REVIEW: Casey and Diana at the Stratford Festival
iPhoto caption: Photo by Cylla von Tiedemann
“AIDS is not the antagonist of this play,” Andrew Kushnir writes in his incendiary director’s note for the rending world premiere of Casey and Diana at the Stratford Festival.
And he’s right: in a play sculpted around the ticking clock of hospice care for men with AIDS, it’s not the illness itself that wields such power against the patients about to die. It’s that more complicated enemy of circumstance — of a timer about to ding.
And ding it does.
Casey and Diana is extraordinary, punching well above its weight in a limited three-week run at this year’s Stratford Festival. From Nick Green’s ravishing script to Kushnir’s sensitive-yet-spurring direction to a perfectly calibrated cast, Casey and Diana should top the list for artistic directors in Toronto (and New York) planning their next seasons.
The premise is almost seductively simple, if “terribly, terribly sad,” in the wrenching words of our frequent narrator, Thomas (Sean Arbuckle), who has spent the last five months waiting to die in Casey House, the first hospice in Canada designed for men dying of HIV/AIDS. It’s 1991, and Casey House is expecting a visit in one week from Princess Diana (Krystin Pellerin). She’s going to visit every resident, and she’s going to hold their hands.
That is, if they live that long.
It’s a tough, exhausting story that could easily settle into melodrama or sentimentalism — but it never does. The community inside Casey House is dysfunctional in its own, emotionally wrought way, but there’s humour, too, lots of it. There’s Vera (Sophia Walker), the competent nurse outlined in sharp edges and firm boundaries, and Marjorie (Linda Kash), a volunteer whose cheerfulness often clashes with the ugly realities of palliative care. Then there’s Andre (Davinder Malhi), Thomas’ much younger roommate, who swims in his sweaters and spends his days haunted by the past.
Eventually, we meet Thomas’ sister Pauline (Laura Condlln), who’s abrasive and neurotic and a little too comfortable hurling therapy-speak at the people she’s hurt — but she’s hurting too, we learn, when Thomas finally agrees to speak with her after a terrible cold war of estrangement.
Casey and Diana masterfully binds together small subplots to give the audience a sense of the community behind the headlines — the funny digs at obnoxious nurses, the frightening episodes of “sundowning,” the candles lit in memory of residents who die. Princess Diana, while played by Pellerin with total respect and compassion for the real person, isn’t a central character in this play — she’s more of a motif, a physical embodiment of the things Thomas wants but can’t have, a ghost to shepherd other ghosts. Green wisely avoids breathing false life into Princess Di, and expends that energy elsewhere, giving us tantalizing glimpses into Thomas’ youth, Andre’s family, Marjorie’s grief.
Sean Arbuckle’s Thomas deserves bigger stages — it’s a performance destined for history books, bringing to life all of Thomas’ rage, and love, and rot, and hope. One of Thomas’ monologues might as well be this generation’s “to be or not to be,” given its poignant meditations on life, death, and the frightening in-between. There’s much we don’t know about Thomas, but in Arbuckle’s performance it doesn’t matter: the character seeps all the way down to his bones.
Kash as Marjorie has a difficult job in keeping a flighty character grounded in the never-ending, sky-high stakes of Casey House. She achieves that and more, squeezing out heartache time and again with endearing poise. Vera’s a tough nut to crack, but Walker’s up to the task, and a monologue in the play’s second act brings to light all of her complexities and sorrows. Malhi’s Andre fills in the gaps left by Green’s at times ambiguous playwriting, pushing a rich inner life to the surface.
It’s Condlln’s Pauline who perhaps enjoys the most linear of emotional journeys in Casey and Diana, a grieving sister who doesn’t yet seem to understand the persistence and inevitability of AIDS. As the play evolves and matures, so does she, and Condlln’s performance is note-perfect, capturing every layer of a woman doomed to be an only child once more.
Joshua Quinlan’s set, and even more so his scrumptious costumes, even further suggest the world of Casey House, a universe of pajamas and quilts — and Princess Di’s suits and gowns are spot-on, too. Debashis Sinha’s music and sound design takes that work even further, suggesting not only the outer skin of these dying men but their inner psyches, too. Louise Guinand’s lighting design tops off the whole visual affair, never overshadowing the artistic genius of the people holding the pen and acting their hearts out.
