A Leave of Absinthe
by The Asinthe Collective
Paris. 1888. Five o’clock. Rotten day. Lousy weather. Ugly people. Waiter! An absinthe! Day improving. Clouds interesting. Girls prettier. Waiter, another! Day not bad. Clouds miraculous. Girls, so pretty. Waiter, a third! Beautiful girls. I love them all. Why won’t they come here? I will write a poem–a poem so perfect, it will save mankind. But first, another absinthe!
mutatis mutandis
Ottawa ON
Venue 5- Arts Court Theatre
Comedy Multimedia
Mature
| Date | Time | Buy Tickets |
| Sunday June 22 | 21:30 | |
|---|---|---|
| Monday June 23 | 23:00 | |
| Tuesday June 24 | 19:30 | |
| Thursday June 26 | 18:00 | |
| Saturday June 28 | 14:30 | |
| Sunday June 29 | 18:30 |
The Ottawa Fringe Festival » Interview with the Absinthe Collective
June 20th, 2008[...] A Leave of Absinthe plays from June 22-29 in the Arts Court Theatre. [...]
Joe Fox
June 23rd, 2008The beginnings of a very good show are here, but it doesn’t quite come together. There are great performances all around but the direction and presentation need some more thought and work. I kinda wanted to see a better depiction of the era in which the show was set, and more interaction BETWEEN the characters. And why project words on a screen if you’re just going to read them? Isn’t that breaking the first rule of “effective presentations”?
Brian M. Carroll
June 23rd, 2008Every year it amazes me that theatre companies put all this creative energy into what’s on stage, without putting similar creativity into getting bums in seats. Mutatis Mutandis has been just as guilty as any.
Till now!
David Whiteley (Mutatis Mutandis) and the Absinthe Collective (Richard Gélinas, David Hersh, Teri Rata Loretto, and Margo MacDonald) clearly decided to pull out all the stops on advertising “A Leave of Absinthe”.
Let’s start with the title. The word Absinthe alone implies sex, debauchery, danger. It practically flashes in bright green neon just sitting on the page. Turn the word into the pun and you get implications of playfulness, escape, and holiday. Brilliant.
Next, put Margo MacDonald in tails and a low-cut top, get a good photographer, have local arts publicist, Jessica Ruano, submit an article to Ottawa XPress (a local gay and lesbian newspaper) and get them to splash her picture on one of their pages.
Be still my beating heart!
This is no accident. In last year’s Mutatis Mutandis production of “What Goes Around”, Margo MacDonald and Emmanuelle Zeesman’s scene together almost melted the stage. Combine that memory with Margo’s sultry smile and hints of Marlene Dietrich (in tails in her 1931 American debut in “Morocco”) and you’ll have women and men coming…
to the show in droves. Opening night was a sellout. It was all hands on deck to add another row of seats to handle the demand.
(Here’s a fundraising hint to David Whiteley, gratis. There’s no credit for wardrobe in the program. Get Margo’s tailor to BUY a full page ad and insert it into the program. It’ll be worth every penny!)
But there’s more.
The same issue of Ottawa XPress had a vaguely homoerotic picture of David Hersh and Richard Gélinas on the front page, above the fold. So add gay men to the lesbians and the straights in the audience.
Now check out the poster with the picture of a buxom, hourglass-figured French woman in a green strapless from a period Absinthe ad. Tell me it didn’t grab your eyeballs as you passed!
Add the clever plays on words in both official languages. “70% MATURE CONTENT BY VOL.” (in full caps of course). “Distillée par”. “Ingrédients”. And my particular favourite: replacing “Mise en scène” with “Mise en bouteille par” for director David Whiteley. So the message becomes: not only is the show sexy as hell, but it’s also witty and intelligent.
Now that’s creative!
And isn’t creativity what theatre is about!
Did I mention that opening night sold out? Get your tickets early (in the run and in the day of the performance). Consider buying advance tickets.
Other theatre companies take note.
One of the things I love about the Fringe is how few rules there are. (In spite of some people trying to define what is or isn’t “Fringe”.) You win a slot in the Fringe lottery or find a BYOV and you get to put on pretty much whatever you please. And then let the audience decide for themselves. You pays your money and you takes your chances (performers and audience alike).
There’s some pretty powerful stuff in this green bottle.
The casting is bloody brilliant.
Let’s start with David Hersh (if only because the play does). As Absinthe bar owner and entrepeneur Salis, Hersh projects a magnetism that draws the other characters into the alternative reality he creates in his salon of a bar. His verbal seduction of a tourist from Canada (she’s represented by a doll) into the rites of Absinthe is an object lesson in the psychology of persuasion. It’s also a chance for David Whiteley to inject the kind of playfulness with words that he brought to his recent brilliant translation of “Tartuffe”. This is the most seductive performance I’ve seen Hersh give.
