Finster Finds

Although Christmas is still a month away, this week I felt it creeping closer and closer. Part of that was the switch-over to Christmas music on the radio station my son prefers, and part of it was taking in  Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley   at the Citadel Theatre. For me, it was particularly fun to return to the land of Jane Austen, having immersed myself in the world of the Regency Era as part of my role as Assistant Director of Sense and Sensibility two seasons ago. The show, although lighter and funnier than Pride and Prejudice , has much to recommend itself to Austen aficionados. You will re-meet four of the five Bennet sisters, Mr. Darcy, and Mr. Bingley. For the most part, they are recognizable from the novel, but changes to their lives in the years since allow for new discoveries.  The show centers on the middle sister, Miss Mary Bennet, played with a prickly charm and much wit by Toronto-based Mikaela Davies. Mary is the forgotten middle sister, left to her books an

I'm always a little nervous about Jukebox shows, but Beautiful , currently playing until November 11th with Broadway Across Canada, manages to weave the iconic music of Carole King wonderfully with the first part of her life and career. Sarah Bockel, as King, is terrific. She embodies the sound and look of King without caricature, and manages to convincingly shift through the stages of her life from a 16 year-old aspiring songwriter, to young mother, to the vocal powerhouse who creates and performs Tapestry . Although the entire cast is great, it's Bockel that the audience rose to their feet for. The role is bigger than life, much like King herself. The music is all recognizable, although you may not have been aware that King wrote them (mostly with her ex-husband Gerry Goffin), and the show cleverly creates tension by showing the competition between rival songwriters (and friends) Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil (played with great humour and intelligence by Jacob Heimer and