TRISTAN in the News

WELCOME Faithful Readers!

It's been a good week. TRISTAN is getting ready to take centre stage at the Shaw. We finished Technical rehearsals this past week, and are in good shape leading into our first Preview performance, this Thursday July 12th. The lighting cues are stunningly beautiful, the scenes flow into one another smoothly now, and we have finally added the gorgeous costumes. Best of all, after all these technical rehearsals, we ran the play and it's better than ever. (That is not always the case, as sometimes you "lose the show" for a few days after Technical rehearsals.) We have only two more chances to run the show, and work out any last minute kinks before our first audience. These are exciting times!

Another cool thing happened this week. I was asked to take part in an interview about TRISTAN for the Toronto Star. On Thursday at 11am, Richard Ouzounian (theatre critic and entertainment reporter for The Star) and I spoke by phone for 15 minutes. He also interviewed Glynis Ranney, the show's leading lady, and Jay Turvey and Paul Sportelli, the show's writers. Later in the day, a photographer from The Star came down to take photos of the four of us for the article. It was a fun experience. I've known Richard for a long time, (I premiered "Emily", one of his musicals at The Charlottetown Festival) and thankfully he made the interview fun and easy. I know he has a soft spot for any Canadian Musical, haven written many himself. He wants to see TRISTAN succeed.

Lo and behold, there it was, in Sunday morning's Toronto Star, on the front cover of the Entertainment section, a full-page, full-colour photo of Glynis and I, with Jay and Paul in the background! The article was on page 6, with another large photo of the four of us. Sections of the article appear below:

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Embracing The Music Of Love - Paul Sportelli and Jay Turvey have created a new musical that tells a timeless love story
July 08, 2007 - RICHARD OUZOUNIAN, THEATRE CRITIC

Let the commercial theatre search for the next Jersey Boys or Wicked. Those are all well and good in their own way.

But when one of Canada's largest classical festivals puts its considerable resources to bear toward the creation of a new piece of musical theatre, the odds are that that it's going to be something out of the ordinary. And that's what everybody at the Shaw Festival hopes is going to happen with Tristan, the new show by Paul Sportelli and Jay Turvey that starts previews on Thursday, prior to an opening on July 28.

After all, events like this don't happen very often. You could count the completely original musicals presented over the years by Shaw and Stratford on one hand and still have fingers left to wiggle. So obviously, Tristan is a major investment, not just financially, but artistically and emotionally as well.

It's based on a 1902 short story by Thomas Mann, set in a sanitarium in the German Alps. (***ACTUALLY, in a sanitOrium)

While they are both being treated for tuberculosis, a brooding poet (Spinell) becomes attracted to a happily married woman (Gabrielle) who has sacrificed her great talent as a pianist to serve her family. (***ACTUALLY, my character Spinell is NOT ill)

The two of them become hopelessly entwined, with Gabrielle's playing of the famous aria from Wagner's Tristan and Isolde proving the flash-point for a series of emotional explosions.

It's a work with the depth that you'd expect from Sportelli and Turvey. What drew them to this strange story? They both agreed that the scene where Gabrielle finally plays the piano "leapt off the page" to them as something they had to theatricalize. But what they see underneath that moment is slightly different. "For me it's about reawakening," asserts Turvey, "rediscovery." "While for me," insists Sportelli, "it's about the power of music, the power of art, to change lives."

The two people who are playing the leading roles, Jeff Madden and Glynis Ranney, have been with the show from the first reading in 2003 and their feelings haven't changed. "What struck me immediately," recalls Ranney, "was the power of the music and the great passion that came alive through it. And I continue to be amazed by it four years later." "It's the complexity that appeals to me," finds Madden, "the struggle between what your heart wants and what your brain says is right. The morality of choice."

Sportelli adds, "I enjoy art that can exist on many levels. If I'm just in the mood to be entertained and have someone tell me a story for a couple of hours, fine. But, if into that experience the author can drop some truly serious ideas that's even better. A piece of art should be flexible enough, plastic enough, for that to happen." Turvey's vision is a bit more intense. "I'm hoping we can provide moments of transcendence, flashes of feeling that the audience can recognize and take home with them."

It's obvious these men are playing for higher stakes than normal and it's inspiring that the Shaw Festival has had the courage to stick with them every step of the way. Whether or not Tristan turns out to be the thing of beauty its creators are hoping for still remains to be seen, but in the often heartbreaking battle that constitutes the history of musical theatre in this country, a certain kind of victory has already been won.
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For the full article, copy and paste this link:
http://www.thestar.com/article/233520

Have a great week, folks, and WISH ME LUCK!!!!!

Cheers,

JEFF