Theatre BC Greater Vancouver Zone Festival committee chair Val Dearden doesn’t simply want the festival to be a success this year – she wants it to become a point of pride and a focus for regional community theatre supporters for years to come.
“I have a strong vision that this festival is going to grow into something unique in the Lower Mainland,” said Dearden, a Peninsula resident well known for acting in, and producing, shows at Vancouver’s Metro Theatre.
Reaching such pre-eminence will take a few years to accomplish, she acknowledges.
It’s a known fact that community theatre ventures tend to go through cycles of renewal and decline as enthusiasts become subject to the natural ebbs and flows of life. But that shouldn’t prevent aiming for excellence in the present, she noted, or encouraging young and small companies to get involved in the festival.
“We want to become the venue, when people think of really great theatre,” she said.
The committee’s hard work this past year seems to be paying dividends with the upcoming festival, set for April 28 to May 4 at the White Rock Players Club’s home base, the Coast Capital Playhouse (1530 Johnston Rd.).
Ticket purchasers have a wide variety of quality shows to choose from during the week-long event – and some outstanding savings on festival passes for all of the shows.
Adding to the excitement and potential for surprise inherent in the event, the shows – representing the best work of participating groups – are in competition to be chosen zone winner by this year’s adjudicator, Fran Gebhard, whose public summations of each night’s performances will be heard following the shows.
Winners from all the zones will then travel to the Theatre BC provincial finals, Destination Mainstage, held in early July in Kamloops.
This year’s Greater Vancouver Zone shows offer everything from an edgy musical to classic and contemporary comedy and suspense, with nightly performances at 8 p.m.
First up, this Sunday, will be an encore performance of White Rock Players Club’s entry, the Neil Simon comedy Fools, about a young schoolmaster’s encounter with a village-ful of idiots in pre-revolutionary Russia.
On Monday, April 29, Vancouver’s Maniac Productions presents two new and original one-act plays – Jeff Hoffman’s comedy Public Washrooms, and Karin Atkinson’s Dating Sim.
“Jeff and Karin are a couple who have just moved from Alberta,” Dearden noted. “Both shows are basically two-actor short pieces, with Jeff and Karin alternating as actors/playwrights and directors.”
Dearden noted that both plays come with a warning of mature content.
“I think it’s mainly language, but there is also partial nudity,” she said.
“We don’t have a problem with that, but we didn’t want audiences to be taken by surprise, either.”
Next up, on April 30, is Stephen Dolginoff’s dramatic and unconventional musical Thrill Me – based on real life 1920s thrill-killers Leopold and Loeb – from Vancouver’s Fighting Chance Productions.
Dearden notes that the director, Ryan Mooney, is also new artistic director for the White Rock Players Club and director of the club’s entry Fools.
Does that mean he’s competing against himself?
Not really, Dearden said, although it does highlight the versatility that has helped make Mooney a force on the Vancouver theatre scene.
“They’re two totally different genres and approaches,” she said, agreeing that the dark and challenging Thrill Me is about as far away from a traditional musical of The King and I era as you can get.
But tradition is not neglected in the festival.
On May 1, Theatre in the Country will present the classic Brandon Thomas farce Charley’s Aunt (“in three acts, just as God wrote it,” said Dearden). She added that the central appeal of farce – of seeing someone “dig himself into a hole and then try to dig himself out of it” – is just as strong for audiences now as it was when the play was first presented in 1892.
DSR Productions version of the radio play Sorry Wrong Number, originally broadcast as an episode in the 1940s series Suspense, will also return the frequently-filmed material to a one-actor, one-act format, starring well-known actress Tanja Dixon-Warren as Mrs. Stevenson.
For extra entertainment value, the balance of that evening will be filled out with a demonstration of Latin dance by champion ballroom dancers and JC Dance principals Joel Marasigan and Clara Shih-Marasigan.
Concluding play, May 3, is Vagabond Players’ production of Canadian playwright Michel Tremblay’s For The Pleasure of Seeing Her Again, based on memories of his mother’s irreverent tales of family and friends.
Featured in the key role of Nana will be Nancy Ebert, last seen on the White Rock stage as the Mother Superior in Peninsula Productions production of Agnes of God.
Final night, May 4, is the gala and awards ceremony, emceed by Mike Busswood, which will also include entertainment from Fighting Chance Productions (A Taste of Broadway) and The Comedy Company (Nuts In May, The Full Mountie).
For ticket info, including savings through week-long pass and student pass options, call 604-536-7535.
