REVIEW: Bâtardes at Theatre Passe Muraille
“Tu viens d’où?”
It’s a question drowned with subtext.
“Where are you from?” could as easily be “why do you look like that?,” or “why do you have an accent?,” or “what colour is your passport?” The notion of from-ness can be a frustrating and alienating one — it limits people to one-worded identities.
Bâtardes at Theatre Passe Muraille tackles “tu viens d’où” with full force, tracing fault lines in the hyphenated identities of sisters Chloé and Jade Barshee, who together make up Théâtre Everest. Raised in Québec and of Tibetan heritage, Chloé and Jade have lived a life of nosy questions — Bâtardes answers them definitively while also celebrating the sisters’ Tibetan roots. In joual-laced French, Chloé and Jade guide us through a childhood inlaid with languages and culture. A story about momos (Tibetan dumplings, not unlike potstickers) is complete with a comparison to Québécois tourtière, and a sequence in which the sisters skip rope features rhymes in both Tibetan and French.
Chloé and Jade aren’t alone onstage. They’re joined by their “monster” (Mathieu Beauséjour), a festively-fringed dragon who joins the sisters as they excavate their lives. The monster is a friendly beast, devouring momos by the fistful and artfully dancing through the TPM mainspace — and he’s a representation of the Tibetan culture just beyond the sisters’ grasp. In a moment of culture shock on a trip to India, the monster is a comforting familiar face — a reminder of family and tradition.
Chloé and Jade have written and directed Bâtardes themselves, and as such the piece feels incredibly personal and intimate. Numerous aesthetics (neon light-up sneakers, the monster, a truly staggering number of momos) come together in harmony, and the stories they tell are sharp and funny. Chloé and Jade have created a “patchwork blanket” of their identity, and it’s a feast for the senses, vibrant and textured. The play celebrates that these young women are, by their own assertion, “bâtardes” — bastards — of mosaicked heritage and culture.
While Bâtardes is delightful, for the most part, your mileage may vary if you don’t speak French.
The surtitles for Bâtardes are tiny and at the performance I viewed, often quite badly timed, offering little support to those who can’t keep up with the French narration. I’m about 70% fluent in French, and I would have appreciated functional surtitles to bridge the gap — I don’t know how much those with no working knowledge of French will take from this performance. The visuals are gorgeous, but they’re scaffolding for a text-heavy performance: readable, well-rehearsed surtitles are the missing piece which might elevate Bâtardes from good to great. This is an important play exploring the depths of an identity not otherwise found on Canadian stages, and I hope to see it again with more accommodations in place for a largely Anglophone audience.
Bâtardes runs at Theatre Passe Muraille through June 4. Tickets are available here.
Aisling Murphy
Aisling is Intermission's former senior editor and the theatre reporter for the Globe and Mail. She likes British playwright Sarah Kane, most songs by Taylor Swift, and her cats, Fig and June. She was a 2024 fellow at the National Critics Institute in Waterford, CT.
LEARN MORE
iPhoto caption: Photo by Aisling Murphy.
In the darkest months of Yukon winter, it’s all about the Sun Room
I’m here for a week in January as a guest of Nakai Theatre, a hub for theatrical experimentation and outside-the-box programming in Canada’s westernmost territory.
Armchairs, tattoos, and an online theatre magazine
When I started at Intermission, my world was limited to the confines of an armchair. Arts journalism was a high it felt dangerously fruitless to chase. The life stretched ahead of me was amorphous and frightening, a chasm filled with hand sanitizer and immigration concerns. It was worth crying over a spilled kombucha and scrubbing at the stain.
iPhoto caption: Liz Appel headshot courtesy of Liz Appel.
Five questions with Wights playwright Liz Appel
Intermission spoke with Appel over email for a brief Q&A about Wights, now playing at Crow’s Theatre until February 9.
Call for applications: Publishing and editorial assistant
Intermission Magazine is seeking a dynamic and collaborative individual to join our team.
iPhoto caption: What Writing Can Do: The 2025 Musical Theatre Critics Lab
Announcing What Writing Can Do: The 2025 Musical Theatre Critics Lab
What Writing Can Do is timed to coincide with the Grand and Theatre Aquarius’ co-production of Waitress, which will serve as a jumping-off point for discussions throughout the Lab.
iPhoto caption: A Christmas Story production still by Dahlia Katz.
REVIEW: A Christmas Story feels fresh at Theatre Aquarius
If you want to catch A Christmas Story before it closes, good luck — the show is close to sold out, and with the talent on that stage, it’s not hard to see why.
Comments