MONTREAL, QC - When Artistic Director, Gordon McCall chose to dedicate Centaur’s 2005-2006 Season to six plays by Montreal playwrights, he wanted to celebrate one of the greatest cities inthe world, its vibrant combination of old and new, its proud sense of community, its renowned sense of sophistication and style and its dynamic cultural scene - just to name a few. The result was a season of plays entirely about our own city, which, to Centaur’s knowledge is a first in Canadian theatre history.
While the theatre community applauded the move, many waited anxiously to see how this unique and historic programming selection would fare. The verdict is in: Montreal Stories is an unqualified success!
Centaur’s Montreal Stories season achieved 94% of its box office target, lead to an overall season surplus, and inspired such positive audience response that two of the plays were held over due to popular demand (David Fennario’s Condoville and Vittorio Rossi’s Hellfire Pass). It has turned out that celebrating Montreal playwrights was a recipe for success.
The Montreal Stories season included Condoville by David Fennario, the romantic comedy Real Estate by Allana Harkin, the first part of “A Carpenter’s Trilogy” Hellfire Pass, by Vittorio Rossi, (Part 2, Carmela’s Table will premiere this upcoming season),
the daring and spicy tragic-comedy CHEECH by François Létourneau, David Sherman’s comedy Have A Heart and a Montreal collaboration with Imago Theatre of Bye Bye Baby by Elyse Gasco to finish off the season with a bang.
Mr. McCall had this to say about the historic initiative: “The public response has been rewarding beyond expectation and to share the development and showcase of these remarkable playwrights with our audience has been one of the most gratifying experiences of my professional career.”
Other highlights of the season included a very special performance of Shakespeare by Request, featuring Douglas Campbell and a surprise appearance by Colm Feore, the Other Theatre’s presentation of Galapagos, based on the novel by Kurt Vonnegut as partof Centaur’s Brave New Works, and a thriving 9th annual Wildside Festival, highlighting Centaur’s Best Of The Fringe Award, Boygroove. In a co-production with
Theatre Lac Brome, Centaur presented The Four Anglos of the Apocalypse, starring Bowser and Blue, Josh Freed and Terry Mosher (Aislin) for three limited engagements! Centaur also continued its dedication to the Saturday Morning Children’s series with 13 shows this season and increased its popular Theatre Of Tomorrow high school program to include five of the season’s shows instead of three in years past.
Well into the launch of the 2006-2007 Season, Centaur continues its commitment to being The Voice Of Montreal by presenting plays by two of Montreal’s most celebrated writers: Michel Tremblay’s Assorted Candies, in its first English incarnation; and the world premiere of Vittorio Rossi’s Carmela’s Table, the second part of the popular “A Carpenter’s Trilogy”. The season will also include the hilarious comedy, Glorious!, Shakespeare’s classic tragedy Romeo & Juliet, Nobel prize winner, Harold Pinter’s The Caretaker and Joanna McClelland Glass’s drama, Trying.
And for the 10th year in a row, Centaur will present it’s annual Wildside Festival, which will include the winner of the Montreal Fringe Festival, now being juried by a panel of theatre professionals on Centaur’s behalf. The winner will be announced at the Fringe on Sunday June 18th.
