THE TORONTO STAR - 3 out of 4 Stars
THE GLOBE AND MAIL - 3.5 out of 4 Stars
THE NEW AM 740 - 4 out of 5 Stars
In the plays of Morris Panych, the laughter and tears live so closely together that one can't speak too loudly for fear of drowning the other out.
The Canadian Stage/Theatre Calgary co-production of 7 Stories which opened at the Bluma Appel Theatre on Thursday night sometimes violates that rule, but it keeps the two in balance for enough of the time to call the final result a success.
The Man, a strange Magritte-like figure with a bowler hat and umbrella, is perched on a window sill, seven storeys up in the air. He obviously intends to jump, but the frantic lives of the people all around him prevent that event from happening - at least for 90 minutes.
There's a distinct musical rhythm to the writing of the scenes here: some staccato, some legato, some stating a theme at great length, others recapitulating it briefly.
It takes a masterful conductor to orchestrate it properly and director Dean Paul Gibson's major fault is to lean on the gas a bit too much near the start of the show and go for a non-stop allegro vivace, which isn't always called for.
But variety mercifully sets in and by the time we reach the long andante sequence with which Panych ends the play, all is well.
The Man is the leading character and Peter Anderson plays him with the right wryly befuddled air: wearing the mask of comedy on top of the mask of tragedy.
But the four other actors get to steal the evening and Panych encourages the larceny with the variety of roles he lets them play.
Christopher Hunt impresses as a sleep-deprived psychiatrist as well as a colour-obsessed decorator, while Rebecca Northan scores as a wronged mistress and a tight-lipped nurse.
Damien Atkins is a knockout, virtually unrecognizable in a trio of parts that include a slimy seducer and a second-rate actor making his mediocrity finally pay off.
And Melody A. Johnson proves that, once again, she is the kook supreme of the Canadian stage, delighting us with a pair of wacky weirdos before breaking our hearts as Lillian, the little old lady whose wisdom wraps the whole play up in a bittersweet bundle.
Ken MacDonald's set is a superb mixture of skyscraper and sky, which Alan Brodie has lit to perfection.
But Panych is the one we should thank the most. Twenty years after its creation, 7 Stories seems more entertaining and yet more relevant than ever. It's the kind of fate that every author should enjoy.
THE GLOBE AND MAIL
Monday, Nov. 16, 2009
A window into the beginnings of Panych
J. KELLY NESTRUCK
The title of Morris Panych's 7 Stories, getting a snappy 20th-anniversary revival at Toronto's Canadian Stage Company in co-production with Theatre Calgary, has two meanings.
The Man, played by Peter Anderson as in the play's 1989 premiere, spends the entire show perched on an outdoor ledge seven storeys up, while behind him are seven windows into seven apartments that contain seven different stories that burst out and interrupt his contemplation of suicide.
In one apartment, poet Charlotte (Rebecca Northan) and lawyer Rodney (Damien Atkins) liven up a dull affair by taking turns trying to kill one another.
In another, actor Michael (Atkins again) smokes his last cigarette and prepares to assume the role of "Marshall". In a third, a drunken party that no one wants to be at, and the host wishes he wasn't having, rages away.
From 20 years on, we can see the seeds of future Panych plays in many of these shreds of stories. Vigil is foreshadowed in the relationship between terminally ill 100-year-old Lillian and her misanthropic nurse. Paranoid insomniac Leonard - played with bug-eyed vigour by Christopher Hunt - seems a precursor of Earshot's reclusive Doyle. There's even a pet goldfish in peril that brings to mind Girl in the Goldfish Bowl.
Dean Paul Gibson directs 7 Stories with flair, finding ingenious ways to rise above the restrictions of Ken MacDonald's challengingly confining set.
The Man stands on a thin strip and the rest of the characters are only glimpsed through thin rectangular windows, but Gibson gets more out of less by using depth and height to his advantage and filling every square inch of stageable space with sharp, stylized movement.
In a way, the play's cleverness under constraining conditions seems a riposte to the reasons the Man gives for considering suicide. One morning, he awoke and suddenly saw his body, his shoes and his hat as all prisons.
