WAITING FOR THE PARADE by John Murrell (Soulpepper). At the Young Centre for the Performing Arts (55 Mill). To May 29. $20-$70. 416-866-8666. See Continuing. Rating: NNN
Waiting For The Parade, John Murrell’s gentle drama about the impact of the Second World War on five Calgary women, doesn’t deliver the same charge it did in 1979 – partly because it’s no longer unusual to see plays with several juicy female roles.[rssbreak]
You can’t blame Soulpepper’s production, directed by Joseph Ziegler. It begins with a superb sequence in which Janet (Deborah Drakeford), the gung-ho head of the women’s war effort, dances to big band sounds with each of the women, ingeniously establishing character right from the start – and without a word spoken.
And the actors are really good. Nancy Palk is gloriously gloomy as Margaret, who’s convinced she’ll never see her two sons again. As Eve, who thinks Prime Minister Mackenzie King would never stoop to conscription, Krystin Pellerin conveys a sad naïveté. And Drakeford successfully makes the difficult shift from bossy bitch to someone deserving our sympathy.
Marta is Murrell’s most impressive creation. With her German roots and a father interned for stashing Nazi paraphernalia in his basement, she’s got a ton of baggage, and Fiona Byrne carries it with quiet dignity.
But Michelle Monteith almost steals the show as the sexually charged army wife who spends a little too much time at the local soldiers’ canteen.
Waiting For The Parade takes a small dip near the end of the first act, when the cast’s energy seems to flag, and that’s a problem for a play that’s already pretty quiet.
But it does give you the chance to see some of T.O. finest female talent.