I’ve ignored Teri Rata Loretto till now, so let me remedy that. As Charlotte the barmaid, Loretto heats up the show by showing off her cleavage in a bustier and flashing her “Parisian ass” in tights. Charlotte clearly knows how to increase her tips (from both men and women). And it’s a treat to see Loretto move around the stage in Emmanuelle Zeesman’s choreography. Charlotte adds to Salis’s Absinthe salon atmosphere by adding to his exposition of the attractions of Absinthe. At the same time, she tries (not always successfully) to keep his excesses in check, lest he overdo it and scare off the customers (and her tips).
Richard Gélinas has a tough role as Allais, writer and artist, with a penurious lust for Absinthe. Salis and Absinthe draw him back night after night to escape his failures: to win the approval of publishers, to sell his paintings, to attract women, to win the respect of men. He’s the butt of jokes in this bar, yet he also finds the acceptance that he lacks elsewhere. It takes a talented actor to keep our attention on such a character.
Back to Margo MacDonald as Suzanne, on the prowl for fresh female flesh. It’s a good thing that Loretto and Hersh project such strong magnetism, or MacDonald would unbalance the production with her sophisticated sexual presence. Director Whiteley walks a fine line between holding her in check so the other players have more room to strut their stuff, and letting her off her leash to burn up the stage. Perhaps a little longer leash would be appropriate. The interplay between the longing Allais and the disdainful Suzanne adds sparks to the tension on stage.
Warning: the suspension of disbelief in the main characters is very strong. Please remember when you meet the actors on the street: they are NOT the characters they play on the stage. We don’t want any arrests or restraining orders, now do we? We are Canadians after all!
Whiteley and the Collective want to explore the facts and myths surrounding this powerful drink and the notorious impact it had (or supposedly had) on French society. (I’m reminded of Hogarth and his visual explorations of the impact of cheap Dutch gin on British society.) To do so, they impose another 10 characters on the 4 actors on stage. These include Rimbaud, Verlaine, Oscar Wilde (with 2 actors) and a host of others.
And here it becomes obvious (as stated in the director’s notes) that this is a work in progress. The Fringe allows artists to take chances and that’s what’s happening here. It’s cheap for them to take risks, and it’s cheap for us the audience to participate in those risks (especially with discounts like 2-for-1 shows, 5 or 10 passes, and volunteer comps).
For me, usually it worked. Even though both Hersh and MacDonald portrayed Oscar Wilde, that character’s transitions were clear to me. (The electronic version of Bertolt Brecht’s on-stage signs helped here.) Similarly Gélinas makes a fine pompous French politician of the period, denouncing the debauchery of Absinthe culture. I had no trouble with Loretto as the mythical representation of Absinthe as “The Green Fairy”. A lightning costume change distinguished MacDonald as the abolitionist. (Where did that skirt and shawl come from? Or disappear to?)
But I had trouble with other transitions. Was the hydrotherapy patient Allais? Are Suzanne and “the scandalous woman” the same or different? And when was Hersh Verlaine? Or the murderer?
Were this play fleshed out to 90 minutes there would be more time to smooth out these rough edges. I hope Whiteley and the Absinthe Collective can take our few dollars and do so.
All in all an exciting piece of theatre.
And a worthy though unfinished experiment.
Well worth an hour of your life and the few measly dollars charged.
Get your tickets early!
Fiona Currie
June 23rd, 2008Many thanks to the huge crowd who made it out to opening night in Ottawa! It’s never a bad sign when you have to bring out more chairs.
Unlike Brian Carroll’s review, Alvina Ruprect was very brief on CBC Radio this morning (due to her having to fit in reviews of 10 fringe shows), but called the show “very exciting”.
In answer to Brian’s musings: yes, this Fringe version of A Leave of Absinthe was planned as a precursor to a full-length production — a proof of concept if you will, so stay tuned. :)
If you’re still not sure if it’s worth a punch-hole on your Fringe pass, here’s a review from the Montreal Fringe: http://www.indyish.com/fringe-reviews-mmm-lard-absinthe.
Jessica Ruano
June 23rd, 2008Just a small correction to Brian’s commentary: my article was published in the Capital Xtra, Ottawa’s gay and lesbian newspaper. I often freelance for them, and I no longer write for the Ottawa XPress.
But thanks for the mention, Brian!
Sounds like a wonderful show. Wish I could be there.
Tara
June 24th, 2008I had the pleasure of seeing this absolutely amazing show on opening night. The opening monologue alone is worth the price of admission! Words cannot begin to express how much I enjoyed this production. All the actors put in such wonderful performances. I was hooked from the first line all the way through to the closing scene… So much so that I did not want it to end! Congratulations David Whiteley and the Absinthe Collective and thank you for taking us along for the ride!
Katoo
June 24th, 2008LOTS of fun, very trippy. They were already full on opening night, and with good reason: what an entertaining way to spend an evening!
Comprometteur
June 25th, 2008A wonderful show that is well worth seeing. Kudos to the entire production team. I left the theatre with a very strong hankering for absinthe…anyone care to join me?
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