HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Goderich Signal-Star, 1984-08-01, Page 20PAQE; A. -GQD +'LICIff SIG iALSTAR, WI.,�DNESDAY, AUGUST 1,1
SALTFORD
VALLEY HALL
FOR RENT
CALL 5 2 4.2 4 4 3
Happy 4?
BIRTHDAY
Paul
524-7165 or
524-2544
,t
TAINM NT
Blue City gives accurate depiction of life
BY DARRELL KLOEZE
Layne Coleman, in his latest play now -
being performed at the Blyth Festival, has
written a very accurate depiction of life in
the small town. As inch, Blue City is an
effective new play to be presented at Blyth.
Blue City is a believable piece of theatre,
at least in the situations and characters it
portrays. The circumstances of the play
surround a women's baseball team in a
small town, and its team members. The play
is simply a day in the life of some of the
people who live ill a small town, and
examines some of the characters'
motivations and reactions to life.
The team plays a baseball game during
the course of the play (the action comes off
believably well on stage), and wins;
however,one gets the impression that the
team loses just as often as they win. And
that is a fairly accurate summation of the
lives of the people who live in this small
town, that they win and lose in equal
measure.
But the overall outlook of the play is not
pessimistic. The characters, as all people,
are able to live with their losses and rejoice
in their gains, and this makes their lives
somewhat livable.
The play has no real plot, at least in the
way plot is understood, and it has„ no real
central character. Instead, the audience
meets a number of the people on the
baseball team and in the small town where
the play takes place.
Some of the team members include
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THEATRE REVIEW
iimunimmir
Chicken, played by Peg Christopherson, a
young woman who has fleeting glimpses of
ambition to move to the city, but who is too,
afraid to leave home and whatever false
sense of security she has establlshed. The
security is false, especially to herself,
because we suspect she is capable. of much
more, but settles foreven less than
mediocrity.
Mary Ann Coles plays Barbara Boom, a
married woman who is beginning to regret
the lack of interest her husband shows in
their marriage. The husband, played b
Robert King, would rather go out drinki
with his buddies than make aneffort to
communicate with his wife.
One of the buddies is named Butter,
played enthusiastically by Ron Gabriel.
Butter has probably enjoyed better days as
somewhat of a local character, but now has
turned into an unemployed, futureless
drunk.
He can still .get by on his fading earlier
reputation, however, and is still enjoys some
small level of reverence shown by his peers.
This has to explain why his girlfriend Kim,
played by Jenny Munday, would go out with
him in the first place. But Kim is tiring of
Butter's irresponsibility, and rejects his
drunken proposals of marriage.
HAIR DESIGN
FOR
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EAR PIERCING AVAILABLE
Oreads
gIlp
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OFF
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Fri. Aug. 3 - 9 a.m. - 9 p.m.
Sat. Aug. 4 - 9 a.m. - 3 p.m.
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ITEM SIZES & QUANTITY
LIST
PRICE
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R-800 Replacement Windows
9 18' x 36' Double Hung
5248
5124.
9 36" x 18 Side Slider
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15 Cottage Custom 433/„" x 33'/,"
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Limited quantifies
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Tor further information please call
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DASHW000
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P O. Box 10, Centralia, Ontario NOM 1 KO
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Kim seems like she°might have a chance
to avoid the paralyzing lack of ambition that
plagues the others, but it is clear that peer
pressures and her own uncertainty are
factors which are constantly urging her to
conform. and it is not at all certain that she
can resist these pressures.
Lori Walker, played by Deborah
Kimmett, is an important character in the
play, because something concrete actually
happens to her. The father of her young son
returns to the4own after a 14 -year absence,
and she is forced to deal with that.
She does, to some degree; at least she
confronts the man, played by Wendell
Smith, and tries to settle the pain she has
had to live with for so long. As with most of
the play, the resolution is unclear, but at
least the issue has been confronted.
David Fox gives the best performance as
Lori's father, Bill Walker, who is at the
same time the team's coach and the self-
appointed moral guide- for the community.
His religion is well-meaning and basically
kind, but his ministrations are unheeded by
'the others.
Mr. Walker sets the tone for the whole
play, and strangely it comes at the very end
in the form of a prayer he says out loud on
stage. He prays for happiness and peace,
and in the end that is all that anybody could
ask for. The characters in Blue City seek
their own versions of peace, and the ones
who win are the ones who can honestly
identify what they think can give them what
they want.
But life mainly keeps on going in Blue
City, and eventually nothing much will have
changed. The play itself resolves little. The
audience however is left with the impression
that life in the small town is not as rustically
peaceful as some people make it out to be,
but it is equally not as terrible as others
might imagine.
It is life, just like anywhere else, with its
ups and downs. Your life is what you make it
out to be, and by stressing the good and
learning to live with the bad parts, you can
learn to make your life fulfilling. The people
in Blue City are divided among those who
will never realize that, and those who are
just becoming conscious of the fact that they
do have some level of control in their own
happiness.
Blue City opened
centres on the
after the game, are
at the Blyth Festiykal last week. The play is about small-town living and
lives of the women on a baseball team. Here, in a scene showing what goes on
(left to right) Ron Gabriel, Jenny Munday, and Robert King.
Playhouse production is fascinating
BY DARRELL KLOEZE
Billy Bishop Goes Ta War, now playing at
the Playhouse II at the Huron Country
Playhouse, is a fascinating look at an
unusual subject -the matter of the Canadian
hero.
