom, wit, and weirdness
The first inklings of CHILD-ish came to Drake in 2017. “I got to an age where I started having a lot more kids in my life,” he said. That “got me curious about what adults can learn from kids: playing with and flipping that power dynamic of who’s the learner and who’s the teacher.”
iPhoto caption: Photo by Mathieu Taillardas.
REVIEW: Feu Mr. Feydeau! takes charming liberties with a famous playwright’s life
Feu Mr. Feydeau! is an effortlessly enjoyable historical fantasy that takes on death, the creative act, and life's bittersweet disappointments.
iPhoto caption: Samca production still by Barry McCluskey.
REVIEW: Samca is a disturbing, unique production that explores folklore and womanhood
The feminist folklore play, written by and starring Natalia Bushnik and Kathleen Welch, is an engrossing and sometimes frightening experience, perfect to kick off the scary season.
iPhoto caption: Photo by Marie-Julie Garneau
This is a powerful, deeply-felt performance about the treacherous but necessary work of tracing personal and political histories.
iPhoto caption: Photo by Mathieu Taillardas.
REVIEW: Filles du Roi is an entertaining, thoughtful reappraisal of French Canadian history
Sébastien Bertrand takes these women out of the symbolic realm, giving them fully formed identities.
iPhoto caption: Photo by Mathieu Taillardas.
REVIEW: Convictions thoughtfully explores myth in the modern world
Lara Arabian and Théâtre français de Toronto have created a provocative, timely new work that intelligently explores the contradictions of immigration, family, and faith
iPhoto caption: Photo by Francisco Castro Pizzo.
REVIEW: asses.masses is an endurance performance that takes boredom as its subject
By the sixth or seventh hour, I indeed felt like a worker at the factory of cultural production. I began to ask myself if the demands of the job were too high, if the compensation was fair, and if I felt fulfilled or alienated from working for the proverbial man.
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