The Cultch gets its 50th anniversary season off to a bang, welcoming the award-winning Fairview to the Historic Theatre stage. Running until October 8th, the thought-provoking play by Jackie Sibblies Drury is theatre at its best; entertaining, funny, dramatic, introspective, stimulating, and perhaps a little bit uncomfortable.
Co-presented by The Search Party (Vancouver) and b Current Performing Arts (Toronto), Fairview is tightly co-directed by The Search Party founder & Artistic Director Mindy Parfitt and Toronto-based Ghanaian-Canadian actor-director Kwaku Okyere.
Fairview initially presents itself as an homage to the typical American-TV sitcom. With Amir Ofek’s set design echoing the Brady Bunch and its timeless mid-century feel, we are lulled into enjoying this African-American middle-class family comedy; Bev (played by Angela Moore), family’s core, is preparing a family dinner for her (off-stage) mother’s birthday, her loving husband Dayton (Christopher Bautista) helps – to the best of his ability – with preparations. Jasmine (Miranda Edwards), Bev’s sassy, flashy sister shows up for some sibling tropes. Then Bev and Dayton’s daughter, Keisha (Yasmin D’Oshun) arrives home enlisting her Aunt to help tell her mother she wants to take a gap year – creating drama between the siblings.
Whilst their drama creates opportunities for sassy one-liners and come-backs, Moore and Edward display a true-to-life recreation of sisterly bonds, anchoring the show with a familial realism. As the family shares and prepares for the dinner, Keisha, and the audience, seem on edge like something is lurking beneath the ‘sitcom’ facade, but the secret isn’t quite what you think. At the dramatic climax before the sitcom would air a commercial break, the action halts then rewinds and we begin the second act watching the same family scenes we just witnessed occur all over again, but this time through a different gaze. Then again, in the third act audience members are jolted into another point of view, which must be witnessed first hand, without spoilers, to get the full effect and impact of Jackie Sibblies Drury’s smart climax.
Each step of Fairview invites the audience to face complex and sometimes uncomfortable truths about their own assumptions of race. Watching with the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation top-of-mind may also stimulate audiences to listen and learn more about their own and other’s stories. The producers of Fairview have also curated a selection of educational resources for those who wish to study more about the production and subject matter.
Fairview gets The Cultch’s 50th Anniversary season off to a brilliant start. Recommended for mature audiences, Fairview runs 90 minutes with no intermission, at The Cultch Historic Theatre, 1895 Venables Street, until October 8, 2023. Visit thecultch.com/event/fairview for more information, show times and tickets.