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Poster of Coffeehouse Theatre's "The Underpants"
As an emerging artist who once put everything I had into making a grassroots theatre company work, I was delighted to be part of the the audience for Coffeehouse Theatre‘s inaugural Toronto production of “The Underpants”. It is a humourous play adapted by Steve Martin from the original “Die Hose” by Carl Sternheim. The play follows the maelstrom of events that occurs in the household of a woman after her underpants unexpectedly fall down during the King’s parade. What at way for Coffeehouse to start in Toronto! Founded by Evan Harkai in Montreal, he did the courageous act of packing up his project and moving it to Toronto in order to explore the arts scene. It is an extremely bold move when one has existing networks and support.
I think the phenomena of “breaking out” is always on the mind of emerging artists and collectives. We either seek to strengthen our ties with our own communities, and improve the local arts (eg. MT Space), or we are eager to leave to take on the world. It is an extremely important and usually risky choice that defines out artistic futures. Evan has the vision of “national” theatre company, refusing to restrict himself to the various places he’s traveled within Canada to experience and create art. I stand for that. Canada is the only country, as far I know, to have provincially divided stands at World Trade Shows. While local pride is important, it looks embarrassing in the face of other countries. Evan’s broad idea may appear too large for a small company, but all plants have to start somewhere, and he offers unification of theatre presentation in a nation.
Coffeehouse Theatre‘s mission is as follows:
Coffeehouse Theatre aims to continue to work with emerging theatre artists both on stage and off, engaging new audiences with contemporary works that not only entertain, but inspire creativity and an enthusiasm for the arts.
Created by emerging artists for the inclusion of emerging artists, I think these companies are vital for the opportunities of young professionals to begin in the industry. It is a known fact that entering the professional industry after education is an extremely difficult task. Collectives of emerging artists and theatre companies are the perfect way to work in a safer environment and showcase their talent on a professional level . Given first hand experience at how skeptical I find arts funding to be towards these companies, I certainly believe that taking the risk to support them is absolutely essential.
Evan also has a strong concept for the choices of his work. He wants to address socio-political issues normally not touched by the general public. By doing so in a gentler, comedic way, he hopes to “entertain, impact and most of all inspire audiences in a positive, creative and hopeful way.”
There is often a vitality that I see with projects that involve emerging actors, and “The Underpants” by Coffeehouse is no different. There is more at stake, more fear, more raw energy, more nerves, more excitement that I find very beautiful. I certainly felt like the actors were playing, and there’s a great energy in that. Diamonds in the rough are the prettiest when placed in the perfect setting.
Obviously, things need to be ironed out. The venue posed some small logistical issues such as the single bathroom being located behind the wings, and program lacking details about the play itself and the playwright. Criticism shouldn’t really be made, however. It’s not as easy at it looks to prepare a production with low staff numbers. Stage manager Ada Tsang spoke about the tight budget and timeline, and how hard everyone worked to get everything done with extended hours and hard sweat. Evan should be very proud of his team.
Congratulations to Coffeehouse Theatre for your first production, and I wish it all the best in its run.
“The Underpants” continues to run on September 22, 23 and 24 at 8pm | September 24 at 2pm in Red Sandcastle Theatre (922 Queen Street East). Box Office 416 845 9411. Adults $18 | Students $15
I normally try to keep my blog posts to informative things that people enjoy reading other than my own ramblings, but I suppose sometimes my ramblings are interesting as well. Also, sometimes writing my thoughts helps me place them in perspective.
When I first started my career as an actor, I had two very specific goals in mind:
1. Become a very successful voice actor.
2. Become a successful film actor.
And then I proceeded to be sucked into the fantastic world of theatre and all that it had to offer during my university years. As a professional actor, I have performed in theatre for the past 5 years. I have explored a diverse range of theatre that would make many envious, and have had the honour of connecting with some of Canada’s best in the industry.
Now, I am starting over again, back at the bottom. Perhaps the bottom is not the best to describe it, since I don’t believe there is ever a “bottom” opportunity. I merely feel at the bottom because it isn’t easy anymore. I know very little about breaking into the film industry, and I think that it’s also partially because the industry is more walled in than that of the theatre industry. In my opinion at least. Perhaps I just haven’t knocked on the right door.
