Firstly, apologies friends. I’ve owed you an instalment of my In The City series for some time. No despair! Here are a few personal suggestions of some events you should get to in the next few weeks.
Music
Payadora
Tango and Argentine Folk Music
Gallery 345
Sunday December 2, 2018 at 7:30 pm
Tickets: $25 /$15 Student; avail online
Founded in 2013, Payadora Tango Ensemble has quickly become one of Toronto’s most vibrant and sought-after acts. Payadora performs an expansive repertoire that draws from the height of Buenos Aires’ Tango tradition, including compositions and arrangements by De Caro, Pugliese, Troilo, and Salgan, to the masterful, contemporary sounds of Astor Piazzolla and beyond.
Theatre
What I Call Her
Written by Ellie Moon
Directed by Sarah Kitz
Crow’s Theatre
Scotiabank Community Studio, Streetcar Crowsnest
Until December 8, 2018
Tickets $28.25 – $50.85; avail online
The estranged mother of 25-year old Kate is on her deathbed. A Facebook post becomes the subject of heated debate. Then, a knock on the door. What I call her is a play about gaps in how people perceive and understand the world they live in, female generational rage, and the loneliness of holding onto one’s own truth.
Scorch
Written by Stacey Gregg
Directed by Brenley Charkow
Until December 2, 2018
Theatre Passe Muraille Backspace
Tickets $20-25; PWYC Sundays; avail online
When Kes (Julie “Niuboi” Ferguson) poses as a boy and embarks on an intimate relationship with another girl, it leads to devastating effects both legally and personally. Based on the real-life UK court case of Justine McNally, Scorch explores the controversial subject of “gender identity fraud” prosecutions by giving voice to the trans and gender variant youth whose lives these prosecutions often leave shattered.
The Code
By Rachel Aberle
Directed by Patrick McDonald
Young People’s Theatre
November 27 – December 14, 2018
Tickets $19 & $24, avail online
After receiving backlash for instigating a student protest at her high school, Moira is initially supported by her best friends Simon and Connor. However, Simon’s support turns to anger after learning his feelings for Moira are not reciprocated. When Simon leaks a humiliating video mash-up of Moira’s protest speech, there are consequences he cannot control. Green Thumb Theatre’s play for teens examines complex questions about loyalty, accountability and taking power.
Film
The Price of Everything
Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema
Opens Friday, November 23, 2018
Tickets avail online
This documentary takes a deep dive into the contemporary art world, holding a mirror up to our values and our times — where everything can be bought and sold. Basquiat paintings regularly fetch tens of millions of dollars, and the recent sale of a little-known Da Vinci topped $450 million—but what forces are driving the white-hot art market? Who assigns and who pays these astronomical sums? What currency adequately measures art’s value? The Price of Everything leads us into a rarefied labyrinth of galleries, studios, and auction houses to wrestle with these questions and explore what society loses and gains when art becomes a rich person’s commodity.
The Great War on Film
TIFF Cinematheque Retrospective
Westfront 1918
Dir. Georg Wilhelm Pabst | Germany 1930 | 93 min. | PG | B&W
Wednesday, November 28, 2018
While both sides were traumatized by the war, Germany additionally had to endure the bitter blow of defeat. Though the war was a frequent subject for German novelists throughout the 1920s, filmmakers largely avoided it, with G.W. Pabst’s very fine Westfront 1918 a rare exception. In the vein of The Big Parade, All Quiet on the Western Front, and Wooden Crosses, Westfront follows four German infantrymen in the final months of the war, when the tide was decisively turning and it was becoming clear that all the years of sacrifice had been in vain.
Wings
Dir. William A. Wellman | USA 1927 | 139 min. | PG | B&W
Saturday, December 1, 2018
Pianist William O’Meara accompanies the film.
Wings was directed by William Wellman, who was hired largely because he had actually flown combat missions during the war. The aerial footage he and his crack team of stunt flyers captured wowed audiences of the time, and continues to impress today — certainly more so than the rather conventional plot, which sees the usual pair of bright young American boys (Charles “Buddy” Rogers and Richard Arlen), best friends and romantic rivals, joining up and going off to war in search of excitement and glory.
Multimedia Arts
Onelight Theatre
Asheq: Ritual Music To Cure A Lover
by Shahin Satad
Harbourfront Centre Theatre
December 5 – 7, 2018
Tickets $18.85 – $24.50 avail online
Blending music, projections, and live storytelling Asheq tell the captivating tale of a father’s life and death battle with himself and his son. The play culminates in music and movement, as the son is forced into a ritual zar/exorcism ceremony to rid him of a “sickness” — his love for an outcast woman.
To authentically situate the play on the Persian Gulf coast, Onelight Theatre has commissioned internationally-renowned musicians Habib Meftahboushehri (Iran/France) and Mohsen Sharifian (Iran), with the additional contribution of Toronto-based composer Sina Bathaie, to bring to life the rich and eclectic music of Southern Iran. Shahin Sayadi also travelled to Iran to film pivotal scenes that are interjected into the production through projections.
