Upstart company Le Theatre de Boheme is close to a year old now, so they thought they’d celebrate the anniversary with an easy adaptation of 1984.
“1984 doesn’t exactly fall into the mandate of the company,” says director David Connellan, laughing wearily on a break at the Khyber. “We’re more minimalist.” The production features more than a dozen actors (including five children), plus a sound artist, video artist and the requisite behind-the-scenes peeps. “We adapted the script from the novel, and there is a play out there that was written in ’56, but it hasn’t dated very well. So we went with our own adaptation.”
The company launched last summer with Salome, followed by Sartre’s No Exit at the end of 2005. That production incorporated multimedia projections, which Connellan considered a “test” for 1984. For the new play, Ed Beals provides audio while Ariel Nasr supplies video. The multimedia reference “sort of the Fox News kind of thing,” says Connellan. “The constant propaganda, it’s always being fed, it’s always being streamed out.”
There are swears and a bit of nudity, so this production is adults only. 1984 opens April 13 and runs Thursdays through Saturdays until April 29 at the Khyber Centre for the Arts up in the Turret Room. Tickets are $10 and $12, call 425-6427 to get yours.
Neptune news
Neptune Theatre announced its 2007-08 season last week, hoping the audience would be too busy enjoying its free sandwiches to notice the not-so-subliminal subscription advertisments lobbed continuously via speakers and PowerPoint. (Fueled as we were by deli meat, we narrowly avoided the tattoo artists in the lobby inking <\n>SUBSCRIBE NOW onto bypassing apendages.)
The line-up is OK as always—Arthur Miller, Oliver!, a play that is also a movie (opener A Few Good Men) to help nab that elusive Hollywood blockbuster audience—with the two biggest surprises being the November production of This is How it Goes (Neil LaBute!) and the season-closing Beauty and the Beast (which you may remember from 2001, when it was the holiday show. This one has more singing, so it’s different). More to come in five months when it might actually matter to you.
Animated learning
The Atlantic Filmmakers Co-operative has announced a brand-new animation program called Frameworks. Nine filmmakers will be chosen for a six-month workshop. Find applications and more information at afcoop.ca, or drop a line to [email protected] Application deadline is May 5.
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