I think the more pressing issue (as with most artists) is the financial one. While I had been doing almost all exclusively paid theatre work, my current work in film is all non-paid. Do not get me wrong. I love the projects, but it certainly takes a toll on my living.
Regardless, I shall remain optimistic. Agent packages are being sent out, and I actively seek work everyday. I believe that to succeed in this industry is 90% hard work, and 10% talent. I was the gawky, awkward engineer turned actor that no one really thought would make it. I made it in theatre. Now, I shall make it in film and voiceover.
Thanks for reading my plethora of run on sentences and musings.
I think the amount of times I apologize at the beginning of a post is going to become a tad excessive. I wish I could blog on a more regular basis, except I always want to structure the posts correctly, and that takes time. And I never seem to have time. Hopefully, in the next little while, while I have a lull in my work, I can put some posts up of things I’ve wanted to update about (including but not limited to Iceland, FanExpo 2011, Acting Life).
But I figured being caught in a tornado merits a bit of attention.
Perhaps to some people, living with tornadoes is old hat. But only recently in Southern Ontario that we seem to have witnessed a growing number of these buggers. Yesterday, my best friend and I were venturing through the St. Jacob’s Farmers’ Market, when we saw the sky go black. We figured that it would be best to go back to the car instead of checking out the next building. This turned out to be a silly mistake since it started raining. Hiding under a vendor’s tent (in my defense I did buy his corn) seemed to be the logical option until what we thought was a flash shower passed, except that it didn’t stop. It got harder.
Suddenly, torrents of water was everywhere, and the wind picked up substantially. We found ourselves aiding vendors hold down their tents as boxes, fruit and other random things blew down the road. Then the rain started blowing sideways, and it hurt. I remember looking around and crying out, “Holy crap! Is that hail?!” and then bracing myself as the wind went wild. As one tent blew away, we were told to abandon our efforts and take shelter in the trailer. For a few moments, all we saw was grey. It was pretty frightful, watching everything get taken apart by wind and heavy rain, but my adrenaline was jack high. In fact, I even whipped out my cell phone to record the event. I felt a bit sheepish while doing that, considering it’s the very thing we always yell at characters in movies when they do it in the middle of a disaster: “You idiot! Why are you taking photos of the giant monster alien that is about to eat you?!”
Clearly, I am that foolish movie character.
When I discovered that an F3 tornado had ripped through Heidelberg (near St. Jacob’s), my perspective did change a bit. I was pretty lucky to be on the edge, and not on the middle of it. The other part of me was also thinking, “So, another thing to cross off my list of things to experience while being alive: be outside during a tornado.”
I am a risk taker. I am adventurous and want to experience everything. It is this mindset that keeps me working in the unstable career as an artist, keeps me traveling and hiking the world, and gives me great stories to tell from adventures gone awry. But I am becoming aware that my boundaries are becoming smaller, and that I am doing scarier things as I survive more adventures. It’s only going to be a matter of time before I lose the fight. Can you imagine what would happen if I tried to chase down a tornado at full blast? It’s pretty wrong when you get cut deeply by a shard of glass (this happened very recently, and I have never been cut by glass before) and the firs thing I thought was, “Huh! Now I can say I’ve been cut by glass!” Sometimes, it’s better to reassess the frailty of our lives, and recognize that we are not invincible, no matter how many mountains we conquer. That way, we will certainly live long enough and stay healthy enough to continue witnessing all the amazing things that life has to offer.
And the Farmer’s Market? No one was hurt as far as I know. Farmers sadly lost produce and tents were damaged. Signs held up by concrete were blown over, and the beloved “Welcome to St. Jacob’s Market” was flattened.
Additional Notes: Today (September 5, 2011), it has been confirmed by weather experts that the event was not a tornado but more like a huge storm with winds up to 100km. There were 5 reported injuries to people. Many of us are still calling it a mini tornado however, since the symptoms of the weather were very similar, and it wreaked a huge amount of damage. Many hydro lines were downed and roofs taken off barns. I have attached a few links to news reports for additional details.