There is no escape from himself, he realized, not even in his car: "This instrument of liberation. It wasn't freedom. It was merely the idea of freedom, bound in metal. A kind of hope, but with a speed limit attached to it."
None of the characters in the building - played by a fine quartet of actors - have any sympathy for him. Indeed, only a couple are aware enough to notice that he's about to kill himself. Even Lillian offers little consolation: "When you're a hundred years old, you'll understand everything. And then you'll die."
Anderson is excellently expressive in his silences when playing straight man to the building's odd tenants, but becomes oddly stilted when he opens his mouth to deliver his final speech. This production's main flaw, however, is that there is never enough tension over whether the Man will jump or not; his kindness is always more clear than his desperation.
But Panych's text delivers: It is funny, philosophical, often poetic and shows no signs of dating. When partygoer Percy brags about having 940 friends, but has trouble naming a single one he likes, it's hard to believe his lines were written in a time before Facebook.
The only nod to the fact that the play premiered in 1989 is that Rachel, a religious zealot who tricks her downstairs neighbours into believing in God, lowers a crisp Canadian one-dollar bill out of her window instead of a loonie. (The paper currency was withdrawn from circulation the month after 7 Stories premiered.)
Panych's strengths are all here, but so are his recurrent weaknesses. The self-deprecating metatheatrics diminishes his work for cheap laughs.
"What's the flying supposed to represent?" asks one character. "Is it an existential statement or what?"
Metatheatricality can sometimes feel like a form of artistic apology, which may be why so many Canadian playwrights have embraced it. In some recent works, Panych, 57 has shown himself reaching beyond the protective one-liners and digging deeper into real emotion.
He has given us many gems over the past two decades, but I'm fairly confident that his best story has yet to be written.
THE NATIONAL POST
Posted Tuesday, Nov. 17, 2009
Trying to bring down The Man before he falls off the edge
ROBERT CUSHMAN
I have to confess to one tiny disappointment over 7 Stories, bred of my own mistaken expectations. I had never seen Morris Panych's 20-year-old play before, but I knew that it was about a man contemplating suicide by throwing himself off a high building; and I had assumed that the punning title meant that, as he plummeted from the seventh floor, we would see vignettes that involved the people residing on each level he passed. It seems, though, that even the Panych panache -- not to mention that of his designer Ken MacDonald and the current director Dean Paul Gibson -- wasn't up to presenting that picture of continuous precipitation intermittently frozen. And it probably wouldn't have made sense anyway.
I had also heard that this was Panych's best play; and that is something that, after seeing this exhilarating revival, I am in no mood to dispute. Its characters in fact share that seventh level, the protagonist -- known to us and the program as The Man -- teetering spectacularly on the ledge's edge, the others appearing at, naturally, seven windows, and one or two of them even joining him outside. Very few of them think to inquire what he's doing out there; they're all too preoccupied with their own lives, most of which are at least as desperate as his, even if they themselves don't realize it. At least, he knows he's unhappy; he also seems to be humane, and his humanity progressively interferes with his resolve. The first interruption comes from a man who seems intent on murdering his girlfriend, though it turns out that it's all a game and she can give as good as she gets. Next door, or next window, lives a paranoid psychiatrist in pajamas, who has no sympathy for or curiosity about his neighbours, though he deplores the noise. Even making allowances for the tromp l'oeil nature of Mac-Donald's set -- an awesomely tilting edifice surrounded by fluffy clouds -- these must be very narrow apartments.
At the opposite end lives an unsuccessful actor about to seal his vocation by marrying a rich woman under an assumed identity, which he will then have to maintain for life. Somewhere in the middle is a party that nobody's enjoying. And, by way of comparative comfort, the last person The Man encounters is a 100-year old woman, tended by an abrasive nurse who can't wait for her to die. All of which -- I don't think I'm giving much away here -- leads our hero to the conclusion that, as Dorothy Parker almost and immortally said, he might as well live.
