Tarragon Theatre: Bremen City (World Premiere). Written & directed by Gregory Prest; solid: Tatjana Cornij, Oliver Dennis, Farhang Ghajar, Sheila McCarthy, Veronica Hortigüela, Dan Mousseau, Nancy Palk, William Webster. Continues till October 26, 2025 at Tarragon Theatre; tickets right here.
The world is a horrible place, filled with terrible folks doing terrible issues, everybody will get outdated, and all the pieces ends.
And but…
That’s basically the course of Bremen City, a Tarragon Theatre manufacturing that stars Nancy Palk as Frau Esel.
Set in what may very well be nineteenth century Germany, Frau Esel has been the uber-dedicated housekeeper of the outstanding Völksenhaus, in a city simply exterior Hanover for 45 years. Because the story opens, she’s been unceremoniously canned by a brand new mistress of the mansion.
She’s setting out for Bremen to go dwell together with her son, who she says is a musician, however after all there are mishaps and detours alongside the way in which, and a parade of characters who be part of her, at the very least for a time, together with bumbling magician Herr Hund (Oliver Davis), would-be musician Herr Katze (William Webster), and Frau Henne (Sheila McCarthy).
Their paths cross with many others who supply each comedic and darker moments to their journey in a mix of the excessive and the sharply practical.
Whereas this model is a world premiere, Bremen City started its life as a challenge by the Soulpepper Academy. It was carried out in an preliminary model through the Subsequent Stage Competition in 2023.
Tip: If you happen to didn’t catch the connection between the names and the title of the play, there’s a useful reference right here.
The Play
The play opens with Tatjana Cornij (Vogel) who serves as intermittent narrator and musician, taking part in the accordion to intensify the feelings of the scenes as they play out. Cornij composed the music, and her narratives typically act as a type of conscience to Frau Esel. When Frau Esel repeatedly mentions going to stick with her son in Bremen, for instance, she asks her, “Will he know you?”
Frau Esel squirms for a second, tellingly.
The story veers from foolish bodily comedy to the blackest of black humour. Oliver Dennis’s magician with cash issues has a cute bit with a fish that recurs to viewers laughs. A couple of scenes later, grownup youngsters wish to promote their mom.
Animals… don’t fare so effectively within the play, let’s simply say.
Like the unique folktales that the Brothers Grimm collected and compiled, and in contrast to the usually sanitized film variations, it runs the gamut; whimsical to tragic, truthful to fanciful.
The play is stuffed with telling particulars — a kite pageant, Herr Hund’s magic methods, crowns of flowers. Whereas the stage is just about naked apart from a few rugs, intricate costumes by Nancy Perrin and a vibrant array of props flesh out the scenes. Actors on stage flew the kites and knelt to create the ruffling of Frau Esel’s skirts within the wind, bits of stagecraft that added to the fairytale mode of storytelling, fairly than detract from its impact.
Logan Raju Cracknell created attention-grabbing lighting results that added to the folktale vibe. The Dora-nominated designer’s starry evening impact was notably magical.
Performances
Nancy Palk’s Frau Esel is the emotional coronary heart of the meandering and fanciful storyline, and she or he gives a nuanced portrait of a girl confronting the thought of her redundancy in a world that now not appears to want her. She’s led a life filled with function and devoted to outcomes, solely to have the rug slipped out from beneath her.
She’s bitter and biting, however nonetheless possesses a coronary heart that may be reached, and hopes that may be ignited. Frau Esel is any of us confronting growing older in a world that doesn’t worth what the aged can convey to it, and she or he says the laborious elements out loud unflinchingly.
Stage and display veteran Sheila McCarthy provides a shiny observe to the manufacturing because the not so barely befuddled Frau Henne. Her musical contributions to the story (with out giving a lot away) are one of many present’s comedic highlights, and along with Herr Hund and Herr Katze, she provides among the sweeter emotional moments to the combo.
The solid is uniformly robust, and particular kudos to Farhang Ghajar, Veronica Hortigüela, and Dan Mousseau, who juggled quite a lot of roles (together with non-human) with a effectively tuned sense of comedy.
Closing Ideas
In Western society, the norm is for the aged to largely disappear. When you’re now not of use to society, you develop into an inconvenience. Because the outdated fairytale about Bremen tells us, it’s a theme that has resonated all through centuries.
Frau Esel’s journey will not be heroic in a standard sense, and will go away concepts and points unresolved, however in it, Gregory Prest has created a bittersweet messiness that’s akin to what we expertise in actual life.
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Anya Wassenberg is the Toronto Metropolis Editor at Ludwig Van. Beforehand, she was a contract author with a specialty in tradition and journey for 3 many years, and a inventive writing teacher for Ontariolearn.