Group dramatics

The newly formed National Arts Centre resident company begins to bond with a monumental play

Actor Tanja Jacobs at the ready for Brecht's Mother Courage

The year 2009 brought with it a resurrection of an old idea for our city – a good one too, whose original tumble into death was a tragedy: the idea of repertory theatre. A large amount of Canadian theatre is contractually based: Actors are auditioned and hired for single productions and move from place to place in a sort of mercenary lifestyle. “You learn to go deep really fast, and do it well,” says actress and singer Randi Helmers, “but rep theatre is a different animal”.

With the formation of a resident company of actors at the National Arts Centre, Ottawa sees the same group performing through a whole season of work. “It’s the difference between oil and acrylic painting,” says Helmers. “The oils set slowly, they keep living, they keep going deeper and the subtleties keep coming out.” This sentiment more than anything else kept emerging in every interview with the NAC group: the simple joy of artists being allowed the time to rehearse and luxuriate in their art.

According to actor Michael Blake, an intense and necessary trust is built through this long process. “You must have that [in order] to risk and to play in rehearsal and on stage… You’ve got to have those people there that you’ve worked with and you feel comfortable with.” His appreciation is understandable considering the company officially opens Brecht’s juggernaut drama Mother Courage this week.

Brecht is one of those names heard as often in mockery of the theatre as in celebration of it, but NAC artistic director Peter Hinton is enraptured of Mother Courage: “It’s an adventurous, living, human, passionate, funnnnnyyyy [he here punctuates his dry delivery with a soaring emphasis] musical story.” His final words serve to really whet my appetite: “It’s not passive… it’s a big experience. You have to come awake.”

As appeared in the Ottawa XPress – January 14, 2010
http://www.ottawaxpress.ca/stage/stage.aspx?iIDArticle=19132