Arts and Style
Pour débusquer les préjugés
By René Girard on March 19, 2009
Cet ouvrage constitue l’une des meilleures démonstrations à l’effet que les préjugés entretiennent l’absence de démarche intellectuelle face aux fausses représentations du monde. En d’autres termes, il s’agit de montrer en quoi consiste l’abdication pure et simple de la raison devant tout ce qui est présenté comme étant à croire sans examen, et aussi comment les pensées humaines sont, en quelque sorte, embarrassées par les préjugés qui remplacent souvent le manque d’éducation...
Buried Child was best of Segal series so far
By Alidor Aucoin on February 26, 2009
The National Art Centre’s production of Sam Shepard’s loopy nightmare, Buried Child at the Leanor and Alvin Segal Theatre was a thriller that walked a tightrope between the real and the surreal...
Oscars – The First Reality Show
By Sharman Yarnell on February 26, 2009
From a dark eyed boy scrounging off the streets of India and a baby born an old man, to a shamed American president, a martyr of the gays rights movement, and, finally, a young man's love affair with an SS concentration camp guard. Now that's pretty eclectic!..
Shirley Valentine
By Alidor Aucoin on February 5, 2009
Shirley Valentine, at the Centaur Theatre until February 22, is a harmless feminist fantasy about a middle-aged housewife who skips out on her husband on two week Aegean holiday to find her self...
Peace for Piaf
By Sharman Yarnell on February 5, 2009
She was born in Belleville, Paris in 1915 and died at age 47 in 1963. Little did she know the lasting affect that she would have on generations of music devotees the world over. She was once the most highly paid star in the world, but when she died, much of her savings had been spent on alcohol and a drug habit...
Le Bon Prof
By Louise V. Labrecque on February 5, 2009
Le Québécois David Solway, écrivain anglophone et poète reconnu qui s’est notamment mérité en 2004 le Prix littéraire de la ville de Montréal, est l’auteur de l’essai sur l’éducation Le bon prof. Dans ce livre, on entre en conflit frontal avec la « nouvelle vérité ». En effet, en plein « renouveau pédagogique », voici un ouvrage qui décape, littéralement, et nous sort de ces tristes zones embourbées jusqu’au cou par le prêt-à-penser de la pensée unique...
King Jack
By Alidor Aucoin on January 15, 2009
As one of Canada¹s richest industrialists and media barons, a biography of John Wilson McConnell, the President of St. Lawrence Sugar Refineries who once owned Holt Renfrew and the Montreal Star newspaper is certainly long overdue...
The Childrens’ Theatre turns 75
By Sharman Yarnell on January 15, 2009
When I interviewed him at a Montreal Actra Awards ceremony, William Shatner recognized a number of Montreal theatre icons as being instrumental in creating a strong foundation for his career in acting...
Nous sommes tous Kafka
By Louise V. Labrecque on January 15, 2009
On commence à ouvrir les yeux lentement sur les vrais rapports qui lient l’auteure à Kafka, et cela, dès la première page. Les métamorphoses, c’est bien connu, s’opèrent lentement, de fil en aiguille ; mais pas ici. C’en est presque frustrant, car déjà on sait que le suicide, réellement la mort, est imminente, à la toute fin...
Un exil à la fois intérieur et extérieur
By Louise V. Labrecque on December 18, 2008
Un exilé, c’est quelqu’un qui a des souvenirs différents. Et qui revient de loin . En littérature, il est facile de les reconnaître, ceux-là qui bâtissent sur l’expérience passée afin de recréer la vie présente, riche et sensible. Souvent, leur grande sagesse inspire un choix de vie, un changement de position, un peu comme le fait de changer de lunettes, ou de coiffer ses cheveux la raie sur l’autre côté...
Habs 100th
By Alidor Aucoin on December 18, 2008
The Habs observe their 100th birthday, next year, but the centennial celebrations got off to a head start earlier this month...
Le festin lu
By Louise V. Labrecque on November 27, 2008
Le repas est un acte social. Il est le rituel par excellence de la socialisation, soutenu, à partir du dix-neuvième siècle, par un nouveau discours alimentaire, tout à la fois hédoniste et normatif...
Sex: Uncovered
By Dan Delmar on November 27, 2008
For the last two decades, Dr. Laurie Betito has been shining a light into the dark, dirty and sometimes depraved corners of the human psyche. “Better communication, better sex,” is her motto and beginning this week, she will help take readers of The Métropolitain on a journey to new heights of sexual enlightenment.
Intimate Passions
By Dr. Laurie Betito on November 27, 2008
Titanic sails again
By Alidor Aucoin on November 13, 2008
A touring exhibition of artifacts from the Titanic opened this week in the old fourth floor cinema in the Eaton Centre in downtown Montreal, where they will remain until April...
Sleek Cat without claws
By Alidor Aucoin on November 13, 2008
Barry Flatman as Big Daddy, the dying patriarch of a decaying Southern family is alone worth the price of admission to the uneven production of the Tennessee Williams Classic, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at the Segal Centre for the Performing Arts at the Saidye...
Bill Brownstein's 24 Hours
By Alidor Aucoin on October 30, 2008
Bill Brownstein never walked into a saloon he didn’t like. The Gazette’s man about town has compiled a loving tribute to Montreal’s night spots in 24: Twenty Four Hours in the Life of a City. His interlocking chapters convey the mood of the city through the owners, employees, trend setters, and bar flys that he¹s interviewed in 24 different locations around town...
MCA's Sympathy for the Devil
By Alidor Aucoin on October 30, 2008
On the heels of the show at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts which examines music and dance in Andy Warhol’s work, the Museum of Contemporary Art has opened a similar exhibition of its own: Sympathy for the Devil: Art and Rock and Roll since 1967...
