HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2013-07-04, Page 30PAGE 30. THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, JULY 4, 2013.
Beyond The Farm Show, the Blyth
Festival season’s opening
production, will be viewed in two
different ways: from the eyes of
someone who knows the people
being portrayed on stage, and
from the eyes of someone who
doesn’t.
It’s important to make that
distinction. The show opens, for
example, with Rylan Wilkie as Neil
McGavin of McGavin’s Farm
Equipment in Walton. And if you
know McGavin, as Wilkie first
fiddles with his hat and glasses and
then speaks his first words, asking
“do you like my haircut?” you know
it’s McGavin he’s portraying on
stage.
So I, as someone who knows
McGavin, know Wilkie has
identified the voice, mannerisms and
demeanour of McGavin perfectly.
However, for someone who doesn’t
know that this is a high level
impression of one of Huron
County’s finest jokesters and
businessmen, where are they left?
They are simply left in a world of
pure theatre where, as far as they
know, the characters are fictional
and alone on the stage to survive on
their own merit.
Are they interesting? Are they rich
and complex? Are they worth
watching on stage?
Luckily Huron County has its
share of characters. And what
Beyond The Farm Show strives to do
is exactly what the Blyth Festival has
been striving for over the last 40
years.
As familiar as I am with the Blyth
Festival, there are pages I can
essentially ‘skip’ in the Festival’s
annual press kit, compiled for
reviewers of the plays. This time,
however, I found it helpful to revisit
the Festival’s mandate, written in
October, 1997.
“The Blyth Festival is a
community-based professional
theatre that endeavours to enrich the
lives of its audience by producing
and developing plays that give
voice to both the region and the
country.”
On a large scale, this is, of course,
what the Festival hopes to achieve
with every season, but with Beyond
The Farm Show there were no
bridges to be crossed or conclusions
to be jumped to. This show is Huron
County on a stage, regardless of
whether you know those being
portrayed or not.
Most readers of The Citizen will
know many of the “characters” of
Beyond The Farm Show, as I do, so
for now, I’ll focus on the play from
the perspective of someone in the
know.
From the first minutes of the play
it was clear that “The Collective” as
it’s being called, has a tremendous
amount of respect for the farmers,families and community members
who made time for them earlier this
year.
When you recognize someone on
stage, it’s not in parody, it is a
homage. Marion Day, Catherine
Fitch, Tony Munch, Jamie Robinson
and Rylan Wilkie are all familiar
with Blyth. They have friends here
and they have a self-imposed
responsibility to give the people they
care about their due on the Memorial
Hall stage.
The stories portrayed on stage
range from the hilarious to the tragic
with a number of stops in between.
A scene that immediately jumps to
mind is the portrayal of Don and
Cliff Schultz of Westfield by Munch
and Robinson respectively.
When Cliff passed away before
Beyond The Farm Show made it to
the Festival stage, but after he had an
opportunity to meet with Munch and
Robinson several times, it was
evident the pair’s admiration for the
brothers would manifest itself on
stage, but it was unclear what form
this would take.
Robinson’s work as Cliff Schultz
is a loving representation of a man
he admired and cared about.
Robinson’s Cliff is a humorous ode
to a man who left his mark on
Robinson. The performance plays
like a dramatic obituary from
someone who knows Cliff will be
missed.
Similarly Munch and Day capture
the heartbreaking restraint and
privacy of an Amish couple who lost
a daughter to a farm accident.
Which should be no surprise to
anyone who has seen a Festival show
recently, Fitch is a stand-out in the
roles she takes on, two of whom are
people who spend their days in the
North Huron Publishing office,
where I sit writing this review.
Fitch is hilarious in her turn as
Ursina Studhalter, University of
Guelph agriculture student, goat
farmer and The Rural Voice summer
student.
I laughed uncontrollably as Fitch
portrayed Studhalter, whether what
she was saying was funny or not.Fitch is spot on as the eccentric, no-
nonsense girl who hopes to own her
own farm one day.
On a more dramatic note, Fitch
also spills into Memorial Hall from
one of its side doors as Citizen
Publisher and Festival co-founder
Keith Roulston. As Roulston, Fitch
harkens back to the Festival’s
mandate, serving as an artistic voice
of the voiceless in rural Ontario
Fitch truly shines as Central
Huron Councillor Alison Lobb, who
can now brag to friends and
colleagues of her Farm Show hat
trick. After being portrayed in
1972’s The Farm Show, she
“played” an integral role in the
Young Company’s The Farm: 2012
last year and now her character is on
stage once again in Beyond The
Farm Show.
Fitch drew unsolicited applause
with her performance as Lobb,
simply for speaking Lobb’s mind.
She is a champion for rural Ontario
and she fears for its future, a
sentiment shared by most in the
audience, so the applause is no
surprise.
Over the course of the months-
long process of research and farm
visits, actors struggled with facts and
figures they didn’t understand being
thrown at them in the early stages,
only to dig deeper to find the
emotional stories; the stories of the
people on the farm, not just stories
of the farm.
Beyond The Farm Show feels as
though you’re on that journey with
the actors. This feeling is given a
boost by nearly each actor taking a
turn as himself or herself. You feel as
if you’re along for the ride with
these actors when they portray
themselves on stage, with the
confusion and willingness to learn
that came along with this process.
