REVIEW: Dave Malloy’s Octet vibrates with sublime vocal beauty at Crow’s Theatre
iPhoto caption: Photo by Dahlia Katz.
I spent a few hours scrolling through social media before writing this review of Crow’s Theatre, Soulpepper Theatre, and the Musical Stage Company’s production of Dave Malloy’s chamber choir musical Octet: A few friend updates. Some discourse about a favourite TV show. A bit of neighbourhood drama. Oh, and the increasing and pervasive sense that everything is ruined and we’re all doomed.
The irony of my actions isn’t lost on me. Malloy’s intricate a cappella compositions, rich with complex harmonies, are the hymns and confessionals in a show about a support group for internet addiction. Regardless of what form their ego-feeding or doomscrolling compulsions take, the characters know it’s actually about appeasing what they call “the monster” inside — that gaping maw of emptiness that begs for shiny treats in the absence of real connection.
Crow’s is by now very familiar with Malloy’s work, having already presented Ghost Quartet and Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812. Under Chris Abraham’s direction, this song cycle lets audiences make that missing emotional connection, the score cycling from frenetic, electronic anguish to more vulnerable moments of contemplative calm where harmonies ring and characters admit why they seek solace in the digital landscape. While the message is bleak — we have been forever changed by our online habits, and we can never go back — Octet’s dedication to sublime vocal beauty is a rare theatrical treat.
Set designer Joshua Quinlan turns the Guloien Theatre into a community centre, which begins as you enter past signs warning that “silence is not enough” for your phones and a bulletin board festooned with nods to the current Crow’s season. The only thing distinguishing it from any other church basement is a suspiciously shiny floor that soon sports video (designed by Nathan Bruce) representing the liminal space of the web: singers tread over shifting, pixellating squares and match items with their feet on candy-coated gameboards.
A cappella is as human as it gets, with no mediation between the voice (save amplification) and the audience’s ear. Kudos to music director Ryan deSouza and the terrific singers, who maintain difficult intervals and traverse unexpected progressions armed with only pitch pipes. Primarily used to start each number, with the song’s lead vocalist blowing a single note, the pipes take centre stage in a transitional sequence where they’re used as instruments to pierce the dark mood; it sounds like a cross between a harmonica solo and the mournful wail of a train.
The stories will likely seem very familiar to the terminally online. Jessica (Jacqueline Thair) obsessively searches her name after a viral tantrum video gets her cancelled; Thair seems to burst with rage, Jessica unfurling herself after months of forced contrition. Henry (Damien Atkins) rots his body and mind with junk food in his mouth and on his game screen. Substitute meeting leader Paula (Zorana Sadiq) bemoans how she’s drifted from her husband, their bed just another place to surf. Karly (Hailey Gillis) bluntly lays out the horrors of online dating, fearing that a rejection from her will be the excuse one more man needs to tip over into violence. Giles Tomkins’ roaring bass provides a counterpoint as one of those lonely, unsocialized men, desperate for a moment of kindness. And Toby (Andrew Broderick) is down the conspiracy theory rabbit hole, convinced he’s the only one who sees the truth among the sheep.
Alicia Ault stands out as the group’s newbie, chirpy bell-voiced Velma, who gives us the evening’s only note of hope — that, as impossible as things appear, we can occasionally find harmony with others online.
Malloy alternates between hymns that metaphorically explore the fight between the e-monster and the forest of inner peace, and more secular-sounding numbers that creatively explore each character’s journey. The fluctuation between the direct and the mystical gives the 2019 show’s current references more depth, though it already feels a bit dated in being written prior to the AI boom that today further muddies the waters between real and Large Language Model-generated connections.
Mysticism is a thread throughout, from Velma’s obsession with tarot (each song apparently corresponds to one of the Major Arcana) to a reverentially treated “founder” who orchestrates the meetings but is absent from this night’s proceedings. It’s enticing but unclear messaging — is this AA-like gathering just another cult for the lonely, and is this a dig at 12-step programs, or is the show actually encouraging audiences to embrace religion to fill the void?
The most mystifying, though entertaining, moment involves Marvin (Ben Carlson), a scientist so focused on remaining skeptical that he refuses to acknowledge God — or a god — when it literally appears to him and performs miracles. At this point, Malloy’s messaging about recognizing the greater and divine within becomes oddly explicit, tugging the show away from something grounded to another plane that it doesn’t have enough bandwidth to properly address.
But who needs a higher power when you have that transcendent music? It’s enough to make anyone pause, take a breath, and put the phone down. That is, until I want to see how many people have shared this review…
Octet runs at Crow’s Theatre until October 19. More information is available here.
Intermission reviews are independent and unrelated to Intermission’s partnered content. Learn more about Intermission’s partnership model here.
Ilana Lucas
Ilana Lucas is a professor of English in Centennial College’s School of Advancement. She is the President of the Canadian Theatre Critics Association. She holds a BA in English and Theatre from Princeton University, an MFA in Dramaturgy and Script Development from Columbia University, and serves as Princeton’s Alumni Schools Committee Chair for Western Ontario. She has written for Brit+Co, Mooney on Theatre, and BroadwayWorld Toronto. Her most recent play, Let’s Talk, won the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival’s 24-Hour Playwriting Contest. She has a deep and abiding love of musical theatre, and considers her year working for the estate of Tony winners Phyllis Newman and Adolph Green one of her most treasured memories.
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