From a black comedy to a time-travelling fantasy, a tantalizing preview of Central Alberta Theatre’s new season will be offered on Friday.
Red Deer area theatre-goers are invited to drop in at 7 p.m. for a free taste of four new plays that will be shown in 2023-24. The CATena cabaret starts at 7 p.m. on Friday at the Memorial Centre, but doors open at 6 p.m. Tours of CAT Studios will also be available.
Suzanne Hermary, the group’s vice-president of productions, said staged scenes and readings will be performed from the upcoming plays, which are “lovely and amazing.” The scripts offer plenty of laughs, she added — as well as new opportunities for local actors and production volunteers to stretch their skills.
The season opens on Oct. 27 with The Memory of Water, an award-winning black comedy by British playwright Shelagh Stephenson.
Directed by CAT veteran Cynthia Edwards, the show that will run until Nov. 4 at Nickle Studio (upstairs at the Memorial Centre) is about three sisters who come together at their mother’s passing to reassess their lives and relationships. Described as “a raucous dramedy about family and the human journey,” the original 1998 production won the 2000 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Comedy.
From Dec. 1 to 16, CAT will present The Charitable Sisterhood Christmas Spectacular, by U.S. playwright Bo Wilson.
This comedy set in 1977 allows an audience entry to onstage and back-stage action as several churches collaborate on a Christmas variety show — only to ignite much finger-pointing among congregants after the baby Jesus figure goes missing from a nativity scene.
The play will run for three weekends. Like other plays staged at Festival Hall, it will be offered as dinner theatre, or theatre-only performances. Hermary, the show’s director, hopes local businesses will think of supporting CAT by holding their Christmas staff gatherings at a performance of The Charitable Sisterhood.
The first production of the New Year will be The Gentleman Clothier, by Norm Foster, running from Feb. 9 to 17 at Festival Hall. Directed by Aaron Vanderweg, this comedy shows what happens when somebody who’s convinced he’s born in the wrong century, gets to actually experience life in a long-gone era: “A nostalgic comedy where modern sensibilities and Victorian England ideals go head-to-head amid time-traveling, illicit romance, and high fashion.”
The last play of the season, The Birds and The Bees, is written by Canadian playwright Mark Crawford, whose Stag and Doe went over so well with CAT audiences last spring. This contemporary comedy directed by Tanya Ryga, which runs March 9-16 in Festival Hall, has a complicated mother-daughter-plot-line, involving both failed and new relationships — and bees. It is summed up as “a knee-slapping, rip-roaring comedy about sex and climate change.”
Hermary said CAT is looking at staging a fifth production in the Nickle Studio in January, outside of its regular season — another Norm Foster comedy, On a First Name Basis, directed by Erna Soderberg.
Hermary hopes CATena will draw local people who have been interested in learning more about theatre production, including lighting and set design — both high-need areas for local theatre companies. CAT is planning to bring in experts to teach some skill-building workshops.