A new line-up of plays and much more were revealed at Centaur Theatre’s 49th season launch this afternoon. Outgoing Artistic and Executive Director, Roy Surette, introduced his successor Shaw Festival’s Associate Director, Eda Holmes, at the well-attended gathering of media and theatre practitioners in the Ted T. Katz Family Trust Gallery in the midst of this season biggest snow storm.
“As I hand Centaur over to the wonderfully talented Eda Holmes,” said Roy Surette, “I’m reminded of how hands connect us, point us in new directions, welcome strangers and wave farewell. I move back to the West Coast in June, eager to return to my family and friends but sad to leave this dynamic city and its generous community of talented artists. It has been a marvellous ten years but I guarantee Centaur audiences that they are in for exciting times with Eda.”
Ms. Holmes hits the ground running as of August, heading the season leading up to Centaur’s 50th anniversary in 2019. In addition to that milestone, as of January 2018, major expansion renovations begin in Centaur Two, rendering Centaur One as the sole performance space for the latter half of the season. Ms. Holmes remarked that, “Roy’s passionate humanity has served Centaur so beautifully. I can’t wait to meet all of you on both sides of the footlights. We have lots to talk about as we look toward the next fifty years of great theatre at Centaur.”
The season opens with Shaun Smyth in an exhilarating, tour-de-force performance as hockey great, Theo Fleury, in Playing with Fire, followed by the hilarious spoof on Alfred Hitchcock’s spy thriller, The 39 Steps, featuring four actors enacting more than 100 roles. In the New Year, Centaur presents two new plays from Canadian children of immigrants: The Baklawa Recipe by Pascale Rafie is a touching story of two Lebanese women and their Canadian daughters caught between traditional and contemporary values, and Successions, by Michaela Di Cesare, a budding new voice from the Italian community whose latest script explores the rewards and complexities of family legacy. Sandwiched between them is The Daisy Theatre from renowned Canadian artist, Ronnie Burkett, and a cast of forty audacious and endearing puppets in an evening of spontaneous cabaret humour and song. The season ends with an encore presentation of Michel Tremblay’s seminal play, Hosanna, the first professional English production in M. Tremblay’s home town, produced by Tableau D’Hôte Theatre, and a quadruple winner at the 2015 Montreal English Theatre Awards.
Centaur’s popular ancillary events return, with Urban Tales and the Wildside Festival entering their second and third decades respectively. The Saturday Morning Children’s Series fosters a love of theatre in the younger generation while the free Sunday Chat-Ups and Talk-Backs continue to enrich the theatre-going experience for all.
