Late last month the Foster Festival launched their third season at the FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre in downtown St. Catharines with what's being called a Norm Foster Greatest Hit. It would be hard to narrow down any of Foster's classic plays as such, but after seeing the current production of Wrong For Each Other yesterday afternoon, I'd have to agree it is right up there with the best of them.
Foster's plays allow us to look in the mirror and see ourselves, or at least much wittier versions of ourselves. Norm has this unique gift of being able to distill life experiences both good and bad into a two-hour play most anyone would enjoy, which is precisely why he is the darling of the summer theatre circuit throughout the country. You would be hard pressed to find a summer theatre season anywhere without at least one Foster play on the bill. Essentially, staging a Norm Foster play in the summer is guaranteed win night for most theatre companies.
In fact, the Showboat Festival Theatre in Port Colborne is producing Screwball Comedy starting next week, for example. You might recall, that play premiered last season at the Foster Festival. And that's the wonderful thing about having a festival dedicated to producing Foster's plays and hosting his premieres: we act as an incubation theatre of sorts, eventually feeding the rest of the country another new Foster classic they can bet the proverbial farm on.
Once again this season the Foster Festival is premiering two new plays after Wrong for Each Other closes after tomorrow night's performance: the second show opening July 18th is Come Down From Up River, and Renovations For Six closes out the annual festival with the opening on August 8th. Both of those productions will be directed by Foster Festival Artistic Director Patricia Vanstone.
This first show, however, is directed by Shaw Festival veteran Jim Mezon, who has given us many thought-provoking productions in Niagara-on-the-Lake over the years. Of Foster, Jim writes in his Director's Notes, he "writes us. He writes who we are, what we want and need, what we fear, what angers us, what confuses us, what gives us joy...and he does this without cynicism."
There is a common thread in all of Foster's plays, of course, and that is an overriding sense of decency. They may come off as jerks, stuck up or just plain unlikeable in the beginning, but their sense of decency shines through before the two hours is up and you can't help but see yourself - and others you know - in many of those characters.
All of which brings us to Wrong For Each Other. The play, dating from several years ago, stars Daniel Briere as Rudy Sorenson and Julia Porter as Norah Case. Rudy and Norah, we soon discover, where married years ago, divorced four years ago, and have not seen each other since. Until now, when Rudy, it turns out, more or less stalks his ex-wife and sets up a "chance" meeting in a restaurant in order to see his former love once again.
I know, especially in this day and age any suggestion of stalking is looked upon as something more than a little creepy, but Rudy, we discover, is not acting out of malice but rather out of that genuine desire I think we all have to come to grips with the end of a relationship we are not quite ready to let go of yet.
While in that big-city restaurant at lunch-time, Rudy and Norah decide to put the past aside and share lunch together. Alas, Rudy just can't avoid probing the things that went right and wrong in their relationship, and that makes Norah just a little uncomfortable.
Truth be told, Rudy in the flashback scenes when he first meets and tries to woo Norah, comes across as such an awkward round peg in a square hole sort of guy we are left to wonder what Norah actually saw in him in the first place. But love, as they say, is blind, and who can explain love anyway? Not I, for sure!
Norah and Rudy do fall in love, marry, and try to have a child together. The loss of that child brings more than heartbreak to the relationship, it brings depression upon Norah, and tests the strength of the marriage when Rudy ends up having a fling outside of matrimony. Ultimately, they divorce and that should be the end of it.
But not as far as Rudy is concerned. He still carries the torch for his former love, and for most of the play the compliment is not returned. But at the end? I won't give that away...
Director Mezon has done a fine job of keeping things simple and focusing on the characters themselves, so set changes are kept to a minimum. He allows both Briere and Porter the freedom to delve into their respective characters and find the real people who loved and lost not that long ago.
Julia Porter and Daniel Briere are both making their debut with the Foster Festival in this play and their work together is quite good. Hopefully we'll see them again in future seasons.
In spite of the subject matter in Wrong for Each Other, there are plenty of laughs to go around and Norm Foster is in rare form here. He never allows the subject matter to become too maudlin and the audience looking for the exits.
Wrong for Each Other continues with evening performances tonight and tomorrow night at the PAC, and then preparations will be underway to stage the second play of the season, Come Down From Up River opening July 18th.
For tickets for this and all Foster Festival performances, go to www.fosterfestival.com or call the FirstOntario Performing Arts Theatre box office at 905-688-0722.
See you at the theatre!
July 12th, 2018.
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