HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1989-11-01, Page 23THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1989. PAGE 23.
Entertainment
Theatre review
‘Bordertown Cafe’ still cookin’
BY KEITH ROULSTON
The fact that London’s Grand
Theatre has chosen two plays
premiered at the Blyth Festival as
part of its 1989-90 season gives
local audiences a chance to see how
Festival productions stand up
against those of one of Canada’s
major regional theatres. Off Fri
day s opening of “Bordertown
Cafe at the Grand, Blyth mea
sures up just fine.
Blessed with a strong cast and
directed by one of Canada's top
directors, the Grand’s version of
“Bordertown Cafe’’ is fine enter
tainment but it doesn’t overshadow
the productions that played at
Blyth in 1987 and 1988. The
production does show, however,
how a script can benefit from the
development work that goes on at
the Festival as the rewriting Kelly
Rebar has undertaken since the
play premiered at Blyth in 1987 has
made it a much tighter script.
Bordertown Cafe tells of the
tug-of-war faced by young Jimmy,
the kid living in a family-run cafe
on the Canadian side of nowhere on
the Canadian-U.S. border in wes
tern Canada. His father, a truck
driver who seems to live such an
exciting romantic life compared to
the life of the cafe, has just invited
Jimmy to come and live in the new
house in Wyoming he’s built for his
new wife. Jimmy is torn between
his new life and leaving his mother,
his friends and his hockey.
His mother, Marlene, who marr
ied at 15 but later retreated to her
mother’s cafe to raise her son when
the marriage broke up, is full of
insecurities that her son can really
want to stay with her when he sees
the exciting life offered by her
ex-husband. Yet at the same time,
to try to keep her son’s belief in his
father by covering up for his
undependability on those times
when he had promised to come to
visit his son but never did.
Adding interest to the story is
Maxine, Marlene’s boistrous
American mother who makes it
plain everything is better south of
the border, until, that is, she finds
out she may lose her favourite
grandson and then tries to per
suade him that the U.S. is not a fit
place to live. Countering her outgo
ing personality is that of her
husband Jim, a taciturn Canadian
farmer who manages to say with
few words as much as she does
with her constant chatter.
When Janet Wright as Maxine
and Lewis Gordon as Jim are on
stage, the Grand’s production
zings along, filled with plenty of
humour, but also with undertones
of a couple who’ve been together
40 years and manage to still stick it
out even if they have their dis
agreements. Wright is about as
perfect for the part of Maxine as
you can imagine. She has a solid
presence on the stage that let’s
Maxine natter on without ever
seeming to be a scatter-brain.
With his classical background at
Stratford and elsewhere, it's hard
at first to picture Lewis Gordon as a
hands-in-the-dirt prairies farmer
but he pulls off the role of Jim with
a quiet dignity that makes him a
loveable character.
Unfortunately, Kelly Rebar has
done her best writing for these two
supposedly secondary characters.
For Jimmy and Marlene, she has
created essentially one-note char
acters who end up spending the
second act saying basically the
same things they said in the first
act. Without a chance to change
and grow, Jimmy and Marlene they
Eric Woolfe as Jimmy and Karen Woolridge as his mother
Marlene appear in the Grand Theatre’s production of
“BordertownCafe’’whichopened Fridaynight in London. The
play was originally produced at the Blyth Festival in 1987.
leave their actors with the handicap
of seeming to whine on and on.
Karen Woolridge puts lots of
nervous energy into the insecure
Marlene but there’s only so much
that can be done with the part. Eric
Woolfe, a young London actor,
manages to make the audience like
his Jimmy even if at times he
seems to let enthusiasm take over
when subtler acting might achieve
more.
Martha Henry, the Grand’s artis
tic director, directs the cast with a
sure hand. The set design by
Phillip Silver is functional, but not
spectacular (but then how specta
cular can a little diner on the
prairies be?) When Maxine starts
cooking breakfast on a real stove,
however, and the smell of bacon
starts wafting through the theatre,
the realism is almost enough to
send the audience out looking for a
real restaurant ready to serve a
meal.
Bordertown Cafe is a solid
opening production for the Grand’s
season and well worth seeing but
for Huron county residents, it also
proves that our own Blyth Festival
can rank with a major regional
theatre in putting on a good show.
PIZZA PIZZA PIZZA
THURS., FRI., SAT.
5P.M.-12A.M.
BLYTH INN
EAT IN OR TAKE OUT
523-9381
50lft 'WedrfMty
Nov. 5th/89
GOTCH YA!
TheFamilyof
Tom and Genevieve Allen
invite you to an
OPENHOUSE
at
Londesboro United Church
SATURDAY,
NOVEMBER11,1989
1:30-4:30p.m.
tocelebrate their
50th Wedding Anniversary
Your presence is their gift
for
Doug Craig and
Joyce Hettinger
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER4
Auburn Community Centre
9-1
Starting Monday, Dec. 18th
Extended Christmas Hours
GIRLS NIGHT OUT!
Join us in song or....
just listen
4-part Harmony
Barber Shop Style Singing
BRUSSELS UNITED
CHURCH
TUES., NOV. 7& 14
8P.M. NOCHARGE
Bonnie Gropp 887-6353
Sue Wilson 887-6072
MAPLETONE CHORUS
'WeMcety
/Ivtttcue'i bast cf
ALEX AND JEAN
NETHERY
BLYTH FESTIVAL
LB
xr
Dance to be held in
their honour given by
Saturday, Nov. 4th- 2pm
BLYTH MEMORIAL HALL
CHILDREN’S
SERIES presents X’
ROBERT
MINDEN
ENSEMBLE
Story-telling
Music
Makers
their children on
Friday, November 3,1989 at
9p.m.
at the Brussels, Morrisand
Grey Community Centre
Best Wishes Only Please!
In honour of their parent’s
50th Wedding Anniversary,
the children of Evelyn and
Glen Bray would like toextend
an invitation to family, friends
and neighbours to an open
house on Sunday, November
12,1989from2:00p.m. to4:00
p.m. at the Brussels Legion
Brussels, Ont.
Best wishes only please.
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