The cast of A Thought in Three Parts: even better naked.

Stripped-down stages
I love going to the theatre. Of course, I usually fall asleep during the play but nothing beats the experience of watching real live actors embarrass themselves in front of a paying (or in my case, comped) audience.

One of the highlights of the 2007 theatre season was Sweeney Todd at the Princess of Wales Theatre. Not merely directed but “reimagined” by British director John Doyle (who won a Tony for his innovation), it’s a stripped-down version, which takes place entirely on one set. Apparently, all this started when Doyle found out that Cameron Macintosh owns the rights to Sweeney’s barber chair, a legendary prop which is attached to a trap door so the demon barber can cut a throat and slide the corpse down to a cellar where his accomplice Mrs. Lovett chops up the bodies and bakes them into pies. Sweeney Todd arose from the dark, damp England of Dickens, Dracula and Jack the Ripper. For it to make sense, the play needs to be violent and gory but this production robs it of its context. Narratively, it barely makes sense. The actors play their own musical instruments, there are no real entrances or exits, the costumes are peculiar and unflattering, and they cast a girl as Pirelli. I hope the upcoming movie version is better or, at very least, gorier.

Virtually the complete opposite of Sweeney was Porn Life, one of those little shows that take place in a rehearsal space with bad seating and practically no lights. None of this mattered as the show was actually good—ambitious, well cast (the girls looked just like porn sluts) and consistently funny and revealing. The play deserves a remount or, better yet, a TV series. It seems to have huge hit potential. But what do I know? “Canadian television hates people like me. I don’t know shit about the Prairies,” said creator Bobby Del Rio, who was more inspired by The Office than by actual porn. I loved this show, even though no one in the cast showed any skin.

One play I saw this year that did show a lot of skin was A Thought in Three Parts by Wallace Shawn, produced by Groundwater Productions for SummerWorks at the Tarragon. When I met actor Wes Berger, he made sure to tell me that the play had extensive full-frontal male nudity, in case I might be offended or something like that. So I rushed right over. It’s a strange short play consisting of three scenes, the middle one about kids in a hostel who fuck a lot. Of course, the sex is faked and the commitment to the role did not include tumescence but it was still a jaw-dropping spectacle to behold. Berger and fellow actors Pierre Simpson, Noa May Dorn, Stephen Gartner and Tanya Smith deserve some sort of merit badge for performing above and beyond the call of duty. So even if I didn’t really understand the show (the thought may have been in three parts but I had no idea what that thought was), nudity always makes theatre more fun.

One cannot expect nudity, however, when the title of the show is Women Fully Clothed. This allfemale Canadian super troupe featuring five of this country’s most famous comedians—Robin Duke (SCTV, SNL), Teresa Pavlinek (The Jane Show), Deb McGrath (Little Mosque), Jane Eastwood (Train 48) and Kathryn Greenwood (Wind at My Back)—are currently touring across Canada following their run at the Elgin. Their show features some very strong skits, including one about older professional women who have young children and volunteer at a day care. It satirizes the rigid rules, the mania, the lack of focus on the kids and the rivalries amongst them. As a skit, it was as dense as flourless chocolate cake and extremely funny. Might be even better if the women weren’t fully clothed.

So the only bad things about theatre this year were my fellow audience members. At a recent show, I was starving and took out an energy bar at intermission. The broad to my left just about freaked, although I wasn’t sure if it was because of allergies or if she just didn’t want me to have any energy. Worse yet, the dame on my right text-messaged nonstop throughout the entire play. Honestly, where is Sweeney Todd when you need him?