PTE marks 40th with trio of premières

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This article was published 16/03/2012 (5311 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Prairie Theatre Exchange will celebrate its 40th season with a trio of premières including the latest from the country’s most sought after young dramatist, Hannah Moscovitch, who will explore Canadians at war in Afghanistan.

The Portage Place-based company raises the curtain on its 2012-13 season next October with Ellen Peterson’s new piece called The Brink. Moscovitch’s This is War opens Feb. 21 ahead of The Swearing Jar, a fringe festival hit that has been expanded into two acts that PTE patrons will be the first to see in April 2013.

“It’s an all-Canadian season,” PTE artistic director Robert Metcalfe says. “It speaks to what PTE has always been about. It’s a season that will articulate the values and mandate and place that PTE has in this community.”

PTE’s 140th premiere will kick off its 40th playbill. It used to be called Tokyo but was retitled due to a shift in the content of the drama.

Peterson, who is a member of PTE’s Playwright Unit, focuses on several brinks in a play that is set in 1969 at the time of the moon launch and features a woman who went over the Niagara Falls in a barrel, a deserter from the United States army, a family print shop facing bankruptcy and a young woman who can’t make a leap of faith. Metcalfe will direct.

The programming of a new Moscovitch is a coup for PTE as Toronto playwright has been inundated with commissions from theatres all over the continent since breaking through with Essay and The Russian Play (produced by WJT in 2008) and her first full-length drama East of Berlin (RMTC Warehouse in 2009).

Metcalfe has been looking for plays that speak to the fact that Canada has been at war for many years yet has seen little on Canadian stages to reflect it. This is War, which will be directed by Tarragon Theatre’s artistic director Richard Rose, explores the Afghanistan conflict through the investigation of an incident involving four Canadian soldiers.

“Nobody has been talking what it means to be at war, what it does to the psychology of a nation,” says Metcalfe, who took a break from rehearsals of PTE’s season-closing comedy Till It Hurts to host yesterday’s announcement of its 2012-13 season. “We were kind of ignoring it. I think it is the role of the artist to talk about it.”

In between The Brink and This is War PTE is presenting Gunmetal Blues, a chamber musical that celebrates of film noir archetypes of the ’40s. Metcalfe will admit he was looking for a way to celebrate the organization’s entry into its 40s and thought of Gunmetal Blues, which the RMTC Warehouse presented in 1993.

In the January slot is The Dishwashers by well-known Canadian playwright Morris Panych (Girl in a Goldfish Bowl and Vigil).

“It’s the story of a guy (a high roller) who used to eat in the restaurant upstairs and now is working in the dishpit downstairs,” says Metcalfe. “That certainly speaks to our times.”

The season wraps with The Swearing Jar, the story of a married couple who want to staunch a cursing habit by the time their first baby is born.

“It takes you on a trip full of surprises,” Metcalfe says. “It’s a gentle way to end the season.”

The season also includes its annual dose of Munsch madness. The next instalment is Magical Mystery Munsch (Dec. 21-Jan.6), named by Metcalfe’s daughter Maddy. Apparently it is a family tradition for father and his teenage daughter to riff on possible Munsch titles during a car trip. She was also responsible for coming up with this year’s The Three Munschketeers.

kevin.prokosh@freepress.mb.ca

PRAIRIE THEATRE EXCHANGE 2012-13 SEASON

The Brink — Oct. 11-28

Gunmetal Blues — Nov. 15-Dec. 2

The Dishwashers — Jan. 24-Feb. 10

This is War — Feb. 21-March 10

The Swearing Jar — April 4-21

Magical Mystery Munsch — Dec. 21-Jan. 6