Stage Door News
Stage Door News
September 20, 2013 — For the first time in 50 years, The Glass Cage by famed British playwright J.B. Priestley is coming home the city that inspired its creation. The play, mounted by Toronto theatre company Snowdrop Productions, will run Oct. 4, 5, 6, 10, 11 and 12 at the Alumnae Theatre Studio Space (70 Berkeley Street, Toronto)
In the 1950’s, while visiting Toronto, renowned British playwright J.B. Priestley met three local actor siblings, Barbara Chilcott, Murray Davis and Donald Davis, and decided to write a play specifically for them. It would be the last original play that he would write in his lengthy career.
The Glass Cage debuted in London in 1957, before being performed in Canada. Set in 1906 Toronto, The Glass Cage is a family drama with a larger world view. In the intimacy of the living room of the wealthy entrepreneurial McBane family, Priestley explores the issues of hypocrisy, racism, class
relations, guilt and vengeance. Controversial for its themes of racism and sexuality, the play was left out of the anthology of Priestley’s work that was published following his death, and as a result the play was largely forgotten by contemporary audiences.
This long overdue remount of The Glass Cage is directed by Nicole Bazuin, whose multidisciplinary artistic resume spans the worlds of film, theatre and visual arts. A founding member of the Madeleine Collective, Nicole is an accomplished and talented multimedia artist whose work has been featured in Nuit Blanche and Luminato. Producer Sarah White is a Torontobased actor whose work has spanned the worlds of film, television, theatre and voice. The play features a host of established and emerging talent, including Peter Higginson, known to many for his performance in King Lear at Hart House and JeanPaul Bevilacqua known for his work on the MTV show 1 Girl 5 Gays.
The original production of The Glass Cage was a platform for Canadian artists to show their talents on the world stage, and this remount has amassed an impressive crew of young emerging theatre artists, giving them the platform to apply their talents to a play that revives a lost piece of Canadian history.
2013-09-20
Toronto: Snowdrop Productions mounts a rare revival of J.B. Priestley's Toronto-set play "The Glass Cage"