Dance for the World
By Jesse Samuels on October 30, 2008
ombine your love of music and dance to help developing nations all over the world on Sunday November 2nd at the “Dance for the World” event. The “Dance” in conjunction with CUSO and VSO form Canada’s Volunteer Partnership Fund...
Plummer shines "In spite of himself"
By Alidor Aucoin on October 30, 2008
Christopher Plummer is Montreal’s greatest gift to the theatre, Canada’s own swashbuckling John Barrymore...
Yeah, Yeah, Yeah
By Sharman Yarnell on October 16, 2008
The year was 1964. The date was February 9. It was Sunday night and everyone between the ages of 5 and 85 was glued to the old black and white television set, waiting for the phenomenon that had arrived in New York to appear on The Ed Sullivan Show...
Scorching hot
By Alidor Aucoin on October 16, 2008
The hottest theatre ticket in town these days is Scorched. Toronto’s Tarragon Theatre Company brought its stark, fluent staging of Wajdi Mouawad’s chilling family drama, to the Centaur Friday. As translated from its original French-version, Incendies, into English by Linda Gaboriou, directed by Richard Rose and designed by Graham S. Thompson, Scorched is pure, unadulterated theatre...
The 37th Festival Nouveau Cinema offers quality and quantity
By Melissa Wheeler on October 16, 2008
Film festivals can be a double-edged sword. They’re great for industry to make business and creative connections, and the general buzz is welcome. But for people who just like to see good films, they can be a bit of a nightmare. You can’t just go to see a movie: you must spend a significant chunk of time with the program to make sure you’re seeing the best the fest has to offer...
Warhol draws music
By Alidor Aucoin on October 2, 2008
Andy Warhol’s genius was that not only did he connect graphic design, cinema, sex, politics and pop culture, but as a new exhibition at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts demonstrates, Warhol was also the world’s most successful groupie...
Memo for artists : Arts are a market
By Vincent Geloso on October 2, 2008
Artists in Quebec were hoping that Stephen Harper would be ripping his hairs off to look like Jack Layton as they unleashed ads criticizing the government for cutting funding to arts in the province. However, their cause is not benefitting from widespread support as they expected and whatever support they have are polite yet lacking in passion...
In fond memory of Richard Monette
By Sharman Yarnell on September 18, 2008
At a time when funding for the arts is contracting, it is significant to note that we have also lost a man whose perseverance and creativity pulled The Stratford Shakespeare Festival in Ontario out of deep financial debt...
“Dangerous Liasions” is eye-filling
By Alidor Aucoin on September 18, 2008
As Le Vicomte de Valmont in the Segal Centre’s eye-filling production of Dangerous Liasons, Brett Christopher is a satin-lapelled lounge lizard with all the right moves..
La fonderie Darling : un espace de création unique
By Louise V. Labrecque on September 18, 2008
Il n’y a pas plus québécois qu’un Québécois ! » Voici une maxime résumant à elle seule une québécitude bête à pleurer, un complexe en somme. De ce genre de cliché, de préjugé, de formule toute faite, impossible de ne pas faire matière à réflexion lorsque l’on visite la Fonderie Darling, nichée au cœur du Faubourg des Récollets, dans le « Quartier Éphémère »...
Forgotten master
By Alidor Aucoin on September 4, 2008
Roman Catholic who was incarcerated in a series of Nazi concentration camps during the Second World War, Christo Stefanoff’s signature works have enduring political value because not only do they depict the Jewish Holocaust, but Christian suffering as well...
Thank you Centaur for 40 Magical Years
By Sharman Yarnell on September 4, 2008
Time for Montrealers to raise a glass and celebrate the theatre that has given our city years of innovative, provocative and classical works...
Une élégie empreinte d’ironie
By Alidor Aucoin on September 4, 2008
Dans la plus récente pièce de Michel Tremblay, Le Paradis à la fin de vos jours, présentée au Théâtre du Rideau Vert jusqu’au 6 septembre, le paradis est loin d’être ce à quoi on pourrait s’attendre. Comme le dit l’auteur, on n’y voit pas grand-chose (en fait, on voit rien pantoute, dit-il), le bon Dieu est toujours aussi occupé et inaccessible ici qu’il ne l’est pour ceux qui le prient sur Terre, et le fait de retrouver ceux que l’on aime n’est pas aussi rassurant qu’on voudrait bien le croire...
Cette riche mosaïque humaine
By Louise V. Labrecque on September 4, 2008
Les témoignages sont à la mode. On raconte sa vie. Dans le roman de Josée Bilodeau, la ville désarticulée est au contraire mise en scène, sur 188 pages, avec un impressionnant patchwork de personnages, tous plus hétéroclites les uns que les autres. Au détour des rues et des ruelles, dans les clameurs urbaines, On aurait dit juillet nous transporte dans une ville inconnue – j’aime bien imaginer qu’il s’agit d’un Montréal chargé de vie-, s’observant au travers mille et unes vitrines, comme des scènes parfaitement liées au décor de la ville...
The other side of Beijing
By Alidor Aucoin on August 21, 2008
So you thought the opening ceremonies of the Olympic games were as thrilling as they were chilling?..
Ottawa should learn from Québec’s censorship history
By P.A. Sévigny on August 21, 2008
The federal government should take the time to watch Québec journalist Eric Parent’s new film, “Les Ennemis du Cinéma” before letting Canada’s fundamentalist evangelical groups bully him into making a humiliating, and possibly fatal error for his party’s chances in a not-too-distant election...
Nous sommes l’espèce fabulatrice
By Louise V. Labrecque on August 21, 2008
Notre spécialité, notre péjorative, notre manie, notre gloire et notre chute, c’est le pourquoi...
