MONTREAL - Sarah Berthiaume, 29, is a Quebec playwright who not only thinks outside the box, she travels outside of the province ? in Canada.
In 2008, while nursing a broken heart, Berthiaume crossed the continent on a Greyhound bus, bound for the Yukon ? where the slogan is Larger Than Life ? to visit a friend in Whitehorse. Out of this experience, her play Yukonstyle was born.
This unusual work, now playing at Th??tre d?Aujourd?hui, focuses on the lives of three young people, one old man and a symbolic crow ? no doubt akin to the iconic Poe raven who quoth ?Nevermore.?
Together these people find themselves living, for various reasons, in a northern city where mid-winter temperatures hit minus 50. They sit huddled around a TV screen in a trailer, waiting for Godot ? or a spring that seems equally elusive.
The play opens with Garin (Vincent Fafard), a M?tis man clad in a Vancouver Canucks jersey and red peaked cap, playing video games while his roommate Yuko (Cynthia Wu-Maheux) hangs around looking dead bored. They bond briefly over a CD, singing along to a Moldy Peaches number, in English. But clearly cabin fever has set in.
Then Yuko, who fled Japan following the death of her sister, brings home a stray named Kate (Sophie Desmarais), a 17-year-old teenager fresh off the bus, dressed like a sexy doll. The girl?s presence serves as a catalyst for disruption. Garin is both attracted and repelled by her, and wants her out of his space, fast. But Yuko, a chef at the restaurant where Garin works as a dishwasher, owns the sofa. So the silly waif, who claims she has been impregnated en route by an electrician from Swift Current, Sask., stays.
Meanwhile, Garin?s sodden single Dad (G?rald Gagnon) gets bombarded with questions from his son asking about his mysterious mother, an aboriginal woman named Goldie who disappeared in Vancouver in the 1980s. This was the time frame of the Robert Pickton murders. Watching the TV coverage of the Pickton trial, Garin becomes convinced his mother was one of the victims and pushes to find out more.
This is a dark shadow to cast over an already bleak landscape. Yet Berthiaume pulls it off by leaping into the surreal while staying grounded in something resembling (restaurant) kitchen-sink realism.
In addition to playing Yuko, Wu-Maheux morphs into the ghost of Garin?s mother, as well as the raven. She dominates the production with a performance that continually reinvents itself. Fafard keeps a firm, credible grip on his troubled character, driven to the edge by a combination of circumstances. Gagnon touches hearts as the old man struggles to reconnect with his angry son. And Desmarais adds the demanding voice of another generation, spoiled, hopeless and helpless, to the mix.
Will Kate gravitate to Montreal, or Toronto, or stop in Swift Current, whose banal slogan is Where Life Makes Sense? Or will she just keep rolling back and forth across the country on a bus to nowhere?
Yukonstyle reveals a new pan-Canadian curiosity in Quebec playwriting. While somewhat sensationalistic and incomplete (aboriginal issues are dealt with in swift brush strokes), it remains fascinating for its fresh perspective.
Martin Faucher directs, with appropriate Yukonstyle.
The English version of the play, translated by Nadine Desrochers, is due to premi?re at Canadian Stage?s Berkeley Street Theatre in Toronto in October. A French version has already been presented in France, and other productions are planned for Austria, Belgium, Switzerland and Germany.
Yukonstyle, by Sarah Berthiaume, continues Thursday, May 2?through Saturday, May 4?at 8 p.m. at Th??tre d?Aujourd?hui, 3900 St. Denis St. Tickets cost $34; $25 for students; $27 for seniors. Call 514-282-3900 or visit www.theatredaujourdhui.qc.ca.
pdonnell@montrealgazette.com
Twitter: @patstagepage
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