MY MOTHER’S LESBIAN JEWISH WICCAN WEDDING by David Hein and Irene Carl Sankoff, directed by Andrew Lamb (Mirvish). At the Panasonic (651 Yonge). In previews, opens Sunday (November 15) and runs to November 29. $25-$60. 416-872-1212. See listing
I know what the folks behind My Mother’s Lesbian Jewish Wiccan Wedding did last summer. They won the Canadian theatre lottery.
Barely a week after the heartwarming comedy with the catchy title opened at the Fringe, the show’s creative team was in David Mirvish’s office negotiating a deal.
“I remember standing at the elevator after the meeting, saying, Did that just happen?'” says Andrew Lamb, who directed the original and helms the expanded remount at the Panasonic. “It was one of those pinch-yourself moments.”
David Hein and Irene Carl Sankoff’s autobiographical musical about Hein’s relationship with his mother, who came out late in life, has made the move from the postage-stamp-sized Bread & Circus performing space to the former We Will Rock You venue.
“Actually, I always envisioned it at a bigger space,” says Lamb, who’s directed several Fringe and SummerWorks shows and is director of education and outreach at the Tarragon.
“We didn’t have the budget for a set, but there are lots more costumes,” says Lamb. “There are also more scenic elements, and sometimes people become scenic elements.”
The original cast of seven has grown to 10, while the band (including narrator Hein) has increased from four to five.
Many of Mirvish’s suggestions to expand the 60-minute show to 90 were ones Hein, Sankoff and Lamb had already discussed.
The rather unsympathetic character of Garth, Hein’s father, has been given more stage time. The mother’s growing relationship with her lover is more fully developed.
“And one of the things Mirvish said he wanted to know more about was Wiccans,” says Lamb.
We both chuckle at that idea.
Of course, the show couldn’t come at a timelier moment, a year after California’s Prop 8 shocker and a week after Maine’s rejection of a same-sex marriage bill.
“I was down at Lincoln Center at a director’s lab earlier this year and met the artistic director of the Pasadena Theatre,” says Lamb. “I told him I’d love to mount it in California, especially for those fence-sitters on the same-sex marriage issue.
“The show forces you to think, What if one of my parents came out to me? Would I accept them for who they are?'”
Lamb says he and the MMJLWW cast know how lucky they are to be able to present the show at all.
“We probably wouldn’t be able to do it in Edmonton or Calgary,” he says. “To us it’s a nice, heartfelt comedy. But there are many countries where you wouldn’t be able to even talk about this subject without being turned over to the authorities.”[rssbreak]
On first hearing about the project:
On what he’d like to be doing next:
glenns@nowtoronto.com