In the age of Facebook, a 20-year-old line about a man with 940 friends, none of whom he actually likes, sounds uncannily prophetic; but of course it only puts a number on a situation that's existed ever since people started invented social gatherings. In fact the play's philosophy isn't the most original or attractive thing about it. What really counts is the tang and the snap of it all: also a sense of being plugged into a style and culture beyond Canada. Some of the opening scenes play, in Gibson's crackling production, like vintage American farce; some of the later, more whimsical ones, are positively Parisian.
The Man's urge to self-destruction comes from self-constriction; in his black suit, black shoes, black bowler (he has, he says dolefully, any number of duplicate outfits at home) he's a civil servant painted by Magritte. Everybody else in the cunningly costumed production looks very colourful, for all the good it does them. Peter Anderson, as we know from his performance in The Overcoat, is a virtuoso at physical acting; slipping and flailing in his opening moments here he looks close to landing in our laps; if we don't feel his pain, we can feel his vertigo. It's quite a shock to find that he can also talk, and do it well. His desperation comes over as more thought than felt, but I suspect that's the play.
Four actors share the other roles, all of them with guns blazing. Christopher Hunt is the most extrovert of all as, ironically, the crybaby shrink, constantly ducking beneath his lintel. Rebecca Northan is invigoratingly sharp and smart; Damien Atkins dazzles in three roles, two of them unlike any I have seen him play before. Melody A. Johnson pushes a bit too hard in her earlier incarnations; attack is not her natural mode. But she makes up for it a millionfold as the centenarian, first glimpsed bobbing enchantingly around in the recesses of her room, then emerging for an enchanting duet with Anderson that she plays with unnervingly calm assurance and with timing of almost unholy perfection. This is a very funny play, even by Panych's standards, but this scene had me literally breathless with delight. Johnson has a speech about the Louvre that's a miracle.
NOW MAGAZINE
Posted Tuesday, Nov. 17, 2009
Surreal Stories
GLENN SUMI
Over the past couple of decades, playwright Morris Panych has emerged as the master chronicler of the surreal life, but many of his themes showed up in 1989's 7 Stories, his breakthrough work, which gets a 20th-anniversary remount from Canadian Stage.
An unnamed man (Peter Anderson) teeters on the ledge of a building's seventh floor while various inhabitants, ignoring his predicament, open up their windows to air their own problems.
It's a classic absurd premise, given a suitably clever production by director Dean Paul Gibson and designers Ken MacDonald (set) and William Schmuck (costumes), who immediately invoke the spirit of René Magritte.
Timing is key. If the comedy's too broad (and there are lots of good one-liners), it can seem like a Laugh-In parody. If the existential angst is turned up too high, it can seem pretentious.
Gibson strikes a nice balance, getting clear, engaging performances from his hard-working cast, all of them but Anderson playing multiple roles and making hilarious use of the seemingly limited playing area of MacDonald's set.
Each actor nails at least one good scene. Damien Atkins brings warmth and a hilarious wavering accent to his actor who's taken on the role of a lifetime, while Christopher Hunt brings a born comic's timing to his neurotic psychiatrist. Rebecca Northan, meanwhile, grasps the essence of her cynical mistress and grumpy nurse. But Melody A. Johnson deserves special mention for the pitch-perfect rhythm and musicality of her 100-year-old character Lillian's wisdom.
If there's a problem with the production - and possibly the script - it's in the character of the Man. Anderson, so brilliant as the put-upon protagonist in Panych's co-written adaptation of The Overcoat, can't get us inside the mind or heart of this Everyman.
ROBERT CUSHMAN
I have to confess to one tiny disappointment over 7 Stories, bred of my own mistaken expectations. I had never seen Morris Panych's 20-year-old play before, but I knew that it was about a man contemplating suicide by throwing himself off a high building; and I had assumed that the punning title meant that, as he plummeted from the seventh floor, we would see vignettes that involved the people residing on each level he passed. It seems, though, that even the Panych panache -- not to mention that of his designer Ken MacDonald and the current director Dean Paul Gibson -- wasn't up to presenting that picture of continuous precipitation intermittently frozen. And it probably wouldn't have made sense anyway.
