At the performance of I, Claudia, I was seated between two young teenagers, one was with a friend, the other with a parent. Their reactions throughout the show were palpable; the chuckles of recognition, the uncomfortable squirms, even the occasional chatter, which was less distracting than it was illuminating. I wouldn’t do that, you know, […]
Neptune Studio Theatre
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Play review: Speaking in Tongues
Australian playwright Andrew Bovell’s Speaking in Tongues begins with much promise. The set, music and lighting design are eerie and evocative, and the opening scene is a beautifully choreographed introduction to the characters and their world. The first half of the play tracks two couples coincidentally cheating with one another, their infidelities trapped in a […]
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Life is in the Small Things
Small Things November 10-11, 7:30pm November 12, 4pm & 8:30pm November 13, 2pm & 7:30pm Neptune Studio Theatre, 1593 Argyle Street $30-$52 Birdy (Heather Rankin) has been hired as Patricia’s housekeeper. Patricia (Jenny Munday) is a retired school teacher, measured and intellectual. Birdy is a ball of energy who will talk about anything just to […]
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It’s not about the serial killer
The scene is England, around 1910. A woman in her late 20s is relaxing in a bath. Suddenly, what should have been a calming evening turns gruesome: Her newlywed husband drowns her, framing it as an accident and inheriting the insurance money. It sounds like fiction, but it’s the true story behind Neptune Theatre’s latest […]
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How Little Charlie became Charles Manson
In the early 1960s, Charles Manson was just a young, petty criminal known as Little Charlie. By the summer of ’69, Manson had become an infamous cult leader responsible for inciting the brutal slayings of nine people. In between, he was incarcerated in the same Washington State prison as Alvin “Creepy” Karpis, a Canadian bank […]
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“The audience is going for a ride”
Mocean Dance has something special in store for this weekend. A trio, a duet and a solo dance are on the lineup for Ordinary Rebels, Mocean’s mainstage show at Neptune’s Studio Theatre. Even the title of the show has a tense energy. “We felt the dichotomy of ‘ordinary’ and ‘rebels’ is a reflection of dance […]
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Final weekend to get this Messenger
It’s no surprise that opening night of Messenger at the Neptune Studio brought out a huge cross-section of Halifax’s theatre greats and political progressives. After all, the play was written by award-winning playwright and former MP Wendy Lill. Her credentials put her in the perfect position to deliver both a beautifully written family drama and […]
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Leaving Wonderland has arrived
Some of the themes in Leaving Wonderland may be ripped from the headlines, but there is nothing sensationalized about Shelley’s Thompson’s heart-touching play. This story of grief and growth is firmly rooted in truths about the complexity of relationships. The story begins with a college professor and successful author named Jane (Geneviève Steele) berating two […]
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Way into OUTeast
It’s a Netflix world, but OUTeast Queer Film Festival producer Andria Wilson suggests ditching the couch for a theatre seat once in awhile, “I was at [Toronto LGBT fest] Inside Out, watching Tab Hunter Confidential,” she says. “I was alone, sitting next to strangers, and on one side of me was this older couple, two […]
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In a HIFF
The Halifax Independent Filmmakers’ Festival has a local focus, but festival director Nelson MacDonald says you’d be wrong to assume that priority is a kind of parochialism. “I feel no obligation to show local films,” says MacDonald. “I show local films because they’re good.” In addition to two programs of local short films, the June […]
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The Cave Painter goes deep
“How could you not want to understand the world?” That question, asked by an aging, questing artist named Dianne, is a central one to The Cave Painter, Don Hannah’s one-woman show about art, religion, love, loss and growing old. The atheist, bohemian Dianne (played by Jenny Munday) is facing life alone after her fundamentalist Christian […]
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Death becomes her
A Good Death To January 18 at 7:30pm (Thu-Sat), 2pm (Sat-Sun) Neptune Studio Theatre, 1593 Argyle Street $25/$20 Kim Parkhill isn’t sleeping so well lately. As both playwright and producer for A Good Death, currently playing at the Neptune Studio Theatre, she’s got a lot on her mind. “I’ve discovered sleeplessness accompanies most of my […]