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written and directed by Djanet Sears

Mirvish Productions, Harbourfront Centre Theatre, Toronto

October 28, 2003-March 21, 2004

Djanet Sears's Adventures is a triumph for everyone involved.  It's a big play about big issues and reaches a powerfully emotional conclusion all the more uplifting for being so hard won.         

After three years Rainey (Karen Robinson in a luminous performance) is still mourning the death of her child.  Her grief is ruining her life.  She suffers from pica (the desire to eat earth and ashes), she has stopped practicing medicine, she has lost her faith and she asks for a divorce from her estranged preacher husband Michael (sympathetically portrayed by David Collins).  The event she fears is the immanent death of her own father Abednigo (Walter Borden in a superb performance of great depth and humanity).  He, in contrast, has prepared himself to welcome death and plans to live fully until the moment arrives, including organizing a seniors' group that "liberates" black jockey statues and other symbols of oppression.

Rainey's distress and Abednigo's vigilante activities are the work's tragic and comic strands.  Entwining both is a third non-verbal element.  Inspired by traditional African drama, Sears employs a chorus of 15 singer-dancers of "Ancestors".  Their exquisite a capella songs and movement in Vivine Scarlett's sinuous choreography create transitions between scenes and represent an all-pervading presence Abenigo longs to join and Rainey must come to accept.  When the town council decides to change the name of Negro Creek Road, Abednigo protests.  The name commemorates the black militia who fought the U.S. in the War of 1812.  The chorus, who metamorphoses into trees or African artefacts also becomes Negro Creek itself, Abednigo's heaven.

Astrid Janson's design and Paul Mathiesen's lighting make the stage and actors glow in earthen colours, while Sears' direction finds power in simplicity.  For a few hours the joy and beauty that pervade the show make the theatre another heaven.

©Christopher Hoile

Note: A version of this review appeared in Eye Weekly 2003-11-13.

Photo: Cast of The Adventures of a Black Girl .... ©2003 Mirvish Productions.