The first act can be described as a
flurry of facts, information and
conflicting ideologies, whether it’s
big business vs. community-
supported agriculture, bio-security
or the size of farms, the first act is
By Parker Ducharme
Ten years ago with terrified and
excited faces, we walked down the
stairs of the big yellow school bus
and up to the doors of the school
carrying backpacks bigger and
heavier than us, then we took our
first steps into our kindergarten
classroom, our first steps into a new
life of moments and memories that
we will remember and carry with us
for the rest of our lives.
To me graduation means
celebrating our accomplishments of
elementary school. I believe that it is
also a chance to give us students an
opportunity for a final night of
closure, so it doesn’t just feel like
out of nowhere we were told to pack
up all of the things in our desk and
get out. When I asked some of my
classmates what graduation means
to them they said things like:
“Looking forward to all of the
opportunities we will have in high
school” and “Freedom, growing up,
moving one and of course, summer”
or “Getting to have a new
beginning”. I found these answers
interesting so I would like to pose
the questions to everyone here,
“what do you think of when you hear
me say the word graduation?” That’s
just it, graduation can be described
in so many ways, because it means
something different to everybody.
Who where remembers the very
first day of school? You know the
day when you left your parents
crying at the bus stop, whether they
were sad tears or tears of joy that
you were finally leaving.
Kindergarten was a more simple
time … we only had to go every
other day, we had centres, naps,
playtime and we got to have loonie
lunches. You could imagine then that
Grade 1 hit us pretty hard, a lot of
the free times and games were gone
and now we had to go school every
single day. For me anyways Grade 2
and 3 kind of blended together. I
remember getting to raise a
caterpillar in class and of course,
those spelling word walls that you
found yourself staring at when you
were bored. For most of us Grade 4
was a pretty big step. It was the year
that we crossed that double line and
were finally able to have recess on
the elusive “big kids” side. Grade 4
was also the first year that we
competed in the official track and
field. I’m sure we were all pretty
disappointed when we found out that
we were no longer competing in
events like the sack race and shoe
kick.
Grade 5 was the year that many of
us realized that our true friends were
the people who stuck with us
through thick and thin and not just
the people who gave us a sticker or a
fancy pencil … even if it glowed in
the dark. Grades 6 and 7 were when
most of us took a lot of big steps in
our lives. In these two years we all
had to take the EQAO test for the
second time and also went on our
very first overnight field trip to
Jump. In Grade 7 we were given the
option to join a guitar class. Whether
you had great success or not, we can
all say that we had a fun and
educational time with lots of
laughter.
Now this brings us to Grade 8. At
the beginning of this school year, our
school had an additional 13 Grade 8
students from Grey Central Public
School added into our two Grade 8
classes. Now this was hard on all of
us but together we got through the
first few weeks and quickly all
became great friends. Some of the
major highlights of the year were the
basketball teams, fun fair and even
just the little things like being the
oldest students in the school, getting
to sit closer to the back of the bus
and having more opportunities for
activities during school.
We would like to thank the
teachers for putting up and dealing
with us for all of these years, for
educating us, and helping us all the
way through elementary school. For
all of the people who helped with
decorating and planning everything
that has made tonight a success we
would like to express our utmost
gratitude. If it wasn’t for all of you
this night would not even be half as
fantastic as it is. To our friends,
family and parents, we are so
fortunate to have you in our lives.
Thank you for supporting us and
loving us for our entire lives. You are
all without a doubt the reason that
we are the amazing young men and
women that we are today.
Elma is an extraordinary school
and I know that a small part of all of
us will miss it. Just like when we
were in kindergarten, walking into a
new life of memories, we will soon
be walking into a new life of
experience and fun known as high
school. Even though we may be
going in different directions we will
always be known together as Elma’s
graduating class of 2013 and nothing
can ever change that. Our families
are all extremely proud of us. You
cannot imagine the sense of relief
and excitement they are feeling,
so… right now would probably be
the best time to ask for money.
Wherever you move onto in life
from here, always remember that
you can choose your own path, you
can do extraordinary things if
you apply yourself and despite
what anybody else ever says
to you, always, always be
yourself.
‘Beyond The Farm Show’ delights local audience
Ducharme celebrates with fellow Elma graduates
Elma grads honoured
Returning to the farm
In the forefront, Tony Munch, left, and Jamie Robinson, right, portray Westfield’s famous
brothers, Don and Cliff Schultz, as they discuss their equally famous tractor collection with
some musical help from Marion Day, back left, in Beyond The Farm Show, which opened at
the Blyth Festival on Friday night. Rylan Wilkie, back centre and Catherine Fitch, back right,
round out the show’s cast. (Lisa Hood photo)
By Shawn Loughlin
The Citizen
Continued on page 32
Continued from page 22
Award was won by Sam Johnston;
the History Award was won by Erin
McMahon; the Art Award was won
by Josie van Leeuwen; the
Music Award was won by
Parker Ducharme and the Drama
Award was won by Kurtis
Hutchings-Hahn. Honours Awards
were presented to Parker Ducharme,
Alida Swart, Teresa Spek, Aaron
Tollenaar, Will Patterson, Sam
Johnston, Erin McMahon and
Austin Laidlaw.
Laundromat
Blyth Laundromat
191 Westmoreland St., Blyth
519-523-9687