Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Soul Food: YCT, Cashe, Aaron, PT Founders Return!, etc.

Quick Soul Food buffet.  Click on the links for much more!

Classic comedy closes June 14.  We're in week two of the run, and the tickets are going fast: I believe the matinees are already sold out.  Lots at the blog; production photos, shots of the set model, even an opportunity for you to do a walk-on part in a mainstage PT show! And over at Soul Food Movies, a piece about the film versions that's mostly about the play itself - diligent readers will realize it's pretty much my director's notes from the YCT program. 

May 31 & June 7, Leora (a Christmas Presence regular, currently living far away, back in town to make some music) is the featured soloist with the Beata Vocal Ensemble and Carousel Chorus. Then June 23 she's doing Jazz Vespers ("Gospel Comes Home"), followed by her Jazz Festival gig June 28 singing jazz interpretations of Joni Mitchell tunes. Welcome back, Leora!

is playing a benefit June 16, her jazz material. I saw a gig in Langley a month ago where she also mixed in her older power guitar pop tunes, and my gosh, that girl can rock!  A treat, too, to finally see John Cody working out on the drums - wow.  

Dec 14-16 on the PT stage we'll be reuniting Elaine Adamian Myers, Allen Desnoyers, Byron Linsey, Roy Salmond and me to recreate Pacific Theatre's first-ever production, FIRST CHRISTMAS, which we staged back in 1984!  An incredible celebration at the centre of our 25th Anniversary Season.  We're reserving half the theatre at the Sunday show for all of you who were there that first season - details to follow.

And while you're catching up on PT, check out the audience response to THE WOODSMAN. Lowest-attended PT show in I don't know how many years, but no regrets - read those letters and you'll see why.  (And hey - if you skipped that one, you can make it up by taking everybody you know to YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU.)  

With YCT rehearsals done, our season chosen and even a new General Manager hired (! more on that in due time), this young man's thoughts turn to...  The movies.  / SON OF RAMBOW may be the first time the Plymouth Brethren get themselves a feature film - and no, I'm not talking about a group of vintage car enthusiasts.  Think Regent College.  Think University Chapel and Marineview.  (Though you won't be that much closer.)  Small British coming-of-age comedy is darn near perfect story of boyhood friendship (and cinephilia) for its first half,well worth seeing even though it loses its way after the midpoint.  Religion not necessarily The Good Guy in this one, but by the end I couldn't help wondering if there's more than a little autobiography in it, and that while the Brethren may be in the filmmaker's past, God wasn't left behind so easily. Sweet film. / And speaking of rarely-filmed Christian sects (and rarely-filmed Christian sex, too, now that I think of it), the Soul Food Movie Moment so far this year looks to be the screening of SILENT LIGHT at the VanCity June 5-12. Filmed by Mexican enfant terrible Carlos Reygadas among the old order Mennonites, the picture was feted at Cannes a year ago, with references to Terence Malick and ORDET.  Yum. / THE BAND'S VISIT is back at the Hollywood this week, as is my favourite Soul Food pic so far this year, IN BRUGES (Wed and Thu 9:15 only) - the hired-killers-on-the-lam black comedy and meditation on mortality is also at Granville 7. Also at G7 is the latest very flawed Mamet, REDBELT - which nevertheless moved me deeply, spiritually even, with its portrayal of the central character - finding Soul Food in some very odd places these days!  / And whoa, what do you know!  According to Cinemaclock, U23D is back at the Canada Place IMAX theatre - I saw it twice, rekindled my religious almost-devotion to God's Rock Band.  / Oh, and also at soulfoodmovies, the Halliwell Top 1000 list: it's pretty heavy on Brit pics little known over here, and has leans toward vintage films, but a darn fine list nonetheless.  


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