…could perhaps be a metaphor for my blog. As I experience new things in life, of course my blog changes direction, and notes new observations, which is the absolute intention.
The title of this post is also the title of a play by the author Michel Tremblay, with whose work I am not familiar. The performance of his play marked a première in many ways: my first experience of paid theatre, even though it was amateur drama; the first public entertainment I’ve watched live in French; the opening night for this particular troupe, and the dramatic debut for Sylvie’s cousin Sarah. Considering it comprised so many “firsts”, it was a very enjoyable play, and despite the vernacular (it is based on extremely Montréalaise characters) I managed not only to understand but to empathise with the actors. I had not realised since the days of Shakespearean plays at school, how powerful and deep a drama can hit home.
The location was L’école de la Baie St François, further South and West than anywhere I’ve yet been in Québec and not very far from the US border. The trip down was interesting from the point of view that we had never seen the lake at the foot of Montréal, and the region is very attractive in Spring. Despite the roadworks, we arrived in time to deliver a snack to the debutante, who had thankfully overcome her nerves. She went on to give a practically flawless performance, as did many of the actors and actresses, and we left very impressed with the quality of the show. We dined afterwards in a restaurant with the cast, and though the conversation was somewhat subdued due to a ban on alcohol enforced at the last minute, we managed to run on until well after midnight. The journey back took us almost as far West as Ottawa (I do exaggerate, but the huge scale of roadworks and bridge closures meant we skirted the other side of the city to arrive in Boucherville.
To add a moral to the story, I am now very enthusiastic to read the works of M Tremblay, though I don’t think I have what it takes to even take part in an amateur dramatic production. A good percentage of the ticket price went to help sufferers of fibromyalgia, and the play itself refers a lot to the different forms of suffering which humanity faced in the 60’s and still faces today. Mostly the play is a statement about dysfunctional families, surviving as best they can under the more or less constant scrutiny in the privacy-deprived Plateau area of Motnréal.
I’ve placed the pictures at the end, as I am still too tired to compile an intensive blog, having gone to bed at 2am!
Above: an extremely 60’s café scene, in which we learn about the principal, and perhaps most troubled character in the play.
Whiskey goes down the hatch, with inevitable results.
More scenes from the bar, I will have to research into which song the “diva” performed…
Pre-Gentle Revolution times, violence, control and sexism closely linked in this part of the drama.
Sylvie’s cousin Sarah (left) as a teenage, unwilling witness to her family’s dysfunctional nature: with her longsuffering grandmother.
Daughter, grandmother and intelligent idiot uncle, all great players in the denouement of the drama.