All this brilliance is tied together in a pristine white bow by Kushnir, whose directorial prowess cannot be overstated. Without spoilers, the play’s final image provoked a chorus of audience sniffles on opening night, complementing Green’s writing and securing Casey and Diana as a crown jewel of the Stratford Festival. There’s no doubt in my mind that this play will come back in some capacity for Toronto audiences and beyond — but you’re doing yourself a disservice if you miss this world premiere in all its Kleenex-demanding glory.
Casey and Diana runs at the Stratford Festival until June 17. Tickets are available here.
Intermission reviews are independent and unrelated to Intermission’s partnered content. Learn more about Intermission’s partnership model here.
Aisling Murphy
Aisling is Intermission's senior editor and an award-winning arts journalist with bylines including the New York Times, Toronto Star, Globe & Mail, CBC Arts, and Maclean's. She likes British playwright Sarah Kane, most songs by Taylor Swift, and her cats, Fig and June. She was a 2024 fellow at the National Critics Institute in Waterford, CT.
LEARN MORE
iPhoto caption: Photo by Roya DelSol.
REVIEW: Tarragon’s Craze lacks focus — that’s what makes it fun
A frenzied test of endurance, Craze whips along like a social media feed on steroids, sprinting from image to image with wild, masculine bravado.
iPhoto caption: Photo by Henry Chan.
REVIEW: Erased at TPM sends its greetings from a precarious future
It’s in the moments of poignant ambiguity that Open Heart Surgery Theatre and Theatre Passe Muraille’s Erased really succeeds in firing up the audience’s imaginations, inviting us to try envisioning a better future.
iPhoto caption: Photo by Dahlia Katz.
REVIEW: Baram and Snieckus’ Big Stuff uses improv to explore the materiality of grief
The couple’s Second City-tested comic repartee keeps the show moving with delicious lightness.
iPhoto caption: The Bidding War production still by Dahlia Katz.
REVIEW: The Bidding War is a Lear-worthy extravaganza of housing hell
Ultimately, Albert’s play isn’t just about the house; it’s about a sort of cosmic fairness that has never existed, and how we might feel justified in tipping the scales in our favour after seeing the unscrupulous get rewarded again and again.
iPhoto caption: Photo by Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman.
REVIEW: Moulin Rouge! revels in glitz despite a thin emotional core
While Moulin Rouge! remains a fun romp, I wish the musical had embraced emotional truth as eagerly as it did romantic spectacle.
iPhoto caption: Production still courtesy of The Bee's Knees.
REVIEW: The Bee’s Knees falls short of its timely premise
The Bee’s Knees might evolve into a stronger project down the line, but at present, the play and production feel swept away by the spangled allure of the 1920s setting.
iPhoto caption: Production still courtesy of The Bee's Knees.
REVIEW: The Bee’s Knees falls short of its timely premise
The Bee’s Knees might evolve into a stronger project down the line, but at present, the play and production feel swept away by the spangled allure of the 1920s setting.
iPhoto caption: J. Kelly Nestruck headshot courtesy of The Globe and Mail.
An exit interview with Globe and Mail theatre critic J. Kelly Nestruck
J. Kelly Nestruck has left the building. (Or at least the aisle seat.)
iPhoto caption: Photo of Annemieke Wade courtesy of TAPA.
TAPA appoints Annemieke Wade as new executive director
Wade steps into the position with an extensive background in theatre, with past roles including executive director of Roseneath Theatre and Theatre Direct and company manager of Tarragon Theatre.
iPhoto caption: Beowulf in Afghanistan graphic courtesy of GCTC.
Beowulf in Afghanistan to make world premiere at GCTC
As part of its 50th anniversary season, Ottawa’s Great Canadian Theatre Company will program the world premiere of Laurie Fyffe’s Beowulf in Afghanistan, in a production directed by Company of Fools artistic director Kate Smith.
iPhoto caption: My Name Is Lucy Barton production still by Dahlia Katz.
REVIEW: Maev Beaty sparkles at the centre of a sparse My Name Is Lucy Barton
In Rona Munro’s adaptation, My Name Is Lucy Barton loses some bite; it’s debatable how well the idea works as a piece of theatre. That said, Beaty gleams in a rousing solo performance that showcases her range and emotional depth.
iPhoto caption: Interior Design production still by Jae Yang.
REVIEW: Interior Design sparkles with zillennial wit
Interior Design watches its Peloton-using, social media-obsessed heroines from an empathetic vantage point, holding space for these women and their problems.
Comments