I had also heard that this was Panych's best play; and that is something that, after seeing this exhilarating revival, I am in no mood to dispute. Its characters in fact share that seventh level, the protagonist -- known to us and the program as The Man -- teetering spectacularly on the ledge's edge, the others appearing at, naturally, seven windows, and one or two of them even joining him outside. Very few of them think to inquire what he's doing out there; they're all too preoccupied with their own lives, most of which are at least as desperate as his, even if they themselves don't realize it. At least, he knows he's unhappy; he also seems to be humane, and his humanity progressively interferes with his resolve. The first interruption comes from a man who seems intent on murdering his girlfriend, though it turns out that it's all a game and she can give as good as she gets. Next door, or next window, lives a paranoid psychiatrist in pajamas, who has no sympathy for or curiosity about his neighbours, though he deplores the noise. Even making allowances for the tromp l'oeil nature of Mac-Donald's set -- an awesomely tilting edifice surrounded by fluffy clouds -- these must be very narrow apartments.
At the opposite end lives an unsuccessful actor about to seal his vocation by marrying a rich woman under an assumed identity, which he will then have to maintain for life. Somewhere in the middle is a party that nobody's enjoying. And, by way of comparative comfort, the last person The Man encounters is a 100-year old woman, tended by an abrasive nurse who can't wait for her to die. All of which -- I don't think I'm giving much away here -- leads our hero to the conclusion that, as Dorothy Parker almost and immortally said, he might as well live.
In the age of Facebook, a 20-year-old line about a man with 940 friends, none of whom he actually likes, sounds uncannily prophetic; but of course it only puts a number on a situation that's existed ever since people started invented social gatherings. In fact the play's philosophy isn't the most original or attractive thing about it. What really counts is the tang and the snap of it all: also a sense of being plugged into a style and culture beyond Canada. Some of the opening scenes play, in Gibson's crackling production, like vintage American farce; some of the later, more whimsical ones, are positively Parisian.
The Man's urge to self-destruction comes from self-constriction; in his black suit, black shoes, black bowler (he has, he says dolefully, any number of duplicate outfits at home) he's a civil servant painted by Magritte. Everybody else in the cunningly costumed production looks very colourful, for all the good it does them. Peter Anderson, as we know from his performance in The Overcoat, is a virtuoso at physical acting; slipping and flailing in his opening moments here he looks close to landing in our laps; if we don't feel his pain, we can feel his vertigo. It's quite a shock to find that he can also talk, and do it well. His desperation comes over as more thought than felt, but I suspect that's the play.
Four actors share the other roles, all of them with guns blazing. Christopher Hunt is the most extrovert of all as, ironically, the crybaby shrink, constantly ducking beneath his lintel. Rebecca Northan is invigoratingly sharp and smart; Damien Atkins dazzles in three roles, two of them unlike any I have seen him play before. Melody A. Johnson pushes a bit too hard in her earlier incarnations; attack is not her natural mode. But she makes up for it a millionfold as the centenarian, first glimpsed bobbing enchantingly around in the recesses of her room, then emerging for an enchanting duet with Anderson that she plays with unnervingly calm assurance and with timing of almost unholy perfection. This is a very funny play, even by Panych's standards, but this scene had me literally breathless with delight. Johnson has a speech about the Louvre that's a miracle.
The cast dazzles in a play that remains even more relevant than when written 20 years ago by Morris Panych. The story appears quite simple a man in a three button suite, bowler hat and umbrella is standing on a window sill of a building, 7 stories up. He is about to commit suicide. Not what you might consider a worthy theatrical experiencing, after all life today is tough enough but you would be very wrong. Panych has created a gem of a play that captures the human foibles that jumps from the comedic to the serious with split second timing. Peter Andersen is the central figure, the man, who he plays to understated perfection. Interacting with him are people in the building - there are four actors each playing 3 roles that sparkle and almost overshadow the central character; the acting is so good that unless you are aware in advance that there are only 4 actors you might believe there are twelve. It's a great evening of entertainment with the set, direction and lighting adding the topping to this play. This production of "7 Stories" rates 4 stars out of 5 and is currently playing at the Bluma Appel Theatre until Dec 5th.
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