Canadians have long been characterized
by both their unwillingness to create heroes
and their subsequent lack of heroic figures.
Historical and mythical heroes are an
important part of any country's culture, and
the lack of heroes may be a contributing
factor in an overall lack of identifiable
Canadian culture.
John Gray has gone ,a long way to rectify
both situations, and a couple of years ago
wrote a genuine popular Canadian play with
Eric Peterson about a bona fide Canadian
hero. The subject was Billy Bishop, a World
War I flying ace who held the Allied record
in that war in number of enemy planes shot
down.
The result is an enchanting musical that
tells much about the war and Billy Bishop in
particular, as well as about heroism, and
about Canadians and British in general.
Billy Bishop was originally from Owen
Sound. He had a typically inauspicious
beginning for a Canadian hero -had it not
been for the war, he would undoubtedly have
been expelled from the Royal Military
College where he was a cadet. As it was, the
war came along in the nick of time and, full
of the usual expectations of glory and
adventure, Bishop became an officer in the
army.
Bishop's story would have ended there
had it not been for two thins -his discovery
of airplanes and the relative comfort air
warfare provided compared to trench
warfare; and the interference of an older
British lady who recognized Bishop's
potential for power, beneath his "rude
Canadian exterior."
The story goes on to tell of Bishop's more
successful and lucky war experiences, and
his eventual fame as a flying ace and
international hero,
The play is essentially a two-man show,
and the story unfolds as told by Bishop to a
piano player, ostensibly in a Canadian
Legion Hall, as the program tells us. Bishop,
in remembering the past, plays all the
characters involved, and takes the audience
directly to the scenes as they happened in
his memory.
Hank Stipson as Bishop does an excellent
job of portraying 18 different characters,
some in conversation with each other.
Bishop is of course always the central
character, but Stinson works enough
mannerisms and personality into the others
to give them unique identities of their own.
Stinson must sing as well as act as Billy
Bishop, and his very fine voice is certainly
not a disappointment as he works his way
through the great music John Gray wrote.
The other character is played by Michael
Mulrooney. He is essentially Bishop's
accompanist for his songs, but Gray has
worked him so cunningly into the play that
he must also sing, listen and throw in a few
words of his own. In all these tasks, but
Hank Stinson --is Billy Bishop In the Huron Country Playhouse production of Billy Bishop
Goes To War. At the piano is Michael Mulrooney. The musical plays at the Playhouse II
until this Saturday.
especially in playing piano, Mulrodney
performs very well, and his constant
presence on stage does not detract from
Stinson's performance.
Stinson's portrayal as the Canadian
Bishop, aware of his origins almost as much
as are the British, is very good. The play
offers some choice insights into what it
meant to 'be , a colonial fighting in an
essentially Etiropean war, and what it
meant. and means, to be a Canadian.
For example. Bishop's mentor tells him at
one point, "You°'are behaving like cannon
fodder, perfectly acceptable behavior for a
('anadian." The implication is, in her
British logic, for Bishop to stop behaving
like a Canadian and to start becoming a hero
in the fine British tradition.
Ultimately, Bishop is retired from active
service because his death, as it was
explained to him, would be a tremendous
blow to the colonial enthusiasm in the war
effort. The British, we are to conclude, are
second to none in creating heroes, but it is
not for British to need them.
Bishop himself says, "The British like
their heroes cold and dead, or so it seems."
Perhaps this is why, in spite of the fame
Bishop received as a British -styled hero, he
was to remain a Canadian. 'After losing
some of his youthful enthusiasm for the war,
Bishop sings about his home country in the
song, "Nobody shoots no one in Canada."
"It may not be heaven," he admits, "but
heaven knows we try. 1 wishl-was in Canada
today."
Not bad for a realisation by a Canadian
about his country, and after all, Bishop
wasn't bad as a Canadian himself. If it is not
so easy to inspire pride in Canada, the least
we could do would be to inspire some
appreciation. Gray has done his best in
"Billy Bisshop Goes To War," and after
seeing the fine Playhouse II production, it is
hard to go away not feeling good about being
a Canadian.
CountryFair will have new attractions
The Blyth Festival's third annual Country
Fair will be held at Blyth Memorial Hall
from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, August
11 - just over a week away. And it's going to
be bigger and better than ever before ! !
Favourite stalls from past years include
fruit and vegetables, plants, books,
tomorrow boxes, clothing, Granny's Attic,
and home -baked goods.
Among the new attraction`s' for this year
are the kissing booth (run by members of
t vcaf1. m 1. _a.eal faik jcrlt-eP--
your favourite cake and win a prize), a
mime troupe, a fiddler, and artists to
sketch, or .do a caricature of you and your
family.
Hotdogs, coffee, lemonade and other
refreshments will be available. The Food
Spot will be open for light lunches.
Anyone with items for the Country Fair
( second-hand clothes, furnishings, or books,
home-made goods and fresh produce; etc.)
can drop them off at the box office between 9
a.,11>aa....aur1__8;-30..p.m. on performance days,
and 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on non-performance
days; closed on Sundays: Details for entry
into the Cake -Walk can be obtained by
calling the Blyth Festival at 523-9300 or 523-
9225.
Saturday, August 11 is also the first day of
the Blyth Festival's reunion weekend. A
registration booth will be set up at the
Country Fair and anyone wishing to join in
the festivities can check out what's
happening. We're planning a big party - why
LnotJoin us?_