The Children’s Teeth – Nassau Guardian Article
Philip on Jan 21 2008 at 4:51 pm | Filed under: General Theatre, Reviews
The Nassau Guardian
arts and culture
Saturday, January 19, 2008
The Children’s Teeth bites into social issues
Bethel’s new play officially opens Winston Saunders Repertory Season
By Thea Rutherford
Guardian National Correspondent
thea@nasguard.com
What makes Dr. Nicolette Bethel’s new play The Children’s Teeth so powerful is the fact that the household of characters struggling to sew up the old wounds of their lives could be your neighbors.
The meddlesome mother who can’t mask her concern for her daughter, the middle-aged daughter turned widow who tries to be a dutiful wife long after her husband’s death, the children who relate to their father’s daughter in different ways and the “outside” daughter who never quite fit in, all try to survive under one sagging roof. The house they live in crumbling as the already shaky family crumbles within it.
Throw in the high strung nephew whose connection to the family further complicated by the specter of a relationship gone sour and a developer who wants to buy the dilapidated house the father built with his own hands, and you add to a story that already churns with an undertow of complexities that linger with the audience long after the final curtain call.
As the family grapples with the reality of the father’s death and the patchwork of confusion left in his wake, he haunts the halls of the house he left for them, chiding them, watching over them and counseling one unexpected member of his family to be the savior of them all.
Watching the play is like looking over the fence into the neighbors’ yard only to discover that you share similar problems. The pretty lies, the things left unsaid that hold so many households together, become ugly when there’s no one around to maintain the myths and nurse the unspoken divisions.
The play’s explosive second act becomes the centripetal force pulling the errant wills of all of the characters together in unforeseen tragedy. Undoubtedly thought provoking and frequently funny, The Children’s Teeth embraces issues of inheritance, Haitian immigration and infidelity that are embedded in the society.
The eight-member cast play began as a short story written for a creative writing class in university, the playwright confessed after Thursday night’s gala opening at the Dundas Centre for the Performing Arts. “It’s been through a lot of different formats,” said Dr. Bethel. The play has been a work in progress for 16 years.
On Thursday, it officially opened the new Winston Saunders Repertory Season “in honor of the late playwright and cultural icon” and marked what is hoped to be a sustained revival of the country’s enervated performing arts scene. The new season is the first since 1999. Saunders’ widow Dr. Gail Saunders attended the event.
Bethel eventually worked the short story into the play, named after the Biblical verse of Ezekiel 18:2, but stalled on the first act. “I didn’t know where I was going, I didn’t know what was happening . . . I don’t even remember how it all came together. I just had this family in mind and I had this ghost, and I had a story but I didn’t have a theme.”
Bethel continued work on the play while discussing it with her husband and the play’s director Philip Burrows. “In the last six or seven years I figured out what was going to happen in the second act,” she said.
After extensive re-working and workshopping, the play, produced by Ringplay Productions was ready for the theater. The cast consists of both theater veterans and newcomers whose sincere performances blend seamlessly on stage. Burrows was pleased with the outcome.
“I think it went pretty well,” he said. “It’ll vary each night because each night it’ll be different levels of energy here and there but I thought they were pretty strong tonight, and I think they’ll continue to get even better and just move forward.”
The Children’s Teeth is set for a 13-night run (corrected, an 8 night run) at the Dundas. It is the first of a list of productions planned by Track Road Theatre, Scribes Ltd., Thoughtkatcher Enterprises and Ringplay Productions to fill the new repertory season.
